How Fabindia sees itself at 66; Life at Tata after Chandra
“Our aspiration is to strengthen our foothold in the mind of the customer,” says Fabindia’s Managing Director William Nanda Bissell. Meanwhile, what's brewing at Tata? Who could lead Tata Sons after N Chandrasekaran?
Dear Reader,
The weekend’s almost here, but the boss’s order is to go all in on AI.
Google co-founder Sergey Brin has, in recent months, urged AI staff to accelerate efforts on the Gemini model as parent company Alphabet is eager to catch up with rivals, Reuters reports citing sources.
Last week, the company announced a leadership rejig, moving Demis Hassabis, the co-founder and CEO of Google DeepMind AI lab, to the role of chairman and Alphabet chief scientist. The new AI boss, Koray Kavukcuoglu, has his task cut out: to close the AI performance gap with OpenAI and Anthropic.
Elsewhere, Microsoft has shut at least 15 branch offices and JVs in China in the past five years. The company is reportedly pursuing a strategy of retreat amid China’s domestic push and US export controls.
At home, funding interest is picking up in frontier-tech and growth-stage startups.
Mirae Asset Venture Investments wants to bridge the funding gap between Series B and Series D stages and help founders build large, enduring companies—with Mirae Asset Venture Opportunity Fund – II. The VC investment platform has raised Rs 1,125 crore in the first close of its Rs 1,800-crore fund.
Meanwhile, Bluehill.VC, a frontier-tech focused VC firm in Chennai, has made the final close of its maiden Rs 400-crore fund.
In other news, Honasa Consumer, the parent company of beauty & personal care brand Mamaearth, has reported a 119% rise in net profit for the first quarter of FY27. Its revenue rose by 27% in the same period.
In today’s newsletter, we will talk about
- How Fabindia sees itself at 66
- Life at Tata after Chandra
Here’s your trivia for today: Which company created the first mass-produced portable computer? (Scroll down for the answer)
Interview
William Nanda Bissell on Fabindia at 66
66 years, 340 stores, 127 Indian cities, 13 international outlets, 7 countries. That’s FabIndia’s scorecard in a nutshell. These numbers no doubt point to growth and scale, but they also reflect something quieter: longevity. It’s the kind that speaks about the brand’s rootedness—to the Indian milieu, its people, and the communities it works with.
While everything around us is changing rapidly, there are some constants in life that give us comfort and a sense of familiarity. Fabindia would rather be that ‘constant’ in a customer’s life than be the brand of the moment or the trend of the day. The company values recall more than anything else—the memories and associations a customer attaches to its name.
“Our aspiration is to strengthen our foothold in the mind of the customer,” says Fabindia’s Managing Director William Nanda Bissell, in a conversation with Shradha Sharma, Founder and CEO of YourStory and The Bharat Project.
Excerpts:
- Bissell strongly believes India is not about “fashion brands” but about “passion brands”. “India is a living culture, where the museum is on the side because the real culture is maintained through the hands of the person (artisan),” he says. And it is this living legacy that Fabindia wants to carry forward.
- India’s advantage lies in its micro entrepreneurs. Artisans, he insists, are best understood as ‘micro entrepreneurs’ rather than as ‘beneficiaries’. Some of the relationships Fabindia has with suppliers run three generations deep.
- Fabindia is grounded. At the same time, it is aligned with the demands of modern retail, investing in both physical stores and digital commerce. Both have unique advantages and a distinct moat. The moat in physical stores is services, says Bissell. That’s why Fabindia treats each of its stores as a place people choose to travel to for an experience rather than a place they visit out of necessity.
Analysis
Could a next-gen Tata be groomed for the top job?
Who could lead Tata Group after N Chandrasekaran? That’s the immediate focus. The longer-term question for the group is: could one of the three children of Noel Tata, who is the vice-chairman of Titan, be groomed for an eventual leadership role at Tata Sons?
Key takeaways:
- Tata Steel’s T V Narendran has emerged as one of the frontrunners, with Tata Sons chief financial officer Saurabh Agrawal and Tata Motors managing director and chief executive Shailesh Chandra also named by people familiar with the matter. Reports also place TCS chief K Krithivasan and Tata Chemicals veteran R Mukundan in the wider pool.
- What about Leah, Maya or Neville, Noel’s children? Will a Tata return to the top table? The group has a template for grooming a successor in plain sight. Cyrus Mistry was appointed deputy chairman in November 2011 and succeeded Ratan Tata as chairman only in December 2012. Any move to position the next generation would more plausibly follow that route than involve a direct elevation.
- Can Noel Tata not simply take the Tata Sons chair? Age is just one factor. The group’s governance architecture could present a bigger hurdle. For now, the race is likely to be among experienced Tata executives and senior group leaders. But the more consequential succession story could play out later.
News & updates
- Veranda earnings: Chennai-based education firm Veranda Learning Solutions has reported a strong start to the 2027 fiscal year, with both top-line and bottom-line surging in the first quarter, driven by overall momentum across its portfolio and disciplined cost management.
- Firstcry Q1: FirstCry parent Brainbees has cut Q1 FY27 loss 34% to Rs 44 Cr, while revenue has grown 13%. The India business has posted a 18% y-o-y rise, its strongest growth in seven quarters.
- User outrage: Twitch has been criticised by users after it emerged that the streaming platform had allowed their content to be used to train Amazon's AI models.
Which company created the first mass-produced portable computer?
Answer: Osborne Computer Corporation
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