Micromax 👊 aka "in"-Made in India(The Atmanirbhar Bharat)!

 

👊Micromax- The Comeback!👊

Since the Oct 16, 2020 the day when Mr. Rahul Sharma Co-Founder Micromax, released the humble yet heavily intrigued video the mobile industry is heading towards a major upheaval. No matter how modest the approach is portrayed, the game is not going to be that simple for 2 reasons-

 

1/ A wounded lion is more dangerous than a hungry one…

In August 2014, Micromax was biggest GSM brand in India leaving behind- Samsung, Sony, Nokia, HTC, Lenovo and Motorola. In this list the home grown brands like Lava, Karbonn, Maxx are deliberately omitted due to limited & region specific market they catered. Micromax did not stop here, and was termed tenth- largest supplier of mobile phones in the world. This was the time when even the X-Men Huge Jackman was finding solace in the clutches of Micromax!

And Diwali of 2014 happened, which brought home cheers to many, brought China in the form of a brand in scores of hands. But sadly for Micromax it brought a phase of gloom which became highly irreversible with each passing day and shrouded the fortune of this iconic brand.

This sudden puncture in the shining spinning wheel of Micromax has hurt many and the most it hurt to the founders…

 

2/ “Ne te quaesiveris extra." (Do not seek for things outside of yourself)”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance and Other Essays

India’s tryst with self-reliance is nothing new. This term unravels itself now & then and metempsychosis each time with a different nomenclature.

Dadabhai Naoroji, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Baba Ram Singh Kuka of the sikh Namdhari sect were the torch bearers who coined this thought in mind of masses & asked for total boycott of anything British. This Swadeshi Movement, got wider appeal and influence when Gandhi took this as a tool to bring down Britishers to their knees.

Post-Independence this seed of Self-reliance did not bloom to its potential glory rather had a tragic and slow death due to the improper planning at the highest level. The very objective was defeated and contrary to the original thought became a burden on Govt. finances. Since 2014 the Maverick PM Modi has tried reviving this with a new slogan & new logo- “Make in India” with little progress on the ground. But like all biggest breakthrough happen in state of exigency, his cherished dream is fructifying in Post-Galwan Scenario.

Our age old lethargic approach towards nation building has pinned us down big time and the statistics are alarming & shocking. The race to supremacy as well as the very existential of a nation hangs on control one has in Technology and more specifically the information and knowledge.

All of sudden GOI woke up to a harsh reality that China has 66% market share of Indian smartphone market. Which in simple terms means China has access to each & every action, movement, like, dislike of 66% of Indian people. The balance 34% are also not in safe heaven as their centrifugal rush towards the Chinese social media apps will call the shots here…

Thus the drive taken by PM Modi - “Vocal for Local”, “Atmanirbhar Bharat” found lot of resonance across length & breadth of Indian middle class which motivated him to take concrete steps to galvanize the complete eco system. Consequently GOI launched various sops to stimulate the economical activities- PLI (Performance Linked Incentive) is one such move which could be game changes to make India a global powerhouse in Tech manufacturing..!

Thus Came Micromax back in fray albeit after shedding some unwanted fat the failed legacy of name itself MICROMAX in the new Avatar- in..   

This is called the perfect amalgamation where “matter meeting the purpose” brings a killing outcome and gives a sense of bliss spiritually and materialistically to all parties- People, Enterprise & State.

 Micromax a brief:

Micromax Informatics is an Indian Smartphone Manufacturer and Consumer Electronics Company , which was established by a bunch of 4 young and firing entrepenurial brains ( Rahul Sharma, Rajesh Agarwal, Vikas Jain and Sumeet Arora) in 2000 as an IT software company operating in embedded device domain.It was Rahul's abetted efforts to convince his peers after 8 years of selling computers, software coursesand "fixed wireless" public phones( PCOs), to venture into mobile handset industry in 2008. 

They have many unique products to take credit for in GSM, like first phone with a month long battery backup, slimmest phone in the world, Phone with integrated Bluetooth headset dock, phone with projector and it did not stop here. The scintillating TVC is still fresh in people mind where Akshay Kumar aka Forest Gump found himself in a desolate island. He used all of his wits to use the phone for many bizzare acts like roasting the fish, as shaver, as wood cutter. He also uses the phone as an instrument to project the image of his wife Twinkle Khanna.

