HOW IDBI BANK BECAME INDIAS 17TH FASTEST GROWING COMPANY

The genesis of this entity can be owned to the inspiration sought from Industrial Bank for Reconstruction and Development set up in 1945 to reconstruct countries devastated post World War 2 .It was set up in 1964 as a wholly owned subsidiary of RBI and has to its credit building some of the biggest financial corporations in India today like NSE,the Stock Holding Corporation of India,the Export Import B ank Of India and the Small Industries Development Bank Of India.But for IDBI Bank,which became a full fledged scheduled bank from being a development bank in 2004,such laurels did not suffice.An entity which used to generate 70% of its total business from the corporate sector,has achieved one of the most successful transformations in India Incs history to give its retail business an equal footing-not only in terms of products,but marketing and investments too. During the last fiscal,IDBI Bank registered a mind-bloggling 97.9% growth in its operating profit.Net interest income grew to Rs.22.67 billion in FY10 as compared to 12.39billion in the previous year,translating into growth of 82.9%.Going deeper,the Banks net profit grew 46%,fee based income increased by 53%,deposits grew 36%,advances grew 38%,aggregate assets rose 29% and the total business of the bank registered a growth of 37%.Interistengly,this happened during a period when most of the Indian banking giants were
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still recovering from the slowdown blues.The financial year 2010-11 has already witnessed IDBI Banks aggression in terms of marketing and promotional activities.The year has been special for IDBI Bank owing to its renewed focus on retail banking as it hass realized the powers of numbers well on time,and also about how to survive the cut throat competition.

Major initiatives taken on a long term growth: Firstly,to attract more retail business and achieve its goal of lowering cost of deposits,it has gone a step ahead of its competitors by waiving charges on many of its current account and savings account(CASA) services including account closure,ATM Interchange,demend draft cancellation. Secondly,it has taken the tactical move to install 100000 PoS(point of sale)machines to get hold of the mass by facilitating higher financial inclusion. Thirdly,it is ramping up its branch-wise penetration as it is setting up 250 new branches to increase its tally to 1000 branches.

Not just in terms of infrastructure,IDBI Bank is using an innovative touching advertising and multimedia campaign to woo customers across India.IDBIS ongoing ad campaign with the theme Friendship and the tagline-For us,customers are more precious than their money-have taken well off.On the HR front it is harnessing its staff strength to maintain a better relationship with customers.The Bank has asked its staff to build and upgrade relationship by enabling customers to open more accounts with their family and friends.Certainly though the bank enjoys full privilege of a public sector bank,it is characterized by a private sector look and feel with distinguished services. Highlights of FY 2009-10 vs 2008-09 Total Income Interest Income Non-interest Income FY 2009-10 175.64 152.73 22.91 FY 2008-09 130.32 115.45 14.76
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Total Expenses Interest Expenses Operating Expenses Operating Profit Provisions(Net) Net Profit

148.37 130.05 18.31 22.27 16.96 10.31

116.43 103.05 13.38 13.78 5.19 8.59

Though the bank is on a high growth path at the moment,there are few a still areas where it needs to be cautious.As Pankaj Pandey,Head Research,ICICI Direct warns Waiver of charges by the bank on the CASA account willdrag down the fee based growth of the bank.Moreover, the bank,at present, is in the process of merging IDBI Housing Finance with itself.The hope,as top management of IDBI Bank revealed that synergies would ensure that duplication of operations is reduced and operational efficiencies are realized optimally.But the facy remains that most of the mergers have known to fail in the industry.However,what might work for the bank is that the housing finance wing was originally an offshoot of IDBI Bank itself. Hence,the danger of culture collisions is immediately reduced.While the logic for the housing wing is synergy,the bankalmost against yhis same logic-has floated a wholly-owned subsidiary,IDBI Asset Management Ltd. To undertake mutual fund business.This apart from the banks insurance business in partnership with Fortis.Across divisions,therefore there still exists differences of opinions on strategic imperatives and intent. On the overseas front,the Bank has opened its first foreign branch at the Dubai International Financial Center.The aim us to provide a range of corporate banking services and thus closely follow its peers in the global arena.With a huge history of financing corporations and industries it wont be difficult for IDBI to move on to the global turf
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in the corporate banking arena and start giving global players a run for their money in the decades to come adding more fuel to its fast track growth record.

SORCES:BUSINESS AND ECONOMY MAGAZINE,2010 EDITION