All successful people always believe wisely that ‘failure is the best teacher. Although many of failure’s students give up at just one or two lessons, those on the path to achieving greatness like S. Kishore Sundaram, Founder-Director of Yuga Enterprise, never give up. Instead, he kept on learning all the lessons taught dutifully by this well-known educator called failure. Kishore Sundaram has already been nominated for ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’ by the Entrepreneur Magazine for 2021-2022 under Manufacturing Plastics and Polymers section.
In his own wise words, Kishore Sundaram says, “To start with, I have been an entrepreneur since 2015. I have successfully failed two business ventures earlier. Though the businesses were failures, the lessons and experiences they gave me were more valuable than the capital I lost on them.”
In the beginning, Kishore Sundaram didn’t even know the registration and licensing norms, and he literally had no idea of a revenue model and ROIs. It was in late 2017 that he got the idea of entering the construction and infrastructure space after analysing the scope and possibilities as a material supplier. He shares, “I positioned myself for the next three years as a marketing head of a company which was fabricating UPVC joineries.”
And it was in December 2021 that Kishore Sundaram was determined to start his own company, and he subsequently registered it in its existing name…
Yuga Enterprise
Kishore Sundaram says, “Before beginning the journey, I decided on the don’ts more than the dos. To be simple, I don’t know the one exact way to run a company successfully; rather, I know the rest 99 ways to turn the venture into a disaster.”
So, Yuga Enterprise came into existence in January 2022 as UPVC windows, doors, and other joineries fabricator. As of August 2022, “We have touched 1.5 crore sales,” informs Kishore Sundaram, who formed the core management team even before erecting the machinery. Further, the marketing field agents were handpicked, a production supervisor was hired, including two other machine operators, and a sales team of two persons was formed, with Kishore Sundaram himself handling sales, finance, and purchase only.
In February-22, they shortlisted material suppliers, and hand-in-hand, they began marketing. By February-22 end, they bought their first fabrication machinery and assembly line and commenced production in mid-March-22, with an installed capacity of 15,000 sq. ft/month. As of August 2022, they have two production lines with an expert staff of two dozen professionals.
Kishore Sundaram meticulously defined the roles and limits of each functional department. As such, one doesn’t interfere with the other.
“Now our market consists of clients who search for ‘affordable quality’–period. We don’t overprice our products, nor do we reduce the quality to meet the clients’ purchase power. It’s our logo, ‘Delightness Delivered.’ Our after-sales is up to the industry mark; we give free services, consultations, fast replacements, and reworks whenever required,” states Kishore Sundaram.
The Three Aces
Yuga’s current market is Western Tamil Nādu, and they have 60-70 regular clients and completed 30,000 sq. ft mark and have enquiries for nearly 2.5 lakh sq. ft. They are further expanding into other zones through dealerships. “Our revenue model of 50% advance, 30% on completion and 20% on installation and finishing is keeping our ledgers good and has given more space for scaling and product addition,” mentions Kishore Sundaram.
As of current expansion, Yuga is planning to set up a ‘Die Casting and Injection Moulding Plant for manufacturing hardware materials for the UPVC joinery sector, which Kishore Sundaram and the team Yuga are expecting to commence by March 2023.
Yuga Enterprise was formed to create a complete construction material supply/manufacturing company, and “We are ‘Adamant on our goals’; ‘Aggressive on our approach’; and ‘Ambitious over our dreams,” says Kishore Sundaram.
Ensuring Long-term Business Relationships
Revealing his and Yuga Enterprise’s professional qualities and values admired the most by their clients, colleagues and employees, Kishore Sundaram conveys that their staffs are well qualified and have an average field experience of four years. Also, they deliver finished products with high punctuality. The unnecessary hassle involved in the construction field before the site handover process is a hustle for engineers and contractors, which team Yuga, under Kishore Sundaram’s expert guidance, reduces by delivering the products on or before time.
