Life Beyond Just Tractors

Its back to the trenches for Escorts. The company is rigorously working towards gaining marketshare on the back of diversification plans.

- Avishek Banerjee

ENGINEERING AND FARM EQUIPMENT MAJOR Escorts India (EIL) is aiming for a major transformation as it is aiming to metamorphose itself from a tractor maker into a holistic agro-solutions provider. Helmed by 44-year-old Nikhil Nanda, who recently took over as its CMD following his father Rajan Nanda’s demise, the company is rebooting its operations, which will enable it to build an ecosystem for its end customers (largely farmers). The third generation entrepreneur, who doesn’t mind disposing off loss-making verticals, is also excited about challenging the status quo in terms of its current business model.

Speaking to BW Businessworld exclusively at his corporate office in Faridabad, Nanda says, “The lesson at Escorts is we have to be much more agile than what we are today. That is one element I would like to see at Escorts. But other elements, in terms of being disruptive, question the current model, it is a debate that we will keep having. Few years later, it will be a different story but the purpose will remain the same.”

Rohtash Mal, who was heading Escorts’ Agri Division until 2012, echoes Nanda’s thoughts. “The current strategies of reinventing Escorts are not recent at all as this journey to recast one of India’s most iconic companies began in great earnest more than a decade ago, fired by Nikhil’s passion to rightfully reclaim the great legacy of the legendary H.P. Nanda (Nikhil’s grandfather),” says Mal, who is now Chairman, EM3 Agriservices. “Nikhil is driven, ambitious, and endowed with an exceptionally strong sense of purpose. This is the rocket fuel which will carry Escorts into another orbit.”

First Things First