Infosys Wins Ikea Deal Worth Over Rs 850 Crore

Infosys has secured an impressive $100 million plus ( ~ Rs 850 crore) deal from Swedish retailer Ikea, surpassing competitors such as HCL, Capgemini, and DXC, along with other regional players. This strategic partnership involves transitioning approximately 350 roles at Ikea across various countries— China, France, Germany, India, Poland, Sweden, and the US—to Infosys.

The five-year contract encompasses services like service desk, ServiceNow-based enterprise service management, and IT services management for 170,000 employees and 260,000 devices, spanning 19 languages.

Around 350 positions at Ikea will be affected in China, France, Germany, India, Poland, Sweden, and the US. These workers will transfer to Infosys.

Infosys has been making significant strides in securing major deals recently. Last year in July, Infosys signed a mega deal worth $1.5 billion with British Petroleum (BP) to provide Al solutions. Another substantial deal, valued at $454 million, was signed with Danske Bank.

Infosys' expansion into the Nordic region is a strategic move aimed at tapping into new markets and strengthening its global presence. The Nordic countries – Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden – are known for their robust technology ecosystems, innovation-driven economies, and high digital adoption rates.

The Nordic region boasts a skilled workforce in areas like IT, engineering, and design. Infosys can tap into this talent pool to enhance its service offerings.

Ikea to Launch E-Commerce Operation in India starting with Mumbai soon: CEO

Swedish home furnishing retailer Ikea is all set to launch e-commerce operations in the country, beginning with Mumbai followed by Hyderabad and Pune, a top company official said on Friday.

Talking to reporters on the sidelines of first anniversary celebrations of its store here, Ikea India Chief Executive Officer Peter Betzel said the outlet witnessed one million purchases from over four million footfalls.

He also said the company was looking at various channels including smaller formats and customer meeting points, to reach customers. "India is a long-term commitment for Ikea and we will focus on fast expansion multi-channel approach.

In the coming years, our goal is to meet 100 million customers with our beautiful and affordable home furnishing offer to make everyday life at home better and brighter.." Betzel said. "Our next destination is Mumbai where we will soon start our e-commerce, enabling us to meet many more customers followed by Hyderabad and Pune going online," he said without giving timelines.

Ikea had earlier said it invested over Rs 800 crore in the Hyderabad outlet, which includes an in-house 1000-seater restaurant. The store was opened on August 9, 2018. The restaurant served one million each of frozen yoghurt, veggi balls and chicken balls during the past one year, he said adding the outlet has over 3.50 lakh Ikea family membership registrations.

"We are normally attractive for the fun day out for the whole family. We know that on an average 3 to 4 people as a family visiting us (our store)) so you can say then it is more than 1 million buyers," he said.

On the upcoming Mumbai store, he said the construction work was going on there. On the breakeven of the Hyderabad store, Betzel said they were looking at the long term commencement to India and not predicting when the operations will become profitable.

Asked about the company's plans to roll out smaller format outlets, the executive said, "we are in transformation.. We are now looking at real accessibility with online stores and different store formats."

"So we will have many more product meeting places with different formats, not stores only, but online and meeting places in the cities with big stores formats. That's how we are transforming Ikea. Because the world is changing. We also have to adapt to that."

Ikea had earlier said the Hyderabad store was the first of 25 such outlets planned to be set up in India by 2025. In 2013, IKEA received nod from the government to invest Rs 10,500 crore in single-brand retail. PTI GDK ROH

Furniture Maker IKEA Unveils "Soffa Sans" A Font Made of Sofas

Last week, Furniture retailer IKEA unveiled "Soffa Sans," a font where each letter is formed by pieces of a sofa.

Soffa Sans is born out of the internet memes from its digital "Design your own sofa" tool. The planner allows people to configure different sectionals, and showcases the final product in 3D.

IKEA has called the font “the world’s comfiest font" which creates a typeface out of the Vallentuna couch. The Vallentuna is IKEA's flagship modular sofa series that can be customized by combining individual modules of seats, storage seats and sleeper seats to design the ideal sofa for space by Individual choices.

[gallery link="file" size="medium" columns="1" ids="131751,131749,131752"]

The free font can be downloaded from here, and is available in white, blue, and gray colors. The Drum notes that Soffa Sans features 1,434 products, and would cost £106,320 (about $134,500) if the font were recreated in real life.

