India is a diverse country and Walmart has to think and execute locally and comply with its rules, said Doug McMillon, chief executive officer and president of the world\u2019s largest retailer.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt has its own rules. So we’ve got to comply with those rules,\u201d said McMillon during a fireside chat with Prof Murali Mantrala of The University of Kansas School of Business at Converge @ Walmart, the flagship event of Walmart Global Tech India. \u201cToday we’re not allowed to make foreign direct investment in a multi-brand retail store, the physical brick and mortar store. So we operate in a different way.\u201d<\/p>\n
But in the end, he said the company has to solve the food business in that kind of business model. It also has to solve other categories so it would be able to serve people in the way that they want to be served.<\/p>\n
He said the Indian market is very unique and is one of the most exciting around the world. It is among the top three along with the US and China. The Bentonville-based company (in Arkansas) is locked in a battle with US rival Jeff Bezos-founded Amazon, Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance\u2019s JioMart, and Tata-owned BigBasket for dominance in India\u2019s online retail market through Flipkart, which it bought for $16 billion in 2018. Digital payments giant PhonePe also came to Walmart as part of the acquisition. India\u2019s retail market is estimated to reach over $1 trillion by 2025.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’re really proud of the history that we’ve had in the country as we work to build a business there,\u201d said McMillon. \u201cWe think the future is very bright, and we are going to see a market that’s north of a trillion US dollars by 2025.\u201d<\/p>\n
McMillon said he is excited about the leadership teams at Flipkart and PhonePe and the associates in India and the businesses that are being built. He said the Flipkart business has now reached over 300,000 marketplace sellers and PhonePe business has more than 300 million users. \u201cBoth are growing very well,\u201d said McMillon. \u201cIt\u2019s been really fun to see how our team there solve problems because you have to be so creative, open, and fast and that inspires us around the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Talking about the learning from the India market, McMillon said when Walmart was thinking about making the investment in Flipkart and PhonePe, his key takeaway was that the teams there can solve problems.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo doubt every market where we operate, especially India is going to have challenges. It is a very dynamic environment. Rules, customers and competition are changing,\u201d said McMillon. \u201cThe real question is, can you show up every day and have a really capable engaged set of associates and leaders that want to solve tomorrow’s problems.\u201d<\/p>\n
The role of technology in all of Walmart’s markets, including India, is now even more important than ever. Companies that are born recently, are more digitally native and have some advantages. It’s also true that in an omnichannel world some of the older companies that may employ more people and have more physical assets would also have some advantages. But it would only happen if those older businesses including Walmart have an openness, and an ability to change.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are fortunate at Walmart that we inherit a strong set of DNA from our founder Sam Walton who loved change,\u201d said McMillon. He said purpose and values are constant at Walmart and everything else is open to change.<\/p>\n
Leading a digital transformation at scale is a real challenge as Walmart operates in multiple countries. He said Suresh Kumar, the executive vice president and global chief technology officer (CTO) and chief development officer (CDO) of Walmart, Inc and his team are doing a fantastic job of leading the digital transformation.<\/p>\n
\u201cDigital transformation, in the end, is about people,\u201d said McMillon. \u201cThere is technology involved and automation to play, but you actually have to change the mindset of the way people have worked, and have them be willing to work in a different way, in a small team environment, to get a different outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n
For digital transformation, McMillon also brings in guests and interviews them in front of the company\u2019s leadership group or different teams. These guests include different CEOs of various companies from Google, Salesforce to Microsoft. For instance, \u201cSatya Nadella (Microsoft CEO), if you were a leader at Walmart, how would you be looking at the opportunity for digital transformation?\u201d<\/p>\n
Walmart is focusing on technologies related to the optimization of data. It is also looking at the role of mathematics and algorithms to help it understand how the whole system works from forecasting to the customer experience. Other technologies include robotics and automation. In the future, it expects to see a huge role being played by innovations such as automated storage and retrieval systems and electric vehicles and drones for last-mile connectivity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
India is a diverse country and Walmart has to think and execute locally and comply with its rules, said Doug McMillon, chief executive officer and president of the world\u2019s largest retailer. \u201cIt has its own rules. So we’ve got to comply with those rules,\u201d said McMillon during a fireside chat with Prof Murali Mantrala of The University of Kansas School of Business at Converge @ Walmart, the flagship event of Walmart Global Tech India. \u201cToday we’re not allowed to make foreign direct investment in a multi-brand retail store, the physical brick and mortar store. So we operate in a different […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-798907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-it-2"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=798907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798907\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=798907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=798907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/telecomlive.in\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=798907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}