As things were falling in place for company, they launched consumer electronics like LED, Air conditioners, laptop, tablet also. And by end of 2014 launched Micromax brand in Russia.

With everything falling in place still they could not hold their fort for long, slowly & gradually their grip loosened and by late 2016 were completely out of competition & consideration of people.

 

What were the Mistakes?

 The journey of Micromax from the pole position to obscurity is a tale of the promise and peril of India’s booming yet hyper-competitive smartphone industry. Rapid growth and the future potential of the Indian market helped nurture a crop of local brands, led by Micromax that had outsourced their manufacturing to Chinese factories, as well as many of global brands. As Samsung a brand with deep pockets started launching affordable phones and Chinese manufacturers started entering Indian market with their own brands the GSM place started heating up & local brands found this new reality “too hot to handle”.

Few of the events and miscalculations made by the company while they were at the peak are the reason for such drastic drop:-

Cocky Model-

Micromax Retail Store

Even if they brought quiet an upheaval in GSM business, still the young founders were little conservative in their operational strategies. Customers shift to online market place was much faster than anticipated by Micromax, hence Offline General Trade was the segment in which they were invested heavily with minimal attention to Online & Organized retail. Brand was not visible, where the young value conscious customer was hunting and consequently missed the opportunity. By the time they realized this 2^nd  and refined wave of Chinese brand came crashing to wipe out Micromax completely. 

Caught napping- Dec 2015, when Reliance Jio soft launched their services & Sept 5, 2016 when it launched service for general consumers.

Reliance is infamous or famous for creating its own product category and making the impact by its sheer size & scale. CDMA mobile technology of 2002 was the burning testimony of this might. As a dominant player it was least expected that Micromax would miss the new impending technological change Jio will bring. Moment of truth came in play albeit in unpleasant way for the brand as not only it was already heavily invested in 2G, 3G phones but has substantial amount of stock in basic phones as well.

So this soon to be obsolete excess stock and tardy pace with which brand reacted in the face of  new found reality made it pay a heavy price by giving red carpet to the puckish dragons who pounced on the barren market & pounded the market with choicest of the options to customers.

Carpet bombing - In its urge to cater to the unheard market demands Micromax launched too many of the models at too fast pace. This fast roll out of models had snowball effect in overall brand positioning - First it gave little time for old models to settle down in market and make their niche, second customers kept on hold their purchases in expectation of a better & cheaper model (as changing phone yearly is still a novelty in India, imagine scenario couple of years back); Third to get the economy of scale right and keep their 2 factories occupied brand sat idle on a long and deep tail of inventory.

Careless Attitude- Modern brands were made on 2 foundations- Superior Perceptions & Superior after sales service. Micromax lagged on both ends purely because of the sluggish business model it adopted for an industry which was talking and behaving like speed of sound.

Greater dependence on the Offline General Trade made it to pay the penalty when the after sale service was left in mercy of casual approach towards customer service. Widespread jokes were circulating within consumers where brand new launches were happening faster than getting Micromax phone repaired from a service center which was roughly 11 months… Stalking-horse given like “Spare parts are indented & delivery is expected from China soon”!!

 

Comeback to Make a Mark:

The Micromax Punch

With years spent in oblivion and lot of wisdom gained in PM Modi era, founders of Micromax are ready to take another shot in the battle which no one knew better than them & I’m still very optimistic that they will pull this off successfully this time also on two very accounts –

Take the vengeance; less for self but more for the nation – As Rahul explained emphatically the logic behind chosen brand name in; “that it depicts the aspiration and resolve of India on global platform”

 Atma Nirbhar Bharat is the mantra New India is willing to believe and live by not just for self-consumption but more for a bigger purpose... That is to pass a blooming legacy for the future generations; so that they will not loathe this generation just like we do with our previous one..

Remember Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea were our contemporaries in 1947 but today look at us & them not on population but on GDP!!

OM NAMAH

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