When the resolve is unflinching

MEET YOUR ENTREPRENEUR

Immense ambition and confidence coupled with persistence and hard work can work as a powerful elixir in achieving one's goal.

A striking case in point is the successful story of T Balaji, managing director of city-based Jyothi Dairy Private Limited.

This 42-year-old entrepreneur is a self-made man who started off as a marketing executive in a soft drinks company at Visakhapatnam for three years till 1990.

Nurturing a profound interest in business since his college days, Balaji decided to venture out on his own and shifted to Hyderabad in 1992.

After exploring and evaluating various business areas, he zeroed in on the huge potential for dairying in Hyderabad.

The government's generous permissions to private sector dairies, breaking the monopoly of the co-operative dairies, too encouraged him to venture out into dairy business.

Identifying his business niche, Balaji floated Jyothi Dairy Private Limited in 1992 with an initial investment of Rs 20 lakh at Suraram on the outskirts of Hyderabad.

Recalling his trails in the initial years, Balaji says: "As in any business, I too had to face hiccups in the early years, especially in procuring milk and establishing the brand name in the Hyderabad market. Here, my postgraduate degree in business management and my marketing experience helped me in overcoming obstacles. We achieved break-even in three years."

At present, the company has a 40,000-litre per day capacity processing and packing plant, a 100-strong workforce and a 350-distributor network in the twin cities of Hyderabad.

The company, which received an ISO 9001/2000 certification from the American Quality Assessors (AQA) International in 2003, registered a turnover of Rs 20 crore in the financial year ended March 31, 2004.

The company procures milk from Addanki in Prakasam, Bodhan in Nizamabad, Kodad in Nalgonda and Dammapeta in Khammam districts where it has chilling units.

On the dairy sector scenario, Balaji says that the continuous drought conditions in the previous years was impacting the availability of milk.

"Despite the low procurement of milk and the rise in prices, the demand has been increasing. Keeping in view the demand, we are planning to increase the processing capacity of the plant from the present 7,500 litre per hour to 10,000 litre per hour next year. We are expecting a 10 per cent growth in turnover next year."

Ask him why he didn't branch out into the milk-based products segment, Balaji says that there isn't much scope for milk-based products in the twin cities, adding that he has no plans of entering the milk-based products' business in the near future.

"The trick is to be in a specialised area," he quips. Though managing the company takes away most of his time, Balaji says that he still manages to take time off to listen to Ghantasala's classic songs.