“Our after-sales is unmatched in this field, where we guarantee our products for up to 21 years with certain parts getting replacement warrant also. Also, our response time to any after-sales call is less than three days,” assures Kishore Sundaram. Every UPVC product is separately labelled and item CODED for future purposes, a unique feature of Yuga’s products and services.
UPVC joinery is a highly volatile sector where price variation(s) is inevitable. Yet, Kishore Sundaram ensures consistent prices through bulk purchases of raw materials, which is an added advantage. They have payment flexibility options for regular and performing clients. Further, they are highly system-driven, where a particular person’s absence or withdrawal won’t affect any process at any given point in time. “On a whole, our professional qualities emphasise more on long term business which would increase sales and revenue,” assures Kishore Sundaram.
Delightness Delivered
Briefing Yuga Enterprise’s many USPs, which help it in positioning itself as one of the best UPVC product/service/solution providers, Kishore Sundaram shares that their firm has following uniqueness from other competitors including,
- Precise manufacturing process.
- Hassle free pre-production and approval process.
- Quality of product
- Options to choose from multiple profiles/sections.
- Dedicated installation and after-sales team.
- Simplified financial language while quoting for a project
- Anytime progress check on orders by clients directly
- Specialised quality control person(s)
- Segmented roles and responsibilities
“In fact, we deliver, not just joineries but also Delightness,” promises Kishore Sundaram.
Regarding advanced technologies like AI and ML, Kishore Sundaram feels they are very useful tools which “We can’t introduce into our fabrication work. But once we are into casting, they will be of big advantage in terms of productivity, waste reductions and labour management.”
Triumphing with Transparency
Considering the current industry scenario, Kishore Sundaram states that there are some major challenges which he and his team have to overcome regularly.
Imported profiles/sections with low quality and lower prices are a threat due to the client’s perspective. Initially, it might sound like a viable or intelligent decision, but in the long run, the joineries deteriorate earlier than expected.
Also, high competition and inexperienced start-ups offering the product at a much lower rate than operatable margins pose a serious threat. Moreover, the entry of big firms, since it’s a ₹14000 crore to ₹ 16000 crore market, is increasing the competition. Other factors like price fluctuation, inflation, and dullness in the infrastructure industry (seasonal), and comparison to wooden windows, which are higher in cost and difficulty in installation and inconvenience in maintenance compared to UPVC joineries, are also affecting the bottom line.
Kishore Sundaram adds, “Convincing clients over existing products/suppliers is challenging. Since we are very new to the industry and it’s in its infant stage, the one-word answer we promise and deliver to our clients over all these problems is ‘transparency.’ With boldness, I can proclaim that our factory is always open to our clients. We don’t charge wastage costs on our clients. Our costing system is very accurate and transparent without any hidden costs. New clients may verify us, get our testimonials from existing customers, and even inspect us before finalising to place the orders. And I am reiterating that we will overcome all these problems with our ‘transparency–and that’s it.”
An Earnest Wisdom
Kishore Sundaram’s sincere advice to budding entrepreneurs who aspire to venture into this niche is that they must educate the client/customer on the advantages of UPVC products. Never exploit an unaware customer. Never reduce the product finish and quality for freezing orders at a lower rate. Try to buy Indian products for your processes.
Always listen to your client, “Because it’s just an order for you, but a home is a lifetime dream for many,” feels Kishore Sundaram. Further, he believes that the customer/client is always right.
A Unified Solution
Envisioning Yuga Enterprise’s operations and offerings in the future, Kishore Sundaram shares that they have three primary goals at present.
- Expansion of Yuga’s fabrication unit into Delhi and Hyderabad.
- To start Die Castings and Injection Moulding Plants for manufacturing UPVC hardware accessories.
- “To build an extrusion unit to manufacture our own sections/profiles,” he says.
These goals are split into three consequent timelines in the above order of precedence. “Our goal in the UPVC joinery sector is to build a complete one-point solution for all needs in the sector, which we hope to achieve in the next four years,” concludes Kishore Sundaram.
