Shriram Iyer
DGM, Auto Market Analysis
Tata Motors Business Services Ltd.
PGEMP Batch 48 | Year: 2014–2016
2014: Manager, NPI – CV – Business Planning, Tata Motors.
I was managing the small commercial vehicles and pickups portfolio in 2014-16 as a business planner. The team was working on a project to improve the market share for pickups. We decided to check the positioning of our pickup from a marketing perspective in a market dominated by M&M pickups. We did a deep dive into customer segmentation, made innumerable market visits, and spoke with end users to identify customer needs and product improvements. Through this analysis, we uncovered opportunities to enhance and reposition our product. We aimed to achieve a balance between top-line profits and increased market share without compromising on costs, customer expectations, or the company’s ambitions. The light-duty segment is a high-volume game, and our ambition was to become the market leader.
I understood customer segmentation and why it is important to break the market segment into clear, homogeneous focus areas and position the product to deliver the right performance at the right price to the right customer. The capstone project was so successful that Dr. Ashita Agarwal, my professor, wanted to publish it. My mentor, Projesh Kar at Tata Motors, was thrilled at this development. He was also one of the co-authors and helped me get the necessary approvals so that I could present and publish as a case study for management students.
It is a heady feeling. I believe many PGEMP capstone projects have the potential to become case studies. The Ivey case studies are well-researched and consumed avidly by academia, students, and professionals.
I experienced another real-life marketing problem at Ashok Leyland and documented it as a case study. I plan to convert more of my personal experiences into case studies. These real-life problems and their solutions can impact management students.
These are excerpts from his interview featured in the PGEMP Impact Book (January 2025)