“We See India As A Hub For DuPont’s Global Sourcing”

Font Size

Print

Feedback

Email

Discuss

: Pankaj H Shah, regional leader India and Pakistan and President DuPont, South Asia, has his hands full. With an overall responsibility for the company’s operations in India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal, he is travelling extensively to these countries giving specific attention to new and existing businesses.

In his 20 years with DuPont, he has held senior positions in areas like finance, product management, corporate planning, purchasing and business management. Holding a masters degree in chemical engineering and an MBA, Mr Shah was earlier managing director of DuPont Performance Coatings. In an exclusive interview with Sangeeta Singh of FE he talks about DuPont’s new areas of focus and its India plans.

Are you satisfied with the way DuPont is growing in India? What are your projections for the next couple of years?
Our current sales in the Indian market is $200 million and we are hoping to double it 2005-06. Till last year, Dupont was not maintaining a good growth but this year onwards we expect a 25-30 per cent growth on a year-on-year basis over the next 3-4 years and perhaps more after that. I feel we have crossed the threshold of low growth period.

What are the key areas that would drive this growth?
This will mainly come from our businesses of crop protection, seeds, engineering polymers and auto paints. We are also intensifying operations in the areas of research and knowledge management. We have also realised that brick and mortar is not a sustainable model and have decided to get into contract manufacturing.

DuPont is now getting into the area of safety, which ideally is service-based rather than product-based, and the company has big plans for this in India. Is this a de-risking strategy?
Moving from products to services. It is not a de-risking strategy. It is a well thought out growth strategy. Firstly, DuPont has almost two centuries of experience in the area of safety and secondly, we consider safety as a product which enhances value and reduces costs.