In
every business plan we have shared with him (Aditya Birla), we have
overachieved. And we have also achieved his goal of being in the top
three...
A solid educational grounding, varied exposure across verticals, learning it the hard-way very early in his journey as a leader in the telecom sector besides his pet interest – playing Bridge - Kapania’s is a true manifestation of the fact that education, hard-work, perseverance, and an enterprising self coupled
with a passion to excel will stand you in good stead – no matter what
background you are from and which profession of business activity you
are in.
The man has also displayed great skill in reversing some set-backs
to telecom entity (called Birla AT&T - formed by a JV between
Aditya Birla Group and AT&T) in the early cellular days in India and
helped Idea Cellular (as it was renamed to in due course) stay well and
truly afloat amidst intense competition. Under his leadership and able
guidance, Idea Cellular has grown to a GSM subscriber base of around 140
million with a market share of about 17% and revenues of US$5Bn. His
efforts have won him respect and appreciation from people both within
and without the telecom major.
Early days & Education
Born in 1952, Himanshu Kapania did his schooling in Delhi where he developed a passion towards sport very early in his life. As school-going
child he played tennis - that is where he has derived his competitive
spirit and stamina – which have helped him persevere in times of despair
– such as the one mentioned above.
He enrolled for a Bachelor’s course in Electrical and Electronics
Engineering from the Birla Institute of Technology (Mesra) in 1979.
After completing degree in 1983 and after a handful of professional
stints with the likes of Toyota, he enrolled for a Master’s degree in
business management from the famed Indian Institute of Management (IIM),
Bangalore in 1988.
His decision to do management course proved to be decisive as his
time at IIMB provided him the platform where he, obviously, added a lot
of business skills to his persona. Besides the education that groomed
the astute business leader of the future, there was something else that
helped shape the entrepreneur he was going to be. And that was the game
of bridge: it not only helped Himanshu Kapania
solve academic problems and understand people but has also let him hone
his business skills and equipped him with the ability to see through
things – which qualities he would use to great effect in his
professional life as well.
Early career
After finishing his graduation, he joined DCM Toyota as an engineer.
He subsequently went on to become a Senior Manger Sales which was,
although a digression from his chosen field, a beginning for him in the
marketing field. It was all culminated by his stint with Toyota Japan
where he was sent for training. Once back from Japan he was moved to the
sales department, posted as manager in-charge of south Karnataka.
There was no looking back after that for about 4 years during which
period he acquired enough sales and marketing perspective to take flight
in the bigger space. Followed by this, he had a brief stint with HCL.
The progression
As a logical move up after his tryst with marketing, he joined Idea
Cellular (Birla AT&T back then) in 1997 and was assigned with the
responsibility of managing the company’s Circle Operations in the
service areas of Maharashtra and Gujarat, and later launched services in
Delhi Metro.
During his tenure of 6 years at Idea, he witnessed two-player fixed licenses fee regimes, introduction of NTP in 1999, the fourth license auction in 2001 and launch of CDMA services.
Sometime during his time at Idea (around 1988), he enrolled for a post-graduate course in business management from IIMB (which he would go on to complete in 1990).
The initial stint with Idea was as eventful as well as an educative one for Kapania.
In the year 2010, as part of shouldering the responsibility of managing
the Circle Operations as Chief Operating Officer of the Gujarat telecom
circle, he had to take a call on the tariff (pricing) of call rates and
he took a contrarian one. As opposed to all others who realised the
price-sensitivity of the service which hadn’t yet caught on with general
public hence kept it competitive, Kapania
believed that customers would be willing to pay a premium for services
provided by a joint venture of Aditya Birla Group and AT&T. The move
didn’t work and Kapania had to go re-visit the pricing strategy to correct this aberration.
Disappointed though he was, but the Gujarat Circle fiasco made him richer by experience. It made Kapania understand how crucial the customer pulse is for any business. This understanding was to serve him well in the times to come.
The advent of many big-league companies trying their hands in the
hereto state-controlled telecom industry opened up umpteen opportunities
for any aspiring professional whose careers had just begun to bloom. In
line with the same, and with the experience gained at Idea (during his
1st stint of 6 years there), Kapania joined Reliance Infocomm Ltd. in the year 2003.
At Reliance Infocomm where he worked for three years as Chief Executive Officer, Kapania was responsible for its operations in the northern region covering Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh.
Home-coming
Kapania
returned to his bastion (so to say) in 2006, rejoining Idea as COO –
this time round assigned the responsibility of managing the business in
southern and western India. He didn’t let down the company and the
management which had reposed so much faith in his capabilities. Kapania was instrumental in driving the company’s growth in the two regions assigned to him.
Kapania was also responsible for strengthening Idea’s dominance in established service areas, while also launching services in new service areas and expanding brand presence in other major markets in India.
At the helm
It is said that success follows success, and so it did for Kapania. Along with the company’s growth, Kapania’s career also began to take flight with each success that the company had. In five years time since rejoining, Kapania
had demonstrated great leadership qualities to shepherd the company
amidst fierce competition and delivered results – from a company with
lean resources and losses booked to one of the leading service
providers. There were enough cues for the powers that be at Idea to spot the potential and delegate him greater responsibilities.
And so he was elevated to managing director position in 2011. In four
years since, the company’s has grown from strength to strength to
become India’s third largest telecom services provided. Kapania had
managed to consolidate Idea’s position ¬- there is a huge gap between
the 3rd placed Idea and the next ranked provider – in terms of
subscriber-base, market share, and revenues.
In what could be considered as a recognition of the hard-work and
business acumen demonstrated by Kapania in almost reversing the decline
in Idea Cellular’s fortunes, Kumar Mangalam Birla (Group Chairman,
Aditya Birla Group), announced his induction as a director into the
Aditya Birla Management Corporation Ltd., a sort of think-tank made of
MDs of group companies which oversees and formulates group business
strategy.
The company’s has registered continued growth and expansion under
Kapania. Today, Idea is a pan-India integrated GSM operator with its own
NLD and ILD operations, and an ISP license. What’s more, Idea now ranks
among the top 10 country operators in the world with traffic in excess
of a billion minutes a day, operating across all 22 service areas with
2G services and 3G services spread in over 3,000 towns and 10,000
villages. Idea has grown the fastest in the world's fastest-growing
mobile phone services market.
While there is sustained and almost relentless pressure on the likes
of Himanshu Kapania to perform even in the face of innumerable
challenges such growing number of operators and providers, changing
customer preferences and consumption patterns, pricing, regulatory
issues, and unending need to satisfy customers, from his past record of
facing and overcoming hurdles and converting them into opportunities, it
can only be expected that the growth story of Idea Cellular will be
long told in the many years to come.
Given the turn-around achieved by Kapania, it would be worthwhile to
know who all his role-models were. Although himself very good at
planning and understanding, and possessing great knowledge of the
telecom network, Kapania says he learnt telecom regulatory affairs and
policy from his predecessor Sanjeev Aga, from whom he also picked up the
trait of being a risk-taker. From the Ambani brothers, especially
Mukesh, he learnt project management and how to scale business.
He looked for pockets where voice offerings were underpenetrated.
That is how he shifted Idea’s business focus to rural India and
continued reliance on voice services at a time when the competition was
focussed on mobile data as their growth drivers. The effect can easily
be seen: In 2011, Idea's presence was only in 80,000 villages. It now
covers 350,000 villages.