News: Pantaloon Retail teams up with Staples

(DNA 18/01/2007) Mumbai - Kishore Biyani’s Pantaloon Retail is all set to form yet another joint venture, this time with US-based company Staples. The agreement is expected to be signed within a week, industry sources have said.

Rakesh Biyani, director, Pantaloon Retail India Ltd (PRIL), indicated that an initiative was in the pipeline but refused to disclose any details. “I am not in a position to say anything,” Biyani told DNA Money.

Meanwhile, Pantaloon Retail has made a headstart in the $10 billion office products market in the country by acquiring a “fairly new” company operating in the online B2B space. “It is a business-cum-management buyout of Officedge for an undisclosed sum,” Biyani said. In November 2006, PRIL instituted a wholly owned subsidiary called Future Office Products Pvt Ltd for its foray into the office products space. Taking the inorganic route by acquiring Officedge, industry experts say, will give PRIL an instant market reach.

Instituted in 2004, Officedge provides contract delivery services to corporate customers across the country. Co-founded by Shailesh Karwa and Sharad Dalmia (previously consultants with TCS and Accenture respectively), Officedge currently serves more than 80 large corporate customers across six cities offering close to 1,200 office products on a proprietary e-procurement solution. Besides continuing to run the show for Future Office, the original promoters of Officedge will also be responsible for chalking out an aggressive expansion for the company in this space.

“We are completely open to acquisitions and will pursue it very aggressively as industry today is largely fragmented and the business potential out there is huge,” Biyani said.

Talking of the reasons behind acquiring Officedge, Biyani said its operations were backed by an efficient supply chain infrastructure and offers ease of ordering, next-day delivery and an ongoing savings programme that can be rolled out on a national basis.