Newsletter-Apr'16

ISSUE – 6 | APRIL 2016

From the MD & CEO’s desk… 

Dear Teammates & Partners, 

2015-16 has been a difficult year, specially for most of the customers - metal 

industry is under tremendous pressure. But we have been fortunate to be with 

excellent customers, some of whom believe in 

investing in efficiency rather than cost cutting 

in difficult times. 

We expect a much better 2016-17 for the industry 

and a major change in our domain. My request 

to all customers, continue demanding – without any 

inhibition, and to ourselves, service your customers 

in search of excellence. 

Warm regards, 

Issue – 6 | April 2016 

Shoummo K Acharya

New Feathers 

NOAMUNDI 

eTrans has started a CITE (Center for Improvement in 

Transparency & Efficiency) at Tata Steel Iron Ore plant at 

Noamundi. It is a 24/7 operative center where our staff 

monitor the movement of vehicles with eTrans GPS and 

provide data to improve efficiency of the system. 

GHATO 


eTrans will start tracking in-plant movement of 

vehicles which carry coal through smart cards 

for NKCPL at Tata Steel mines at West 

Bokaro.

eTrans has developed a RFID tracking system for tracking of wagons. 

A composite GPS unit is being developed in-house which will be extremely pocketfriendly 

and will have all features. 

Issue – 6 | April 2016

Karwan-Linde, CESC, ITC 

A meet & greet evening “Karwan” with all our clients was organized on March 18 th . Such meets 

open up grey areas in our mutual relationships enabling us to serve better. All the major Kolkata 

based clients like Linde, CESC, ITC and SPS Steel participated in the program. A presentation 

on our Company’s activities and future plans was shared with them. We did inform them that 

they are not clients but our “partners in progress”. 

Mr. Ranabir Chatterjee, Head of Delivery - South Asia & ASEAN at The Linde Group, was 

extremely enthusiastic about the progress of eTrans. He was full of praise for our MD, Mr. 

Acharya. He emphasized that Mr. Acharya’s vision and foresightedness is exemplary. He 

requested Mr. Acharya not to stop dreaming. Mr. Debanjan Ganguly, Sr Manager – Logistics 

expressed his emotional approach towards eTrans. He has been directly associated with eTrans 

right from the beginning when installations were being done as well as through the stabilization 

process. Mr. Ganguly mentioned that all through these years, he has received tremendous 

response from both Samiran De & Rashid Alam. 

Mr. Partha Bhattacharya, GM- Materials, CESC Ltd was not at all prepared to speak in the 

forum. But he was so motivated from what he heard from others, he thought it pertinent to say 

something on the benefits received by CESC from tracking. 


Customers have always been pillars of support for eTrans. The Karwan (journey) of 15 years 

have been possible only for them. The way customers of Kolkata appreciated the service level & 

contribution of eTrans, it was really an evening worth attending.


Interactive Meet - HCIL 

An interactive meet was held for the transport operators of Himadri Chemicals & 

Industries Ltd. On Feb 26. Such interaction facilitates our understanding of their 

problems & concerns, so that such issues could be addressed better. The 

programme was presided by Mr. S K Chhabra, Vice President, HCIL & Mr. S K 

Acharya, MD & CEO, eTrans. 

eTrans had completed 4 years association with HCIL and it was definitely a cause 

to celebrate. Initially it was with outbound swipe cards which was being used at 

HCIL for tracking. GPS also got slowly included in the association – they started 

with just 10. 

eTrans’ association with Mr. Saubhagya Pattanaik, Sr. Manager – Logistics & 

Planning, goes back to 2008. He has always guided us on improvement in the 

system to create transparency. True to his nature, he gave an inspirational speech 

on the necessities of Tracking and how eTrans has been able to create huge value 

to his organization. Mr. Joydeep Chowdhury, Manager – Coal Tar Div. 

acknowledged the effectiveness of GPS tracking in managing vehicles. 

High performing transporters were also given public recognition through 

mementoes & certificates, from both eTrans & HCIL. 