Other Similar Fonts to Download

• Airbnb Cereal



• Pokemon-font
  
  

  
  
  • Color Dot Font
  
  



• Saucy AF Font



• YayText!

Via ~ ProductHunt

Payment firm Bharatpe Appoints Former IKEA Marketing Leader as its Marketing Head

Delhi-based BharatPe, a fintech startup serving the offline retailers and businesses through UPI payments, lending, and other financial services, has announced the appointment of Abhishek Shah as the Marketing Head. In his previous roles, Abhishek played an instrumental role in building IKEA’s India setup and it’s launch last year.

Speaking on the announcement, Ashneer Grover, Co-founder of BharatPe said, “We are delighted to welcome Abhishek to team BharatPe. As we continue to ease business for small merchants in India, he will provide the creative vision for our growth and together, we shall strive to create the largest network of small merchants in India."

“In the past few months, we have onboard over 8,00,000 merchants, and we are aiming to enable over 10 million merchants over the next two years. Abhishek's entrepreneurial mindset and a deep understanding of the industry will be instrumental in leading this growth. His first task would be the launch of high decibel campaign with Salman Khan,” Ashneer added.

[caption id="attachment_131031" align="alignleft" width="339"] Abhishek Shah, Chief Marketing Officer at Bharatpe[/caption]Abhishek Shah has an extensive experience in building and growing brands and comes with a deep knowledge of consumer insights and triggers. Previously, Abhishek has worked with category leader brands like IKEA, IPL franchises and Tata Group among others across business and marketing roles.

Commenting on his appointment, Abhishek Shah, Chief Marketing Officer at Bharatpe said, “Being in the industry, I have been observing the growth trajectory of BharatPe. Working towards transforming and strengthening India's digital payment ecosystem, and it is a privilege to receive an opportunity to work with the team here, to bridge the gap between digital disruption and consumer engagement to build BharatPe.

In April, BharatPe had raised $15.5 million in series A round of funding from Insight Partners and existing investors, Sequoia and Beenext.

So far, BharatPe has raised a total of $17.5 million in three rounds. The $15.5 million Series A funding raised by the company is the highest Series A funding in Indian startup Industry till now.

Founded in last year, by Ashneer Grover and Shashvat Nakrani, BharatPe has established operations in 13 cities, serving over 8 Lakh merchants across Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Pune, Mumbai, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Indore, Bhopal, Nagpur, Chandigarh, Mysore, and Visakhapatnam. The company is on track to serve over 25 Lakh merchants on its network by the end of 2019.

VC Arm of IKEA Invests in Bangalore's Livspace

Ingka investments, the investment arm of IKEA's parent firm Ingka Group,has invested in Bangalore-based home furnishing startup Livspace for a minority stake, reported Deal Street Asia.

Livspace will use fresh Fundings in areas such as developing new home interior solutions and products, market expansion as well as growing its offline footprint.

Ingka Group operates 90 percent of Ikea’s retail footprint.

Founded in 2015 by a former Google executive Anuj Srivastava, Livspace was initially started as an online shopping destination where users can design, decorate and furnish their home. Later over the time, the startup opt for omni channel strategy and opened its first offline store in Hyderabad last year and has received FDI approval to operate retails store.

The startup has so far raised over $98 Mn in funding over five rounds in total. Its other investors include गोल्डमैन सचस, TPG Growth, Bessemer Venture Partners and Helion Venture, among others.

Livspace has even acquired few companies that include - - YoFloor, a Bangalore-based Home Design platform that uses interactive 3D models, Dwll.IN, a Mumbai-based curated network of interior designers, and DezignUp, an online community for home designers and home products.

IKEA Inviting 20 Growth-Stage Startups to Join its Start-up Program 'IKEA Bootcamp'

Swedish furniture giant IKEA is inviting 20 growth-stage start-ups from across the world including India and Sweden to join its start-up program called IKEA Bootcamp, a 3-months long, semi-remote program slated from March 25 to June 18 2019,. With this startup program, IKEA aims to find partners that can help address the big challenges of future – ‘affordability for the many people’, ‘connecting with and being accessible for people across the world’, and ‘enabling a positive impact on the planet, the people and society’.

For its bootcamp program, IKEA has joined hands with Rainmaking, which is a startup incubator and venture development firm based out of Denmark.

IKEA Bootcamp first kicked off in 2017 where ten startups were invited to join the program, and work closely together with IKEA and Rainmaking to accelerate their startup. Now, the program has pivoted into a pilot-focused program with the aim to be working with 20 growth-stage startups.

