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While India makes an indelible mark globally in the gems and jewelry market year after year, it is the technology that is going hand in hand to consolidate the success story. Emerging from relatively humble beginnings of a small and unorganized sector in the 1950s and 60s, the industry is well on its way to become a technology savvy corporate entity.

With the domestic market peaking $10 bn (4% of the total global market) in 2006-07 and the exports touching $15 bn (which is 18% of India's total exports), the industry seems all set to roll.

Not to mention the rising growth charts of the industry that are pushing up the IT spends, too. With the IT spend only growing by leaps and bounds, the gem and jewelry sector is poised to become the hot sparkling destination for the technology vendors.

Nagaraj Bhargava, SAP's vice president, Marketing and Sales Operation, associates the huge boom in the retail as one of the primary drivers for use of technology by the industry. "With world-class retail players entering jewelry retail in India, customers are changing their buying habits, and so gem and jewel retailers are placing an emphasis on producing a consistent and high-quality customer service experience."

Eastern Software Systems(ESS), offering IT products and services primarily to SMBs, while taking in the retail factor, also includes the manufacturing and export side. Director of ESS, Sanjay Agarwala says, "Firstly, it is the retail side which is most visible to the public, and the other is the manufacturing and export side, which is driving the use of technology."

The retail industry has matured tremendously, and is now more process driven, standardized and most importantly, brand and quality assurance matters more than anything else, adds Agarwala.

And this, of course, is being driven by customer maturity to a great extent, he says. With customers becoming more mobile than ever before, the loyalty to family jewelers is fading and the brand is becoming increasingly significant.

"He is willing to pay slightly more, provided he is assured of quality, as one may not find his family jeweler everywhere," explains Agarwala. India accounts for about 20% of total consumption of gems and jewelry products, which by far is the largest.

This is where technology comes into the picture. As the industry matures, taking a call on delivering better services to customers is becoming top priority.

Technology is not just restricted to designing anymore-managing processes, controlling supply chain, quality assurance, export documentation, inventory management, production control, managing accounts are key areas where technology is core to driving business for many players in the vertical.

Bhargava says, "IT adoption in jewelry is just picking up. Players are realizing the value of an integrated IT application. What is driving adoption is competition and the need to be organized." He points out that two years back, only the traditional jewelers dominated the business across the country. "Today, we have retailers jumping into the bandwagon," he says. Hence, the traditional businesses are looking at IT to deal with competition and manage expansion plans.

Points Laabh Jeweller's CEO, Vipin Sharma, "IT has become an integral part of our entire business approach. We have the IT architecture but as we diversify our activities, it just becomes a matter of strengthening the infrastructure more and scaling up the hardware, applications and the bandwidth."

Laabh Jewellers plans to get a good grip on technology as it draws its expansion roadmap. Laabh Jewellers went for an ERP from ESS and managing the supply chain, primarily, was a daunting task until it decided to go in for an ERP-based solution. Kama Jewellers too went in for the ERP from ESS. Kama Jeweller's CFO, Pradip Shah, points out that as volumes grew, there was a need to align manufacturing package with the financial package. "That's what drove us to hunt for an ERP," says Shah.

Another case in point is the Surat-based Venus Jewels, which has been one of the early adopters of technology. "We have adopted information technology tools since 1987 and its early application at an early stage allowed our business to be more transparent, flexible, and controlled," says Anil D Shah, partner, Venus Jewel.

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