‘PROFILE REPRO INDIA Arevolution in bo Content is king at Repro India, whose plants are becoming less print centric. This ensures publi pro India reported standalone earnings results for the third quarter ended December 2010, The total income rose 25,65% to Re 651.36 million, ‘when compared with the prior year period. From the Drupa year in 2008 to now, Repto has been, adding a raft of it, bolstering existing set up, and ‘establishing a new unit in Surat. And even though the com pany's net profit declined 13,5286 to Rs 52.94-million over the prior year period, the good news is the company’s net profit has increased by 409% over the previous quarter this yea ‘Wemet up wth Pramod Khera and his team atthe Navi Mumbai unit which was established in 1991. And through that meeting one understood why Reprois trying to unshackl itself from ts past reputation of being a mono- lithic, sluggish book printing giant. Khera who isan exec: tive director at Repro since 2009 is armed witha BTech from IT, PGDIM from IIMand PhD in Knowledge Management. Cleary, Khera and his team are using the best of knowledge ‘management tocreatea value chain fora publisher. neal terms thismeans: launchingone title adayforasmall pub: lisher or producing 1,000 copies ofa book within 48 hours or providingan acess to 350 titles ona web store front or print {ng more than million books in two weeks. Providing an insight into the business transformation hap pening at Repro, Khera says: "We are moving away from prin-centrc thinking” He adds, “Thereare invisible costsin book publishing. Pus the publisher struggles with content ‘management, inventory and obsolescence costs due to stor Ingo books. At Repro, we ae revolutionising the book pub- lishing industry, Wetell the publishers to concentrate on editorial and sale toend customers. We will provide end-to fend solutions forall other activities ~ content, digtalisation, printingand flfilment. Those ways publisher can grow the business and enhance margins ‘New innovations Repro India was established with ts offset unitand design services, Among other things, it focused on the annual reports market. In those day, itwas in the news fortwo reasons: the shift oft print production unitout of Mumba ‘And providing services at 30% lower costthan the market rates which were prevalent in those days. Asa result, many printgiantsin Mumbai were toppled, epro'sSurat plant nSEZ started in 2009 has the capacity to produce up to 100 million books ay Repro's sucess inspired awe After steady period of slow growth inthe past few years, Repro Indaissprinting with a focus on educational books. I thas segregated is business into various segments: print-on- demand, short-run, sheetfed and web offset. Today, it operates out of two loorsat Navi Mumbai, runninga let of digital and itho presses. The capacitys being further enhanced to produce upto two million books ina day The Sura facility which came into being n 2009, can print and bind upto 100 million books ayear.Iteatersto the needs ‘of offshore publishers. Apart from USA and Europe, Repro India istargeting customers in emerging economies. AS Rjnish Shirsat, whois the vice president, print solutions, says,"Its astonishing how much the world has changed in the pasttwo years. And exports to these countriesare booming, Today, consumersin Africa, Asiaand Latin Americacan SIPS Eada 0.6110) Mae), 26 Prntek nda Yo sue 25 February2on wun prntweek.comvingiok manufacturing an create myriad avatars of a book, as Ramu Ramanathan and Samir Lukka find out ROIMDIAFACTFIE inded 1991 idalty Provider of tent, printand ilment solutions to alishers, corporates, sation institutions and ji Mumbai: 100,000 saift at: 50,000 sat nover 19-10: Rs 201 crore with ffi of Rs 16.58 crore ronths 2010-m: 5190 fewith a profit of Rs core fT800 uprintweek.comlindia afford houses, cars, appliances, iPods and other goods that ‘were unimaginable justageneration ago.” For Repro this has meant significant inroads into South. ‘Africa and 13 African countries. Anda healthy targeted turn: ‘over of Bs 250-crore for 2010411. Process driven approach ~ ERP and ECM. ‘At the heart ofthe Repro process isan Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software called EFI Monarch. Itwasinstalled atthe Navi Mumbai plant to provide an integrated management system. EFI Monarch’ acquisition component, Digital StoreFront, creates a customised internet desktop for «publisher to order and monitor production status. “Publishers working wth Repro have accesso digital storefront from where they can place ordersfor books. Once approved, the orders ae automaticaly scheduled