Interested startups may apply here and the last date of application submission is 31 December, 2018.

Driven by curiosity and with a constant relevant vision in “Creating a better everyday life for the many people”, IKEA sets out to further explore how to enable the vision in the future. This in a world where everyone has to be more considerate about the limits of the planet and where an increasing urbanization is dawning, changing the needs and dreams of people.

By inviting 20 growth-stage startups to Älmhult, IKEA hopes to find partners that can help with the big challenges in creating a better everyday life at home for people all around the world, now and in the future. These challenges include ensuring ‘affordability for the many people’, ‘connecting with and being accessible for people across the world’, and ‘enabling a positive impact on the planet, the people and society’.

“IKEA has made a huge commitment where we will transform our business model from linear to a circular business – meaning many changes. For us this means a lot of entrepreneurial ‘doing’ and not waiting for perfection. We see the IKEA Bootcamp program as an opportunity to find startups with creativity and knowledge that can truly challenge us going forward.”, says Tony Sandelius, Range & Product Development manager, at IKEA of Sweden.

The 2019 program will be a three month semi-remote program, designed to accommodate the growth-stage startups, who are also managing their day-to-day business while co-creating with IKEA. Throughout the program, IKEA will continuously explore whether or not to progress with the collaborations. That means, the startups will only dedicate a full three months, if there’s a likelihood of partnering with IKEA. The program will be hosted in Älmhult - the heart of IKEA, where the startups will spend time on and off throughout the program. The Bootcamp will result in Demo Day as the “big finale” where progress and next steps with IKEA will be presented.

“IKEA Bootcamp is an initiative where we stretch ourselves to see where we can find new talents, new possibilities, and scale good ideas in order to be a partner for positive change. That is also how we will measure success, because this is not a powerpoint exercise, this is about solving real problems in a way we can act on.” says Per Krokstäde, IKEA Bootcamp manager, at IKEA of Sweden.

This year the IKEA Bootcamp will be a collaboration between IKEA Range & Supply, focusing on product and supply chain development, and the IKEA franchisee Ingka Group where the main focus will be on retail transformation for the future.

”We’re excited to get this process started as we see a huge potential in collaborating with startups to find innovative and inspiring solutions for future retail. With 75 years of experience in life at home and retail business, we are ready to explore new ways of meeting the customers’ needs, in all aspects of life. We want to create a more affordable, convenient and sustainable retail industry in collaborations with others,” says David McCabe, Development & Innovation Manager, Ingka Group.

The program will enable the selected startups to develop by applying Rainmaking’s knowledge and experience with accelerators, in the context of the IKEA values and vision.

“This second edition of the IKEA Bootcamp is more focused on bridging gaps between IKEA and impactful startups solving real-world problems. We’re proud to extend the partnership to also include the retail side of IKEA, which is a meaningful addition to the scope.”, says Alex Farcet, Partner for Rainmaking.

Via - Inventiva | Source - IKEA Newsroom

Google and Ikea to Launch their Own India E-Commerce Stores

Search giant Google and Swedish ready-to-assemble furniture giant Ikea are eyeing Indian e-commerce market as they both are coming up with their own e-commerce stores respectively (and separately) under their own brand name to sell their branded products under one roof.

Google Online Storefront

Google, which recently unveiled series of its flagship products, plans to launch an online storefront for all its branded hardware products, reported Economic Times. The product Google would sell through these online shop would include its flagship smartphone Pixel, Chromecast, Google Home smart speakers, and virtual reality headset, Daydream.

A Google spokesperson has even confirmed the same saying, "We are looking to launch a Google-branded online store for all hardware launched in India, with an authorized partner who will operate and manage the fulfillment."

Notably, Google already has pre-launch version of its India storefront - store.google.com, which allows users to find both online and offline retailers where they could purchase its products from.

Post the launch of full online storefront, which is expected to launch next month, users in India will get an option to purchase, with a redirection to the partner’s page, upon which the transaction can be completed.

For opening its e-commerce store Google is said to be in discussions with several third-party partners for this, including Ingram Micro.

According to Neil Shah, partner at Counterpoint Research, "A storefront allows Google to access info on the premium users looking to buy its phones. Second, it also helps the brand to control the end-to-end selling experience and have the ability to cross-sell other products and offerings, like bundling Google Home or accessories, or even, in the future, extended warranty plans or upgrade programs like Apple does well with Apple Care."

