DIGC webinar educates businesses adapt to new normal

In view of the current economic situation prevailing in the country, DIGC organised a webinar, which shed light on reimagining current business models to bounce back effectively from the Covid-19 turmoil.

Since its first webinar on 29 May 2020 on RBI and FM schemes, this was DIGC's fourth such webinar to educate the industry to overcome the current economic crisis.

"Post Unlock 1.0, with the changed economic scenario, it has become imperative for businesses to revamp their current business model to adapt to the current conditions," Radha Ramesh of Dhote Offset Technokrafts said, citing the reboot-restart-resurge model adopted by many businesses to resume operations. "The need of the hour is how to adapt to the 'new normal' and keep the business afloat."

"A lot of factors will need to be taken into consideration while reimagining business. Factors such as the characteristics of the industry now in relation to the rising costs, changing technology, excess capacity, increase in digitisation and so on," she added. "Then there are the external factors such as the corporate debt crisis, increase in unemployment, and high cost of finance to be considered."

Another moot point highlighted during the discussion was the fallout of Covid-19 resulting in disruption of demand and supply, changed habits of consumers, and importance of health and hygiene.

The webinar was moderated by CA Uday Dhote, director at DIGC. The panellists included Yogesh Kamath and Sivasubramanian (Siva) of Fundviser, and Radha Ramesh and Tushar Dhote of Dhote Offset Technokrafts.

According to DIGC, many industry stalwarts attended the webinar. It also saw attendees from across India with many of them being business owners, promoters, HR functionaries and teaching staff.

As Kamath divulged information about balancing finances, approach to collections, impact of high power and interest affecting exports, Siva dwelled on strategies in the face of reduced demand and means to resurge. He also elucidated on which business model – customer centric or product centric –is best fit for a given scenario.

Kamath and Siva also revealed the possibilities of mergers, amalgamations, buyouts becoming more prevalent in the near future. Ramesh touched upon the topic of management of human resources in the future, hygiene factors playing a crucial role in availability of manpower, rising unemployment, and the importance of reskilling and up-skilling the workforce.

Dhote, however, discussed ways to neutralise excess capacity, need for innovative products, and why businessmen should still attend exhibitions such as Drupa.

One of the attendees of the session was Pranav Parikh of TechNova. "The format of the webinar worked very well. The friendly and warm style of communicating and educating by Uday Dhote was excellent," he said.

Meanwhile, Padmakar Ojale said the webinar was very informative and interesting. "Doing justice to a large and diversified audience is very difficult but you (DIGC) managed to do so." Faheem Agboatwala also described the webinar as a "lovely session".

"All in all the webinar showcased the never-say-die spirit of the industry," DIGC concluded.