for produc- tion. This minimises turnaround time, says Balju Gujarati, vice president for IT governance. When an orderis confirmed, itenters intoa job manage: ment cycle. The entre plant operationsare scheduled around the job, enabling Repro to make productive use of the availa ble infrastructure. "ERP optimises print job schedules across ‘multiple machines across our plants. Our sales managerscan place online requests for uotes. The Request For Quote (RFQ) is processed by the system to generate an estimate, via the estimation module. Customers can get their quote in less than 24 hours adds Gujarati. Repro converts content for use in various media like books, «e-books and interactive media, “We create layouts templates, illustrations, designs, set type and conversion from mono: chrome to four-colour” says Amit Chavan whois in charge of Content Services. “This yar, we are investing Rs 10-crorein ITand Rs7-crore incontent management,” says Khera.“We are helping pub- lishers to reduce inventory costs to zero. Tis effectively results in improving their net margin by over 20%.” Best of both worlds Repro India's digital operation comprises a raft of high-end it, which includes an [Gen 3, an InfoPrint, Digimaster, and Rotatek witha customised Kodak Prosper digital heads for * printing of variable data before or after colour printing” This ‘operation is overseen by Anirudha Khandekar, general ‘manager for digital operations. Khandekar like Kheraisa new facein the Repro team; and like Khera he has impressive credentials. Besides being an opening batsman in Repro’s cricket team, he isa print technologist from PVG Puneand an Mech from Michigan. "We havea tie-up with partner in South Aftica which ‘makes it possible for us todeliver toa customer in Cape Town, ‘with the same turnaround time. Ourserversare connected to our partner's server” adds Khandekat. Through this partner ship, Repro offers customers the ability to order from over: seasand if need be, source from the company’s plants Khandekar highlights the interface with one of Repro’ key US-based Global client, tounderscore ERP integration ofthe digital process. He says: "We have created a Web Store Front forous client which hostsall the tiles. The regional dstibu- torsof that centre given login ds through which they an place an order accordingto their requirements Then Repro delivers itn 48 to 72hours” The company has notched up '8%ofits revenue in 2010 from digital printing We are ship. pingdligital manufactured books to seven countries Repro production ofbooksis based ona strong founda tion. The shopfloorin Navi Mumbai and Surat boast ofbind- ing ines from Kolbus and Accorofor softcover books, Aster book sewing machines, Mulle- Martinis Ventura MC sewing machine, and kit from Welbound,Ithas PUR capabilites in Surat which caters tothe export market. ‘Away from conventional thinking Repro derives 80% ofits revenue from book publishing with 55% of ts services for export and 45% for domestic market rmakinga total tally ofaround 500 publishers under its belt. Inthe past six months, Repro has been reaching out toits core group of supporters through its “Leaders and Legends" seminar which it hosted in Delhi and Hyderabad. According. to yostna Chugh, vice president, corporate communications at Repro, "Thisis an initiative to bring the publishing com- ‘munity together to discuss trends and issues inthe changing market place. Most publishers felt that such an event brought together members of the community bigand small” It included an interaction with Robert Baensch, an e-publis ing evangelist and strategies like monetisation up his sleeve Chugh is excited about the new initiatives at Repro, inclu ing the re-designed website. As we exit, Repro’smethod in their madness stays with us. Especially their ‘can-do’ attitude which is what created its reputation in 1991, in the first place. REPRO — TOP TEN MANTRA ‘© offer Comprehensive Publishing Solutions across content, print and futfilment ‘© Partner education publishers in producing and reaching. content tothe marketat the righttime ‘© Live up to commitments to its clients ‘Invent and re-inventa no-fills model which maximises resources and lowers cost ‘© Volume isthe name of the gam: Isbeautitul ‘© Agood network betters net-worth ‘© Mitigate the risk of traditional books, by playing up the technology angle; and leveraging multiple applications ‘@ Reduce operation costfor end-user | ‘© Bxamine emerging markets with a competitive mindset ‘© Strongintemal cash generation tofund workingcapital | jtthe same time small 25 February 20m Vllilssue n PrintWeek india 37