Mumbai, March 08, 2024: According to the Global Business Optimism Insights report by Dun & Bradstreet, a global leading provider of business decisioning data and analytics, Indian businesses ranked ‘customer retention’ as the highest priority closely followed by ‘competitive positioning’ and ‘business valuation’. Globally businesses ranked ‘improving business valuation’ at the top, followed by growing customer base and competitive positioning.
Priorities for Indian businesses vary by sector and size. large businesses are focusing more on improving customer retention and competitive positioning, while mid-size businesses are prioritising competitive positioning and growing customer base, and small businesses are focussing on customer retention and accelerated time to market. Businesses in wholesale and retail trade are prioritising improving business valuations more than others, whereas for construction companies strengthening supply chain and operational efficiency takes precedence, and for metals sector the priority is growing the customer base.
On the ESG front, Indian businesses are prioritising environmental sustainability and ethical procurement and supply chain policies over more ESG job creation or supporting local communities, like their global counterparts. More than 49% of Indian businesses (as against 40% globally) are looking to include CSR/ESG in their annual assessment and 34% looking for annual assessments of their CSR/ESG activities.
When asked about top three business risks in 2024, Indian businesses ranked risks to business continuity at the top, followed by market changes, and macroeconomic risks, similar to businesses globally. For the Accommodation & Food Services industry, changes in laws and regulations have been ranked as the highest risk. Financial, liquidity and insolvency risks ranked highest for BFSI, IT & Communications, Capital Goods and Textile industries, while geo-political risk has emerged as the most important risk for the mining industry.
Highlights:
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D&B Supply Chain Continuity Index for India improved marginally by 2% for Q1 2024. More than 50% of businesses are looking to diversify their supply chain to multiple suppliers and regions.
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D&B Investment Confidence Index for India dipped 9% for Q1 2024.
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D&B Financial Confidence Index for India improved 4% suggesting improvement in business’s confidence in the cost and availability of funding for operational and investment purposes.
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D&B ESG Index for India improved 4% for Q4 2023.
Speaking about the findings of the report, Arun Singh, Global Chief Economist, Dun & Bradstreet said, “While disruptions to global supply chains have become a norm globally over the last 3 years, it is encouraging to see that Indian businesses are looking to diversify their supply chain across suppliers, regions to mitigate shipment cost and delays. India is well placed to capitalise on the global supplier relocations, even more so with increased government focus on improving logistics infrastructure.”
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