Ikea E-Commerce Store

Furniture retailer Ikea, which made its foray into India in July this year by launching its first store in Hyderabad, would now start its e-commerce operations in India by March 2019, announced Peter Betzel, CEO of Ikea India.

Ikea is looking at total integration of both online and offline channels to generate revenue but expects high number of online orders, since the company is developing its business online with physical meeting points.

"Ikea will create a multi-channel experience for its customers in India. It will launch e-commerce in Mumbai early next summer (March) and introduce other touch points to bring the brand closer to customers," Ikea CEO told news agency PTI.

In May 2017, IKEA introduced an online shopping interactive catalog, as a shopping virtual-assistant intelligent user interface web application.

It is to be noted that, in September last year, IKEA acquired San Francisco-based startup, TaskRabbit, which is an online and mobile marketplace that matches freelance labor with local demand.

The acquisition of TaskRabbit can be seen as Ikea's strategy to strengthen its digital customer service capabilities to better compete with global rivals like Amazon.

With the entry of Ikea, India's local players such as Pepperfry and Urban Ladder have too strengthened their retail presence by envisaging omni-channel strategies that is by opening physical stores to which they call "Experience Centres. Pepperfry has 22 offline store aka ‘experiential’ studios to which the startup wants to grow by 46 by end of 2018. Urban Ladder on other end has 10 physical stores including in Delhi, Gurgaon and Noida.

[Images - Ikea.com]

Google and Ikea to Launch their Own India E-Commerce Stores

Search giant Google and Swedish ready-to-assemble furniture giant Ikea are eyeing Indian e-commerce market as they both are coming up with their own e-commerce stores respectively (and separately) under their own brand name to sell their branded products under one roof.

Google Online Storefront

Google, which recently unveiled series of its flagship products, plans to launch an online storefront for all its branded hardware products, reported Economic Times. The product Google would sell through these online shop would include its flagship smartphone Pixel, Chromecast, Google Home smart speakers, and virtual reality headset, Daydream.

A Google spokesperson has even confirmed the same saying, "We are looking to launch a Google-branded online store for all hardware launched in India, with an authorized partner who will operate and manage the fulfillment."

Notably, Google already has pre-launch version of its India storefront - store.google.com, which allows users to find both online and offline retailers where they could purchase its products from.

Post the launch of full online storefront, which is expected to launch next month, users in India will get an option to purchase, with a redirection to the partner’s page, upon which the transaction can be completed.

For opening its e-commerce store Google is said to be in discussions with several third-party partners for this, including Ingram Micro.

According to Neil Shah, partner at Counterpoint Research, "A storefront allows Google to access info on the premium users looking to buy its phones. Second, it also helps the brand to control the end-to-end selling experience and have the ability to cross-sell other products and offerings, like bundling Google Home or accessories, or even, in the future, extended warranty plans or upgrade programs like Apple does well with Apple Care."

Ikea E-Commerce Store

Furniture retailer Ikea, which made its foray into India in July this year by launching its first store in Hyderabad, would now start its e-commerce operations in India by March 2019, announced Peter Betzel, CEO of Ikea India.

Ikea is looking at total integration of both online and offline channels to generate revenue but expects high number of online orders, since the company is developing its business online with physical meeting points.

"Ikea will create a multi-channel experience for its customers in India. It will launch e-commerce in Mumbai early next summer (March) and introduce other touch points to bring the brand closer to customers," Ikea CEO told news agency PTI.

In May 2017, IKEA introduced an online shopping interactive catalog, as a shopping virtual-assistant intelligent user interface web application.

It is to be noted that, in September last year, IKEA acquired San Francisco-based startup, TaskRabbit, which is an online and mobile marketplace that matches freelance labor with local demand.

The acquisition of TaskRabbit can be seen as Ikea's strategy to strengthen its digital customer service capabilities to better compete with global rivals like Amazon.

With the entry of Ikea, India's local players such as Pepperfry and Urban Ladder have too strengthened their retail presence by envisaging omni-channel strategies that is by opening physical stores to which they call "Experience Centres. Pepperfry has 22 offline store aka ‘experiential’ studios to which the startup wants to grow by 46 by end of 2018. Urban Ladder on other end has 10 physical stores including in Delhi, Gurgaon and Noida.

[Images - Ikea.com]