Titan Company
Public | |
Industry | Lifestyle goods |
Founded | 1984 |
Headquarters | Bengaluru[1], India |
Area served | Global |
Key people |
Bhaskar Bhat (MD) Vikas Kapoor (Chairman) |
Products | Watches, jewellery, precision engineering, Bags, Perfumes, belts, wallets and Eyewear |
Revenue | ₹119 billion (US$1.8 billion) (2015)[2] |
₹8.00 billion (US$120 million) (2015)[2] | |
Number of employees | 7,560 (2015) [3] |
Parent |
Tata Group TIDCO |
Website | www.titan.co.in |
Titan Company Limited (earlier known as Titan Industries Limited) is a joint venture between the Tata Group and the Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation (TIDCO) which commenced operations in 1984 under the name Titan Watches Limited. Titan has diversified into other consumer products including jewellery with Tanishq, eyewear with Titan Eyeplus, fragrances with Skinn, helmets with Fastrack. Today, Titan Company is Tata Group’s largest consumer company, and India’s leading producer and retailer of watches, jewellery, and eyewear.
Company history
Titan was established in the year 1984,[1] becoming the third Indian watch manufacturer after HMT and Allwyn. Titan formed a joint venture with Timex Group, which lasted until 1998, to set up a distribution network across India. Titan is the fifth largest watch manufacturer in the world.
Xerxes Desai was the first managing director of Titan, and played an important role in laying the foundation of the company, after he suggested the idea of watch making to J.R.D. Tata.[4]
Titan Industries Ltd. has now become Titan Company Ltd., it is owned and managed by Tata and TIDCO.
Products
The company is divided into four divisions: watches and accessories, jewellery, eyewear, and precision engineering.[5] The largest manufacturing unit of Titan is located at Hosur, Tamil Nadu.
Watches
Titan watches account for more than 60% share of the total Indian market and are also sold in about 32 countries through marketing subsidiaries based in London, Aden, Dubai and Singapore.[1] Titan offers various brands including Steel, Regalia, Raga, Nebula, Sonata, Fastrack, Zoop, Orion, Purple, Obaku, Automatic, Tycoon, Bandhan, Police, Octane, and the HTSE series. Titan has claimed to have manufactured the world's slimmest wrist watch branded as Titan Edge with a total thickness of 3.5 mm and a movement of 1.15 mm.[6]
In July 2011, Titan launched the High Technology Self Energizer (HTSE) collection of watches which run on light.[7] According to Titan, these watches can be charged with as low as 200 lux of light, which makes them chargeable with light even from a candle.[7] On 16 November 2011, Titan Industries acquired Swiss watch maker Favre-Leuba for Euro 2 million.[8]
Precision engineering
Precision Engineering Division of Titan was started in 2002 to manufacture parts for automotive and aerospace Industries. The division’s products span-precision engineering components and sub-assemblies, machine building & automation solutions, tooling solutions and electronic sub-assemblies. Additionally, the division catering to the aerospace segment is AS 9100B certified and the unit catering to the automotive segment is TS 16949 certified. The unit has recently been selected for the National Aerospace and Defense Contractors’ Accreditation Programme for its non-destructive testing capabilities.
Jewellery division
Titan manufactures jewellery and sells it through three types of stores based on the segment of the society they target at - Tanishq, Zoya and Goldplus. The name Tanishq has been derived from "Ta" (the first two letters of Tata) and "Nishk or Nishkh" (meaning gold coin or necklace in Sanskrit).[9] Tanishq is one of India's largest brands in India.
Fragrances
In September 2013, Titan unveiled the everyday French luxury perfume line, Skinn. They have three masculine and three feminine fragrances.
Eyewear Division
Titan Eyeplus, the third major line of consumer business division from Titan, ventured into the eyewear category in March 2007. The move was an initiative to re-define the industry and straddle the marketplace with exacting quality standards, unparalleled in India’s prescription eyewear industry. Benchmarked against the best in the world, Titan Eyeplus heralds standardization in the eyewear industry. Titan Eyeplus, following the Tata‘s principles of quality and trust, offers international quality standards enhanced by practices such as transparency in pricing, contemporary design, and styling in the highly fragmented and undifferentiated Indian optical retail segment. At present, Titan Eyeplus has over 335 stores operating across 143 cities.
Retail Presence
Pan India
Source: Titan Company Limited Annual Report 2014-2015
Brand | Retail Outlets | Area (in Sq.ft.) |
---|---|---|
World of Titan | 430 | 4,16,806 |
Fastrack | 143 | 89,679 |
Helios | 42 | 53,475 |
Tanishq | 174 | 7,151,644 |
Goldplus | 33 | 80,850 |
Zoya | 2 | 9,346 |
Eyeplus | 366 | 2,26,803 |
Service Centers | 693 | 59,333 |
Latest figures
Brand | Retail Outlets | Area (in Sq.ft.) |
---|---|---|
World of Titan | 446 | 422042 |
Fastrack | 150 | 92829 |
Helios | 41 | 48438 |
Watches | 646 | 564191 |
Tanishq | 186 | 769926 |
Goldplus | 33 | 80850 |
Zoya | 2 | 9346 |
Jewellery | 221 | 860122 |
Eyeplus | 399 | 253960 |
Corporate identity
After 25 years, Titan Industries Ltd. changed its name to Titan Company Ltd. in August 2013 to more closely reflect the range of lifestyle products the company sells and plans to sell. It also unveiled a new logo at this time.[10]
Senior Management
Mr. Bhaskar Bhat, Managing Director. Titan Company Limited
Mr. Vikas Kapoor, Chairman
Mr. C K Venkataraman, Chief Executive Officer – Jewellery
Mr. S Ravi Kant, Chief Executive Officer - Watches and Accessories & EVP - Corporate Communications
Mr. Ronnie Talati, Chief Executive Officer – Eyewear
Mr. Ajoy Chawla, Chief Strategy Officer
Mr. S Subramaniam, Chief Financial Officer & Head Of IT Function
Mr. Rajnarayan, Chief Human Resource Officer
Mr. Sandeep Kulhalli, Senior Vice President - Retail & Marketing, Tanishq
Mr. C Srinivasan, Vice President - Chief Sales & Retail Officer
Mr. A R Rajaram, Head Legal & Company Secretary
References
- 1 2 3 "Company Profile". Tata Group.
- 1 2 "Titan Company Ltd, TITAN:NSI financials - FT.com". markets.ft.com. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
- ↑ "Titan Company Ltd, TITAN:NSI profile - FT.com". markets.ft.com. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
- ↑ "Xerxes Desai: The man behind Titan's success". Rediff. Retrieved 2016-07-03.
- ↑ "Titan Company Profile". Tata Sons Ltd. Retrieved 14 March 2014.
- ↑ "Titan launches Edge, the slimmest watch in the universe" (Press release). Titan Industries. 21 May 2002. Retrieved 4 August 2006.
- 1 2 Tata.com. "Tata group | Titan Industries | Media releases | Titan Industries' new technological marvel — HTSE". tata.com. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
- ↑ "Titan acquires Favre Leuba". 16 November 2011. Retrieved 16 November 2011.
- ↑ WIPO, Arbitration and Mediation Center. "Titan Industries Limited v. Tanishq Corporation". CaseNo. D2000-1793. Retrieved 26 September 2006.
- ↑ "Titan unveils new logo, changes name". Mint. 28 August 2013. Retrieved 30 January 2014.