Chalking out an aggressive expansion strategy in the petroleum retail segment, Mukesh Ambani-run Reliance Industries on Thursday said it will more than double the number of fuel stations across the country by the middle of next year.
On the heels of Reliance Industries foraying into the lucrative retail business, Birla Group too contemplates rolling out its organised retail initiative.
Protests following the arrest of Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray on Tuesday crippled retail businesses in and around Mumbai, the commercial capital of the country
Amendments to the Agriculture Produce Market Committees Act have opened floodgates for private companies and online commodity exchange in Gujarat.
Anil Ambani Group's Reliance Money today signed an agreement with Tata group's IT arm CMC Ltd for setting up financial retail kiosks, besides training students of the software solutions provider in finance.
As fuel prices surged in September, the government's decision to ask companies to cut price by Rs1 each on a litre of petrol and diesel came as a dampner for private players.
India's rank was further amplified by the collapse of the South American and Russian economies.
Coca-Cola and PepsiCo have already announced plans to enter the milk-based beverages segment in the country. Reliance Retail, which has entered the diary segment with Dairy Pure, its milk brand, may also expand into niche categories. Industry observers believe that Bharti Retail may also be working its way towards marking an entry into the dairy space.
The reason for Trent's success is rooted in its slow and steady approach to expansion. Unlike others, Trent, led by Noel Tata, ensured that each store was profitable before it went on to the next, says Raghavendra Kamath.
Despite a massive underperformance at the bourses since the last six months, analysts are turning optimistic on Reliance Industries (RIL). Those at Jefferies, for instance, say that the company is a proxy play for India's consumption growth story. The key catalysts for the stock, according to a Jeffries note, include faster-than-expected market share gain in retail, oil-to-chemicals (O2C) stake sale, recovery in gross refining margins (GRM), potential public listing of Jio and even a possible banking licence going ahead. That apart, analysts feel any tariff hike in Reliance Jio (RJio) - its telecom venture - will also aid performance. With balance sheet adequately de-levered, proceeds from a strategic stake sale in the O2C business will create a sizeable war chest for the company, analysts say.
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani has set targets for his three kids whom he has identified for takeover of telecom, retail and new energy business. Speaking at his father Dhirubhai's anniversary, celebrated as Reliance Family Day, he said the oil-to-telecom-to-retail conglomerate Reliance industries Ltd has embarked on a journey of comprehensive self-transformation. "The end of 2022 is when Reliance will have crossed the half-way mark of its Golden Decade.
About 50,000 to 100,000 people - representing associations of farmers, traders, hawkers, and even chemists from all over India - will converge on Mumbai's Azad Maidan to demand that big corporations quit the retail business.
Mukesh Ambani believes that his dream project of Reliance Retail will not suffer because of political controversy and protests. Speaking exclusively to NDTV, after being awarded the 'NDTV Business Leader of the Year', Ambani said the resistance was much less than he had planned for.
Global retail behemoths seem to have read the signals right.
With the first quarter earnings season coming to an end, the domestic equity markets would be driven by global trends and trading activity of foreign investors this week, analysts said. The movement of global oil benchmark Brent crude and the rupee against the dollar would also drive trends in the market. "Macroeconomic indicators, trends in global stock markets and FII activities will be pivotal in shaping market trends in the coming days," Pravesh Gour, senior technical analyst at Swastika Investmart Ltd, said.
World Gold Council to double investment in India, views organised retail as a boon to industry
They were shut when PSUs were selling heavily subsidised fuel; will reopen now, buoyed by diesel decontrol
Companies seeking to tie up with nationwide pharmacy chain.
The country's fruits and vegetables retail segment has caught up the fancy of international companies even as domestic companies such as Bharti and the Tatas tie up with global firms for supply of farm produce.
Large retail chains like Reliance Fresh, Subhiksha and Spencer's have not been able to do sourcing of their entire farm products directly from the farmers.
Reliance Industries Ltd was the biggest wealth creator during the five-year period from 2018 to 2023 while Adani Enterprises Ltd was the top all-round wealth creator, according to a study by Motilal Oswal Financial Services. The study, based on stock market performance of companies, said for the fifth time in succession, Reliance emerged as the largest wealth creator, adding Rs 9,63,800 crore wealth over 2018-23. It was followed by Tata Consultancy Services (Rs 6,77,400 crore wealth addition), ICICI Bank (Rs 4,15,500 crore), Infosys (Rs 3,61,800 crore) and Bharti Airtel (Rs 2,80,800 crore).
At present, India has 56,999 fuel outlets. Of those, only 6,276 are owned by private companies
Eight companies including Reliance Gas Ltd, GAIL Gas and the joint venture of Indian Oil and Adani Energy have bid for the rights to retail CNG in seven cities.
Corporate retailing of fruits and vegetables - once a domain of street side vendors - seems to be facing more troubles.
Nestle, State Bank of India, Power Grid, Tata Steel, Larsen & Toubro and Mahindra & Mahindra were the other major gainers. In contrast, Tech Mahindra, Axis Bank and Reliance Industries were the laggards.
Reliance Industries Ltd on Thursday launched its fourth highway hospitality 'dhaba' in Uttar Pradesh at a company petroleum retail outlet in Kamlapur on the Lucknow-Sitapur highway.
Efficient use of data and a great sense of timing are two things that stand out in the Sebi whole-time member's order in the matter of Reliance Petroleum
Pointing to the 'dangers' in the opening up of retail sector to multi-nationals and big Indian companies, traders in Kerala are gearing up to launch an agitation, if necessary an 'armed struggle,' to prevent their entry.
A cell of traders in the BJP Sangatham registered protest on Monday against the entry of big companies in retail in general and Reliance Fresh in particular.
As part of this strategy, the e-commerce major has launched a programme to manage the entire business-to-business inventory supply and management for kirana stores in three cities in Karnataka.
Tata group firm Trent Ltd on Friday said Anil Ambani-promoted Reliance Capital has bought 8.68 per cent stake in it for Rs 21.2 crore (Rs 212 million), marking ADA Group's entry into the retail sector.
Private equity investments into domestic companies fell sharply year-on-year by 42 per cent to $23.3 billion in 2022, which is the lowest since 2019, when it was $15.8 billion, according to an industry report. The numbers reflect the overall funding winter that the startup space in particular, and the overall foreign investments in general have been witnessing since the Ukraine war began last February. Private equity investment inflows into the country fell by a sharp 42 per cent in 2022 from last year to $23.3 billion -- the lowest annual inflows since 2019 when it was a low $15.8 billion, but still relatively elevated compared to historical levels, said Elaine Tan, a senior analyst at Refinitiv, the LSEG business arm that provides financial markets data and insights.
It, however, remains to be seen how much money Softbank actually puts in, what the implied equity valuation is and if the e-commerce venture is included in the Jio entity.
Debt-saddled telecom operator Vodafone Idea Ltd's Rs 18,000 crore follow-on offering (FPO) opened to a modest response on Thursday with just 26 per cent of shares on offer being sought by investors. Of the 1,260 crore shares on offer, 331.24 crore was subscribed on Thursday, according to information on the BSE. Qualified institutional buyers picked up 61 per cent of their 360 crore shares reserved for them while non-institutional investors sought 28 per cent out of 270 crore shares earmarked for them.
