Dr. Avinash Shivdas

Purpose Mobile phone markets in india is witnessing one of the most challenging phases in its evolution. The economic growth added with the rise in disposable income has seen consumers demand more smartphones than in the past. To keep up with this demand companies are expanding and developing their distributional channels across rural and urban india. Though there have been several studies on the consumer purchase side, there has been scant research on the role of the retailer. This study aims at understanding the factors that drive the demand of smartphones from the perspective of retailers and their ecosystem Design/methodology/approach – to evaluate the role of actors including the retailers in the ecosystem, a holistic approach is needed. Systems theory was found suitable to evaluate the interactions and the roles of players in this ecosystems. The interview method was adopted to develop the model and understand the nuances of the interactions between the actors. Findings – Evaluating factors based from literature as well as interview transcripts, it was seen that trade margins, functional value of smartphones, inventory turnover and brand awareness were major factors propelling demand among retailers. Originality/value – This study advances the body of knowledge by presenting drivers of demand for smartphones from the retailer perspective, which is under researched, especially in the emerging market context. The implications from this study could serve as a platform for future research in similar economies and further shed light on influencing factors that could aid in enhancing market development activities for practitioners. Further the emerging market context of the study provides insights to industry and academia to advance research in This study provides insights on the factors which have an effect on the increased demand of certain smartphone brands from the retailer side and can be a basis to understand the strategies which mobile brands follows to adopt for increased penetration in Indian market. This study concentrates on the retailer’s perspective and only limited studies have been done on this.

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Evaluation of customers' perception and satisfaction of service quality is widely acknowledged as being a favorable strategy in the laundry industry. In recent years, the Laundromats in India have encountered difficult times due to the increasing customer demands, and due to the strong growing internal industry competition development. However, the industry's main concern around the globe is to cater for its customer needs and their desires, which are mostly addressed through personal services. Research on service quality of such a specialized sector is scare. The present research paper aims to fill this gap by conducting a comprehensive analysis of the laundry sector in India and provide an assessment of service quality suggested by Grönroos (1982; 1990). Servqual is being used to understand the gap between the provider and the customer of this scantly researched industry. The major findings indicate that areas where laundromats in India will have to focus in on reduction of defects and the margin of error. In case of errors, the compensation mechanism should be in place to retain customers. Secondly, the customers are too occupied in their daily routines and will not be ready to wait for delivery or collection of clothes. Hence, waiting time reduction at points of collection and delivery is another critical factor that determines the success of a laundromat in India.

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Innovation in services is one of the prime drivers of several economies. There are various schools of thought that have emerged over the past few decades in this area. The present paper focuses on the evolution of the ‘synthesis’ school of thought. It contributes to literature by extending the framework proposed by Lancaster (The Journal of Political Economy, 74(2), 132–157, 1966) and other researchers by incorporating aspects of Web 2.0 technology with a specific reference to e-learning. The proposed framework is validated using case study from the field of e-learning. © 2015 Springer Science+Business Media New York

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The world of today is not looking for innovations that are mere incremental but those that are disruptive. Aakash, the Low Cost Tablet (LCT) initiative by Indian govt. was launched in 2011 amidst dominance by the likes of Apple, Amazon, and Samsung etc. Single most objective of this initiative was affordable ICT learning tool for the 220+ million students. LCT like Aakash can be seen as a disruptive innovation from the as they are simple to use, cheap, low performing, targeted at low portion of mainstream market and focused on social sectors like education, health to increase access and equity. Within Rogers theory of Diffusion of Innovation, we propose a framework for innovation attributes that can significantly predict student and teacher behavior intentions and motivations towards LCT for use in classrooms. Authors investigate the innovation attributes for adoption of LCT in a social group comprising of (N=121) potential-adopter students and teachers from India. The results revealed that motivations for adopting LCT are strongly associated with innovation attributes like relative advantage, compatibility, ease of use, peer influence, perceived enjoyment and perceived usefulness. Overall, both teachers and students expressed positive attitude towards using LCT as it enhanced their digital literacy skills. Bigger question is to identify what kind of new teacher training program, models and approaches and learning environment are required for successful adoption of educational innovation like LCT. Findings contribute to the design of new pedagogical models that maximizes learning potential of LCTs for K12 education. More »»
Low Cost Tablets as disruptive educational innovation- Modeling its diffusion within Indian K12 system.pdf