Ready for the recovery Cosmo

READY FOR THE RECOVERY

Continuing to flourish during tough times, India-based global packaging films manufacturer Cosmo Films is enjoying the results of its recent investment and remodelling programme. Emma-Jane Batey spoke to CEO Ashok Jaipuria to find out more.

Now in its 31st year, Cosmo Films has seen enough business cycles to know that strategic planning during tough times can deliver strong results when growth returns. CEO Ashok Jaipuria is clear that the company’s careful development over the past four years will continue to deliver excellent results in the coming years, thanks to a close monitoring of its active markets.

With the company dedicated to ‘quality and service’ ever since it was established in 1981, it was determined to guarantee that the promise held as true today as it did in the early days of business.

The ‘remodelling’ of Cosmo Films has largely centred on addressing the issues that Mr Jaipuria and his team had identified as being areas of possible improvement. “With employees as the biggest asset, Cosmo placed a lot of emphasis on training requirements for its employees. A successful team of motivated employees helped us develop new products and thereby making Cosmo carve a niche for its products in the market.”

He continued, “It’s never easy to admit where you could improve, but it is imperative that you take a step back and see what customers see. We realised that our customer response could be better, new products would be welcome, management could be improved and that manufacturing processes could be tightened up. We’ve worked hard to ensure that every area of the business is as strong as possible, so that when the market surfaces back we will be performing over and above the competition.”

Even more customer-focused

Customer satisfaction was, is and will always be the most important aspect of Cosmo’s business worldwide. Cosmo Films has implemented a series of more customer-focused practices, such as ensuring firm delivery times and meeting the exact needs of the customer regardless of whether they request two or three shipments in one order, for example, or various different films within one order. Mr Jaipuria added, “It’s what we call a ‘yes we can’ attitude. If we are asked a question that we have not come across before, or have a request for an order or product we do not have, we say yes and work out a way to make it happen exactly as the customer wants. We do whatever we can to help so that customers know they can always rely on Cosmo”. For our future endeavours we are focused on:

• MANAGING VOLATILITY OF RAW MATERIAL, REGIONAL SHOCKS & COMPETITIVE PRESSURES. • COST, COST & COST. • COMMITTED TO CONTINUOUSLY DEVELOP NEW PRODUCTS & REDUCE TIME TO MARKET. • EMPLOYEE GROWTH, PARTICIPATION & ENGAGEMENT.

All the above will be the driving factors to achieve our goals and mission.

The company’s three core areas of production remain packaging films, laminating films and coated films, with its state-of-the-art manufacturing units in India, Korea, the Netherlands and the USA all offering high quality products. Cosmo changed its strategy of meeting customer needs by teaming up with local channel partners in Europe – its distributors – to ensure in-time deliveries at competitive prices for the customer. Cosmo Film’s best-selling product is its range of laminating films. The new products recently introduced by Cosmo Films also reflect the company’s desire to be customer-focused

at all times. Having acquired a new company that has further enhanced its variety of thermal films, Cosmo Films has improved its product offering by expanding its range as well as upgrading its existing products.

The management changes at Cosmo Films have also played a key role in ensuring the company is perfectly poised to utilise the predicted upturn in the global economy. Mr Jaipuria pointed out, “The last two years have seen a few senior management changes as well as more internal promotions to reward employees that encompass our ‘yes we can’ attitude. I am more than happy that we are in the ideal position to deliver growth in the coming years will all these carefully executed changes in place.”

All about upgrades

“As the future beckons, we are committed to take higher market share through expansion and new investments, expanding more than 30 per cent further, thereby making us stronger in the market to compete and bring us closer towards our growth mission. Cosmo Film’s internal development includes a considerable upgrading of its IT infrastructure. With SAP for all locations and additional investment made to deliver additional online services, the company’s global sales potential has seen a surge.”

Mr Jaipuria continued, “We expect to introduce online ordering soon too, but we do not believe that this can replace the personal touch. Labour costs in India are still very affordable, so we prefer to offer direct contact with our customers and sales people to guarantee that all questions are answered in person immediately. But we will soon offer the best of both worlds, so if customers want to order on line, they can.”

With an exciting year ahead where the results of Cosmo Films’ investment are set to bear fruit, Mr Jaipuria predicts a 50 per cent increase in revenue, “Thanks to additional capacity, a boosted product offer and a management team and workforce that is dynamic and committed, and we are looking forward to 2013 and beyond. We will work hard to manage extreme volatility in the market so that we are well prepared for any other hard-to-predict changes too, as we feel confident that all aspects of Cosmo Films are ready for anything.” n