Vizag: Growth guaranteed

Next to Hyderabad, the city which is guaranteeing RoI for investors is Vishakapatinam. From a tiny fishing village, Vizag has grown into an industrial hub. There are a number of small- and medium-scale industries operating in the city at present. The IT sector in the city is also generating a

decent amount of revenue every year. Around 60% of the IT business in Vizag caters to the education, government and SOHO segments, they being the only scope of business opportunity for the channel fraternity in the region.

Almost all the channel partners in Hyderabad are focusing on Vizag, Kakinada, and Rajamundry for expansion. Suresh Kolla, CEO, Kolla Innovatives, one of the most promising partners in Vizag, recently inaugurated shops in Vizag and Rajamundry. Speaking about his expansion plans, he said that in the forthcoming year his company is planning to expand aggressively in the region. "We are planning to expand our operations within Andhra Pradesh, concentrating on the distribution of HP and Sony products. However, we have not decided the location," added Kolla. Commenting on the responses from the Rajahmundry market for the new brand, Kolla said, "We have just started the branch and the responses till now are supportive. We have done all ground-level marketing needed for establishing the brand. We have to wait and see," he further added. Another partner who has expanded footprints from Vizag to the nearby cities is Pioneer Marketing. The partner has recently revamped retail presence in Vizag and has started retail operation in Kakinada. Elaborating on the initiative, Anand Narla, CEO, Pioneer Marketing said, "We already had franchisee operations where our former employee was heading the division. However, due to some reasons we have planned to take back and are planning to expand our retail division in Kakinada." He added that the new facility will come up by June end.

"Pioneer has chosen Kakinada as it is a hub of power-generating, oil based companies apart from shipping and agro based industries, and thus holds a lot of potential," informed Narla. "The base level work for establishing a full-fledged retailing division has already started. It will be exactly like the ‘computing zone' and the state-of-the-art retail shop we have in Vizag," he said.