Wipro Lighting and Furniture Division, part of the Rs 8,000-crore diversified Wipro group, is betting big on the domestic market. Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting Group vice-president & business head-commercial lighting & furniture business, Parag Kulkarni tells FE?s S Saroj Kumar about the opportunities in emerging areas such as pharma lighting, retail lighting, presence detection system and managed lighting systems. He adds that increasing adoption of carbon accounting and disclosure standards by corporate houses would fuel demand for power-efficient low emission lighting set up in the premises.
How big is the domestic market for lighting solutions business?
The domestic lighting solutions business stands at Rs 1,300 crore spread across various engineering procurement contracts (EPC) in projects such as airports, metro rail, highways and high-mast lighting solutions developed to the needs of various urban beautification projects. The demand is seen in PSU-related projects followed by government and private sector.
How will carbon accounting and disclosure standards aid lighting business?
With increasing awareness to move towards greener living environment enclaves, Wipro is giving priority to energy efficient lighting products. Out of the 25 platinum-rated green buildings, our company is acclaimed to be part of 15 such buildings having low emission light fixtures.
What about your innovation-led design and pharma lighting business?
As a part of our research initiatives, we have struck research MoUs with education giants including National Institute of Design (NID), Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, IIT Powai. MoUs envisage close co-ordination between in-house research department and academic institutions. Some of the research areas include products for model format retail store and indoor lighting. The pharma lighting business is a niche segment. Wipro, perhaps, is the first company in India to develop clean room applications in pharma lighting segment that meet the US Federal Drug Administration standards.
How is your new product portofolio in the furniture business doing?
We cater to the premium and super premium B-2-B market suiting furniture needs of modern office spaces in IT, ITeS, KPO and other back office service industries. We are aiming to maintain a dynamic product portfolio with launch of ‘newbie’ products in the market. The recent launch of ergonomic chair ‘ICAN’ targetting the service industry and tech workers is one such case in point. We will be rolling out some one lakh chairs designed to cosy comfort of modern office spaces.
How important is the furniture business to the parent group?
Furniture business is vital to the overall growth of Wipro group. As of now, around 28% of the topline is from the furniture segment. The parent company derives about Rs 1,400 crore revenue from the seating and furniture business. The growth is said to be ticking in two major sectors—banking financial services and telecom services industry.