General Motors, popular as GM is among one of the reputed brands of automobile manufacturers. It is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan which had made its way to India in 1996. It had two manufacturing plants in India, located in Halol and Talegaon. Lately, it had shut down its Halol plant owing to non-profitable operations.
It had an unfortunate exit at the time when India, rather Gujarat is emerging as an auto-hub, with big brands keenly awaiting their turn to start a plant to attract more customers. Even though it exited, it left a valuable lesson for the C.E.Os across the world thinking about their start-up in India, Business expansion. Below are the points which need to be taken care of for a successful business growth in India:
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Consistency in Leadership: Leadership plays a major role in the success or ruin of any business organization. Best the leader, successful the organization, bad the leader, unsuccessful the organization. The same holds true for G.M. General Motors lacked the consistency in leadership. The short tenure of leaders or various leaders overs short period of time leads to one of the reasons for its closure. India, being a complex country in terms of diversity and culture, the short tenure could not suffice the leaders to understand the people, market and the strategy of the competitors.
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Building a competitive strategy for Indian Market: As said earlier, the Indian market is diverse and unique with diversity in people’s culture, religion, choices, etc. All these factors play a major role in determining the success of a product or product demand. Companies need to focus on this very aspect while designing a product for India. For Instance, Hyundai is doing a great business in India by developing cars at an economical cost and in accordance with the likes of the people.
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Local Autonomy and Customization: Customization and autonomy are of utmost importance when we talk about the Indian market. It’s not necessary that a product launched and being used in U.S. or Europe or any other part of the country would make its way to India successfully and if made way, would sustain for long. Hence, the products need to be customized to suit the needs of the people. Also, local autonomy is significant to cope up with the requirements of the Indian market. If provided a local autonomy, it would help to better design the products, customize them depending upon the customer needs.
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Patience and Persistence make way ahead: Patience and persistence is the key to business success. It should also be taken into consideration that coming from a foreign background and opening up a business in India is not easy. It requires a lot of determination and fortitude to make the way into the market, rather minds of the people successfully. Showing up their determination have thus paved the way forward for other multinational organizations in India.
Though G.M. might have closed a unit in India, that doesn’t mean they cannot be an entrant again with more power to gain the supremacy over and above other giant competitors. Furthermore, the above pointers can help other companies awaiting to start their business rein in India.
Compiled by Faber Ramya Pillai as per excerpts from H.B.R. For original article click here
