The Expert Panel

A jury panel came together on September 2, 2015, in Mumbai to deliberate upon India's fastest growing companies. For the 13th year running, the CW team stepped forward for an event that brings the construction fraternity together while awarding promising companies that made their mark in the past year. Also, an intrinsic part of the event is to recognise and honour the´CW Man of the Year´. To deliberate upon the winners in various categories of India´s largest and fastest growing companies and select the show stealer - the Man of the Year - a jury panel came together on September 2, 2015, at the Indian Merchants Chamber of Commerce in Mumbai. To begin with, G Chokkalingam, Founder & Managing Director, Equinomics Research & Advisory, made a presentation on the companies to be considered for the awards across six categories: Construction; Equipment & Allied Equipment; Cement; Steel; Paints; and Tiles, Ceramics & Sanitaryware. As per practice, a report with quantitative analysis - data sourced from published annual reports and results published by companies - was submitted to the members of the jury much earlier to allow them to assess the numbers associated with the companies in each category. Even in the case of non-listed firms, such data was sourced from the company directly by seeking their audited figures. To ensure authenticity of data during compilation, various checks and balances were put into place. The jury was also informed that the data was further audited selectively to ensure it was error-free. The presentation by Chokkalingam on the parameters of the model was a prelude to the discussion of selecting India´s fastest growing companies. This included a discussion on the definition of large, medium and small companies, and the rationale for the choice of companies along with criteria such as cut-off levels for selecting companies in various categories. Companies not considered for the awards were those with insufficient data available; or those that suffered losses in FY2015; or whose figures were derived mainly from´in-house performance´. While deliberating on the data provided in the category´Fastest Growing Construction Companies - Large´ the members debated on parameters, whether a government-owned company could be considered. The jury was of the view that it was not an even-playing field. Hence, a decision was made to rule out a government-owned company, which was more of a distribution company; it awarded contracts rather than being an executer. Similarly, companies who were major suppliers and not generating a huge share of the business from contracting activities were not considered along with companies that were discussed to be too small to sustain, showed negative profit growth, etc. That said, in the category,´Fastest Growing Construction Companies - Small´, the panel made a unanimous decision to award only one company this year. Nevertheless, this year, it was also observed that although the growth rate of companies in the´Construction Category - Large´ are more than the companies in the´Small´ category, the profitability of the small contracting companies have been better than the large contacting ones. Further, in an exceptional decision passed by the jury panel this year, since the´Construction Equipment´ category did not have sufficient number of competitors, only the category of the´Largest Construction Equipment Company´ was considered, and the category´Fastest Growing Construction Equipment Companies´ was eliminated. However, the category of´Fastest Growing Equipment Company´ in the´Allied´ category was retained. In further discussion, while the jury appreciated the consolidated data, the panel agreed that as the objective was to identify the largest and fastest growing companies, the emphasis should be on both top-line and bottom-line growth. Hence, some companies did not make it to the winning list due to a negative growth in profits. In this way, the jury members discussed the all-round performance of various companies during the period under review and´industry perceptions´ about them. Some companies which ranked higher in the model were pushed down by the jury owing to their concerns on governance. Also, as suggested by the expert panel, the largest wining company in the respective category was not considered in the ranking of the fastest growing; this opened the stage to even more winners this year. In the end, data was comprehensively scrutinised, a decision made, and the list of India´s fastest growing companies is out! (Read on to know the companies that have made it to the list of winners). Further, the discussion moved on with a presentation by the CW team listing the nominations for the´Man of the Year´. An award initiated in 2010, the aim is to recognise a man who has made remarkable achievements in the year and, through his efforts, propelled his company, organisation and the industry forward. This culminated into a debate at great length, and the final decision was made. (To read on the winner of´CW Man of the Year´, turn to page XX.) Further, in an exclusive tOte-a-tOte with Shriyal Sethumadhavan, each jury member shared their perspective on the current scenario and recommendations that the government could consider going forward (Read excerpts in quotes). This concluded yet another year of a successful jury meet, followed by a successful list of winners. Pratap Padode, Managing Director, ASAPP Media Information Group “Bids have started opening, but our focus will always be on BOT. While not much has come from the government, they should focus on bringing forward more viable projects.” - Sudhir Hoshing, Joint Managing Director, IRB Infrastructure “The best way to survive the challenging scenario is by being innovative and proactive in your strategies. The government has to focus on implementation.“ - Ashok Bharadwaj, Director-Sales & Marketing, JSW Steel “While the overall CE market is yet to take-off, the demand for road equipment is booming. Pre-qualification norms for bidding should be made more stringent so that contractors deliver quality.“ - Ramesh Palagiri, Managing Director & CEO, Wirtgen India “With the upcoming smart cities, there are a lot of smart actions around us. Probably, the government needs to think around the mobility part in a smarter way.“ - Apurba Dhar, Director Business Development, RATP Dev Trandev India “Infrastructure will eventually contribute a substantial portion of the country´s GDP, so one has to ensure that the sector comes out at the earliest available opportunity.“ - Issac George, Director Finance & CFO, GVK Power & Infrastructure “The market scenario is far from rosy and it will be a while before it comes back to normalcy. The government needs to keep a watch on what is happening around.“ - Digant Kapadia, Managing Director, BE Billimoria & Co. G Chokkalingam, Founder & Managing Director, Equinomics Research & Advisory “While the current scenario is not that encouraging, in the next one-and-a-half years, if government initiatives such as labour laws, Land Bill, GST, etc, are implemented, there will be a sea change.“ - Debasis Mitra, Senior Director, Shapoorji Pallonji “There are building projects coming up, which was not the case two years back. But, multiplicity of approvals and taxation is what is still killing the industry.“ - Sandeep Mittal, Managing Director, Anutone Acoustics Ltd “We have seen the era of good PPPs and bad PPPs happening, good infrastructure happening and then the infrastructure getting stuck due to bad loans, etc. People have learnt from their mistakes. The government is pushing things forward.“ - Ajay Saxena, PPP Expert-Maharashtra, Asian Development Bank “There are a lot of positive announcements made by the government in terms of policy. The game plan now is in terms of execution.“ - R Ramakrishnan, Vice Chairman, Joint Managing Director and Group CEO, Polycab Wires