Orkla India to go digital to expand domestic, global reach

Orkla India, formerly MTR Foods, is embarking on a digital transformation to increase visibility of its brands, MTR, Eastern and Rasoi Magic, in domestic and international markets. The company is roping in a big four consulting firm to provide strategic direction, draw an action blueprint, and prepare a scoping exercise. It will deploy AI and data analytics to build predictive analytics and enhance customer satisfaction. A pilot in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh has already shown positive results. Orkla India is also focusing on exports, as Indian cuisine and vegetarianism/veganism are gaining popularity.

Orkla India, formerly MTR Foods, is all set to embark on a comprehensive digital transformation exercise to increase visibility for its brands, MTR, Eastern and Rasoi Magic, in the domestic and international markets. The company, owned by Orkla ASA, a Norwegian industrial investment firm that has a deep presence in the food vertical across the globe, is currently in the process of roping in one of the big four consulting firms who would give the company a strategic direction for its digital foray, draw an action blueprint, and would prepare a scoping exercise to guide it in its digital play. “We have started a forward looking function for digital transformation and sustainability,” Sanjay Sharma, CEO, Orkla India, told The Hindu. “This will significantly scale up our digital presence, boost sales and give us better edge in the domestic and international markets.,” said Mr. Sharma, who would be overseeing all key functions of the company including operations, HR, Finance and the newly added vertical Digital Transformation and Sustainability.

Currently, different brands are in different stages of maturity in their digital journey, and the company’s new digital focus would bring synergy to the whole group, he said.

“We will deploy artificial intelligence and data analytics to build predictive analytics to enhance customer satisfaction and also to deliver the exact products the retailers are looking for in a particular store so that the retailers need not entirely depend on their own sales data to decide on future stocking,” he explained.

The company has been running a pilot in the last six months for MTR products in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh and it was already showing positive results in sales with the ability to focus on what you want to sell has increased, he said.   The digital play primarily would cover the company’s third party e-commerce sales and would also take care of its internal digitalisation across sales, marketing, manufacturing and HR functions. “We are in the process of doing a large-scale audit in the organisation and benchmarking ourselves to global industry standards. At present, we are waiting for a proposal from one of the big fours to come and by end of this year we will select a vendor,” elaborated Mr. Sharma. On Orkla India’s increased focus on exports, he said, popularity of Indian cuisine had been on the rise in the global market, and there was also greater adoption of vegetarianism and veganism, which were opening up additional markets for the company in the international markets. “We want to make a deep foray into global markets with products of wider appeal. We already sell our products in 42 geographies,” he added.

Between MTR and Eastern products, Orkla India saw sales of ₹2,200 crore in FY22.