In this episode of ‘Big Deal’, Nisha Poddar spoke to Sanjeev Krishan, Chairman at PwC India, to talk about the company’s new growth strategy called ‘The New Equation’ inspired by the changing dynamics of business in present times and the digital transformation that we are seeing.

Krishan said, " 'The New Equation’ is really based on what our clients have been telling us over the last many months and, and there are three things with stand up. The first and foremost is that there is a significant amount of disruption, which has been caused by many things and technology, by the geopolitics of the world, by changes, which are caused by differences in the haves and have nots, and so on, so forth. Also, there is a significant lack of trust in institutions at the moment and that really is causing businesses to act in a particular way.”

“Our strategy is really in response to what the businesses are saying, there is a lack of trust in between institutions and there is a significant endeavour on part of businesses, in particular, to deal with a disruption, which has been caused by many facets. So, there is a focus on disrupting the disruption, if I call, and causing outcomes for themselves. So, what a strategy is really trying to do is to focus on building trust, and delivering sustained outcomes for our clients in general, and for society at large.”

On recovery aspect, Krishan said, “I think the good news is that if you look at our macroeconomics, over the last few months and weeks the exports have started growing and now, the Prime Minister has actually set a $400 billion export target, we did $32 billion each in the last two months, which is good news, because this means that demand is back.”

“Particularly if the globe recovers faster from COVID, it will really help our manufacturing sector in particular. With the PLI scheme that the government has come up with I am quite convinced that this is one area, which will recover faster.”

He added, “The problem, however, seems to be on the supply side and now you will know that, the inflation numbers have been going up, we heard the RBI governor as well talk about, now the question is whether it is a long-term thing and we have to wait and watch. There are significant supply-side challenges, which are manifesting themselves in high inflation. Not just in India, but even in countries like the US, for instance. Of course, India being an oil dependent economy there is obviously that challenge, considering how oil prices and the commodity price behave. So some of these are actually more supply side challenges.”

“The other piece, which I like to say since you mentioned about brick and mortar companies is on the mid corporates when we see some of the companies, which are beyond the large companies, but you know, before the MSMEs, I think that segment are struggling a little bit. As they come out of the effects of the pandemic, they actually as we all know, there are significant employment generators. Now, those companies if they are unable to recover, can cause significant societal challenges because of lack of employment. So that is the other piece which is worrisome.”

For full interview, watch accompanying video...

(Edited by : Bivekananda Biswas)

First Published:Aug 12, 2021 6:09 PM IST