We speak-Pankaj Grover 

15 th August 2002, eTrans started its association with Tata Steel Jamshedpur – an association which is 

still going strong. The major portion of the credit for this super success goes to the team eTrans, 

particularly Pankaj Grover, who is indeed a role model in the Company. Joining as a Sales Executive, 

Pankaj groomed himself and out of sheer dedication and determination, rose to the position of National 

Head - Sales & Customer Relations. 

When asked about his experience Pankaj said – 

“Generally people have one life companion but I have been 

fortunate enough to have two companions in my life. First being 

my spouse and other quite obviously being eTrans. My life at 

eTrans began on 29th July 2002 when I joined as a Sales 

Executive. Those were extremely tough days as the future of the 

company was dependent on our acceptability to the driver. I am 

very much thankful to those who have supported us & made what 

we are today. The days after initial acceptance had been quite 

smooth until TATA STEEL all of a sudden decided to implement 

GPS. Our Nightmare started once again, with GPS devices getting 

down every other day after installation. All of us ran after trailers 

in order to check the problem and make it work. I would again 

like to extend gratitude to Mr. Jaspal Virk for letting us do all sorts 

experiments on his vehicles. 

eTrans as an organization has been very supportive and has been always there for its employees even in 

bad days when company was making no profit and was continuously accumulating losses. With Mr. 

Acharya’s leadership I always felt cozy as an individual & as an employee. During these 14 years of 

tenure there has never been a day when I felt that I would ever like to get away from eTrans. Over the 

years I have also witnessed a vibrant and wonderful set of colleagues and Superiors. 


To Sum up I have been blessed to have been a part of such a wonderful organization, a vibrant team 

and a very energetic leader.”

We speak – Rashid Alam 

Md Rashid Alam joined eTrans in December 2007, at a time when the Company was going through 

doldrums. GPS units were just introduced & performance was very poor. Rashid, initially worked in the 

card infrastructure department for some time and then moved to the GPS service department. Slowly 

eTrans turned its course and eventually has emerged as the longest survivor in this domain. eTrans can 

boast of having the best service network in India. Let us hear from Rashid on his journey in servicing one 

of the largest network in the country. 

“No doubt the entire journey of 8years in this organization has been 

amazing and full of Experience. Yes it was a roller coaster ride with 

the ups and downs during every accomplishment of my target. I 

started my career in eTrans looking after Cards Swipe uptime and 

would be proud to mention to be the first to achieve 100% uptime 

for a continuous six months. Based on this achievement I was 

assigned to look after GPS uptime and had been working 

aggressively to achieve the uptime to 90% as this was the target 

given to achieve. Though the same was tough but not impossible, 

therefore my entire focus was achieving the unattainable target. And 

yes as the saying goes nothing is achieved without a good Team 

work and this was my backbone to achieving the GPS uptime from 

77% to 94%. This was just one part of the target achieved the second 

part was to ensure customer Satisfaction as the saying goes 

Customer Satisfaction is the key to the organization’s growth and 

revenue enhancement. 


This required all service issues to be attended and closed within timelines irrespective of the hurdles 

thereby ensuring enhance customer experience. Till today all my customers are satisfied and contended 

with the service rendered and have also resulted in additional sales. 

The organization has been very supportive and allowed me to have all the power to take decisions leading 

to greater responsibilities and accomplishments. Every reward and recognition from the organization has 

enthused me with increased determination to excel and achieve more and more... Hope this 

continues….Looking forward to higher responsibilities and excelling in newer fields.”

HOW TECHNOLOGY CAN DISRUPT OUR FUTURE 

Excerpt from an essay by Vishal Sarda – CEO, SKCL Wealth Management Pvt Ltd 

In 1998, Kodak had 170,000 employees and sold 85% of all photo paper worldwide. 

Within just a few years, their business model disappeared and they got bankrupt. 

What happened to Kodak will happen in a lot of industries in the next 10 year - and most people don't see it 

coming. Did you think in 1998 that 3 years later you would never take pictures on paper film again? Yet digital 

cameras were invented in 1975. The first ones only had 10,000 pixels, but followed Moore's law. So as with all 

exponential technologies, it was a disappointment for a long time, before it became way superior and got 

mainstream in only a few short years. It will now happen with Artificial Intelligence, health, autonomous and 

electric cars, education, 3D printing, agriculture and jobs. Welcome to the 4th Industrial Revolution. 

