An IT strategy to embrace digital disruption in the manufacturing business and streamline Ramalingam Foods' international development

Assignment Taken

DEPARTMENT OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

Case Understanding

A successful fast-food restaurant Ramalingam Foods, established in Bombay, 1965 by Mr. Ramalingam Venkatesh was famous for authentic south Indian fresh cooked food and filter coffee. During 1975, India went to some political issues and all company had to follow some rules , even Ramalingam had to sale his food items at minimum price. After considering emergency time, Ramalingam foods started selling idli/dosa batter for better customer experience. His son Mr vijay Ramalingam was come up with new business idea. He wanted to expand his business terriotory but the problem was that the batter has a minimum shelf life. He decided to sell batter as powder, which consumable and people can enjoy the instant cooking. People liked this Instant mix and after buying domestically they were selling this instant batter in foreign countries as well. Ramalingam food’s operating revenue is Rs.152 Crore, and it’s EBITDA has increase by 3.16%. With this Ramalingam want to expand his business internationally, but he didn’t have permission & License, and not even enough capital. They hired our company for better suggestion and strategy. For international expansion, especially in the era of digital innovations and disruptions across the industry, there is a need of extremely sophisticated, latest, very effective IT plan. We have tried to incorporate all the technologies ranging from really basic ones to advanced

BCS Solution Summary

Ramalingam Foods (Tagline: Making Homemade Chefs) approached Global Business Consultancy (GBC) for guidance on worldwide expansion. Since 1965, the company has had a ready-to-cook product range that includes dosa-idli quick mix powder, dhokla, Gulab jamun mix, and filter coffee. GBC has planned to grow in Middle-East Asia, specifically in Oman, Saudi Arabia and UAE, where there is a large Indian community. From there, the corporation would expand greenfield in Malaysia before exporting to Singapore (by road) and Indonesia (via waterways). Ramalingam Foods has been recommended by GBC to debut with current goods in these three countries this year, with product range expansion anticipated over the next two years. Ramalingam Foods will prioritise R&D for product innovation (both authentic Indian and Indian-themed international dishes), marketing for expanding reach and brand building, world-class IT infrastructure for dealing with digital disruption, and employee-friendly, productive HR policies. To offer Ramalingam Foods with dependable and long-term technical services and creative solutions that provide value to the company and its stakeholders while also improving business processes and performance across all departments. A high-level summary of the IT department's mission, basic values, objectives, and methods for achieving its objectives.  Choose flexible collaboration tools  Stay in control ofdata.  Get basic and fundamental necessities like mobile, computers  Use of Communication Platform for online meetings with customer overseas and own employees overseas  Simplify scheduling &Localized Checkout Process

Solution

Creating own Website:

In today’s world especially after the pandemic, the world has inclined towards digital world. Hence a website becomes one of the most necessary things. A business website will be Ramalingam Food’s online company address. It's where you can identify and contact potential consumers, clients, and associates. In comparison to generic Google addresses, an e-mail from a corporation with its own domain is more reliable and trustworthy. Websites provide firms with a distinct online brand. According to a poll conducted by the Better Business Bureau, 84 percent of consumers will trust a company based on online evaluations, which can only be done if they visit the firm's website.

Advantages of having own website:.

• Wider audience reach – The website would be available on the internet, hence all over the world and all the time. This would lead to a lot of people getting to know about the company and its products
• Brand Recognition – Ramalingam might be famous in India but in the Middle East they are relatively new. A website would help them create an image in the customer’s mind and eventually lead to brand awareness, visibility and recognition.
• Own offers – We will have to power of how we want to market our products on the website. We can provide various offers or incentives restricted to only our website. This will increase the reach and the number of visits on our website.
• Analysing customer behaviour – We can get insightful data from the behavior of the cutomers that visit our site. Analysis of such data will be helpful in serving the customers in a better manner

 

Some features the Website would possess:

• The website should accommodate content transcreation. Content transcreation is a term used in the field of translation studies to describe the process of translating a message from one language to another while keeping the communication's intent, style, tone, and context intact.
• It should have the option of buying online
• It can have a "ChatBot" to chat with on all pages, allowing customers to immediately ask their basic questions (if any).
• Customer reviews and comments will be available on the site, and customers will be able to provide their feedbacks, register complains if they have any and can give suggestions on the website as well

 

 

Collaborating with Online food ordering grocery stores:

As it would take our website to get known in the market, in the initial stages what would help us is collaborating with other online grocery stores which are already famous, and people order from there. Also, there will be scenarios that the customers need to buy many other things along with our mixes. In situations like these, people would prefer buying from grocery stores where multiple items are available at a single place.

Data should be stored remotely using cloud:

Since our headquarters is in India and we are expanding in a foreign land, there would be time lag. Thus storing data remotely would not only ensure the security of our data but also allow people to access it remotely from anywhere in the world at anytime. Many facilities like google drive and Microsoft OneDrive are available for the purpose.

Advertising using Machine Learning:

In today’s world, where everything is automated, marketing and advertisement should be done using the Advantages of Machine Learning. Indian Customers and the customers who searched for or ordered items for whom we sell the mixes.

Investing in upcoming technologies like AR/VR:

The newest trends in technology now are Augemented Reality and Virtual Reality. So, investing in such technologies makes sense. We can use them in ways like how the mixes can be prepared and the customers can be shown how to final food item would look like. This would give a better perspective and idea for the customers to buy our product

SAP- ERP Adoption:

SAP – ERP leads to a centralized system which enhances productivity, provides better inventory management, endorses quality, decreases raw material cost, effective HR management, reduce expenses and enhances profits. This would make our supply chain and the process more efficient

Appropriate communication platform:

One more important investment that the company needs to do is in an appropriate communication platform. Unlike earlier when only Skype was an option, many different platforms have come up like Zoom, Microsoft Meet, Google Meet etc.

 

Tentative Budget:

 

Project/Item	Approx. Expense(INR)
Automation of the plant in specifically in Oman, Saudi Arabia and UAE using distributed control system (DCS)	1.5 crore
DCS Maintenance	15 lac (Yearly)
SAP Module (10 users) in each country	65 lac (Yearly)
Computers (12 pieces) in each country	25 lac
Mobiles and landline phones (20 pieces) in each country	15 lac
Business Cloud cum Data Analytic Tool- 6 users	5.5 lac (Yearly)
Website (Initial Cost)	5 lac
Website Maintenance	0.7 lac (Yearly)
Microsoft 365 Business Premium	8 lac(Yearly)
Investment in a start-up focused in Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality	1 cr
Business Antivirus Subscription Fees	15 lac ((Yearly)
Skype/Zoom Subscription Fees	2 lac (Yearly)
Specialized Technology Training	15 lac (Yearly)
SAP ERP Technology	1 cr

Conclusion

It has been proved that information technology (IT) will provide a competitive edge to global businesses, allowing them to remain competitive in the worldwide market for the long term. Information technology is vital to global business because it allows organisations to have easy communication between enterprises in various countries, improved supply chain management, and successful product marketing.

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