Welcome to the Exponential Age. 

Software will disrupt most traditional industries in the next 5-10 years. Uber is just a software tool, they don't 

own any cars, and are now the biggest taxi company in the world. Airbnb is now the biggest hotel company in 

the world, although they don't own any properties. 


Artificial Intelligence: Computers become exponentially better in understanding the world. This year, a 

computer beat the best Go player in the world, 10 years earlier than expected. In the US, young lawyers already 

don't get jobs. Because of IBM Watson, you can get legal advice (so far for more or less basic stuff) within 

seconds, with 90% accuracy compared with 70% accuracy when done by humans. So if you study law, stop 

immediately. There will be 90% less lawyers in the future, only specialists will remain. 

Watson already helps nurses diagnosing cancer, 4 time more accurate than human nurses. Facebook now has a 

pattern recognition software that can recognize faces better than humans. In 2030, computers will become more 

intelligent than humans. 

Autonomous cars: In 2018 the first self driving cars will appear for the public. Around 2020, the complete 

industry will start to be disrupted. You don't want to own a car anymore. You will call a car with your phone, it 

will show up at your location and drive you to your destination. You will not need to park it, you only pay for the 

driven distance and can be productive while driving. Our kids will never get a driver's license and will never 

own a car. It will change the cities, because we will need 90-95% less cars for that. We can transform former 

parking space into parks. 1,2 million people die each year in car accidents worldwide. We now have one 

accident every 100,000km, with autonomous driving that will drop to one accident in 10 million km. That will 

save a million life each year.


Most car companies might become bankrupt. Traditional car companies try the evolutionary approach and just 

build a better car, while tech companies (Tesla, Apple, Google) will do the revolutionary approach and build a 

computer on wheels. I spoke to a lot of engineers from Volkswagen and Audi; they are completely terrified of 

Tesla. 

Electric cars will become mainstream until 2020. Cities will be less noisy because all cars will run on electric. 

Electricity will become incredibly cheap and clean: Solar production has been on an exponential curve for 30 

years, but you can only now see the impact. Last year, more solar energy was installed worldwide than fossil. 

The price for solar will drop so much that all coal companies will be out of business by 2025. 

With cheap electricity comes cheap and abundant water. Desalination now only needs 2kWh per cubic meter. We 

don't have scarce water in most places, we only have scarce drinking water. Imagine what will be possible if 

anyone can have as much clean water as he wants, for nearly no cost. 

At the end of this year, new smartphones will have 3D scanning possibilities. You can then 3D scan your feet 

and print your perfect shoe at home. In China, they already 3D printed a complete 6-storey office building. By 

2027, 10% of everything that's being produced will be 3D printed. 

Business opportunities: If you think of a niche you want to go in, ask yourself: "in the future, do you think we 

will have that?" and if the answer is yes, how can you make that happen sooner? If it doesn't work with your 

phone, forget the idea. And any idea designed for success in the 20th century is doomed in to failure in the 21st 

century. 

Work: 70-80% of jobs will disappear in the next 20 years. There will be a lot of new jobs, but it is not clear if 

there will be enough new jobs in such a small time. 

There is an app called "moodies" which can already tell in which mood you are. Until 2020 there will be apps 

that can tell by your facial expressions if you are lying. Imagine a political debate where it's being displayed 

when they are telling the truth and when not. 

Bitcoin will become mainstream this year and might even become the default reserve currency. 

Longevity: Right now, the average life span increases by 3 months per year. Four years ago, the life span used to 

be 79 years, now it's 80 years. The increase itself is increasing and by 2036, there will be more that one year 

increase per year. So we all might live for a long long time, probably way more than 100. 

Education: The cheapest smartphones are already at 10$ in Africa and Asia. Until 2020, 70% of all humans will 

own a smartphone. That means, everyone has the same access to world class education. Every child can use 

Khan academy for everything a child learns at school in First World countries. We have already released our 

software in Indonesia and will release it in Arabic, Suaheli and Chinese this Summer, because I see an enormous 

potential. We will give the English app for free, so that children in Africa can become fluent in English within 

half a year.

Newsletter-Apr'16

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