Abstract

The case “Digital Innovation at Asian Paints” talks about how Asian Paints Ltd. (Asian Paints) attained a leading position in the paints market by coming up with digital innovations in its operations and products. The case depicts the history of innovations practiced in the company from the 2000s. The case delves into the company’s transformation into the services phase and describes the revamping and rebranding of its product portfolio. It also describes Asian Paint’s early adoption of robotic warehousing, 3-D visualizations, chatbots, internet of things (IoT), and SAP HANA (for streamlining the company’s enterprise resource planning (ERP). The case concludes with the opportunities existing in the paints industry and the challenges ahead for Asian Paints.

Learning Objectives

The case is structured to achieve the following Learning Objectives:

• Appreciate how the company which started as a brick and mortar production facility refashioned itself with the help of state-of-the-art innovations starting on the shop floor and going all the way to the final product offerings.
• Understand the customer facing technologies that helped Asian Paints improve customer experience.
• Understand why repositioning is important for an organization to stay relevant in a changing business environment.
• Understand how digitalization enables a company to improve its operations and customer experience.
• Understand the challenges faced by the firm in retaining its leadership position in spite of being an early mover in digital innovations.

Keywords

Asian Paints; Innovation; Digital Innovation; Digital Strategy; Digitalization; Artificial Intelligence; Repositioning; Concept Stores; Digital Adoption; Internet of Things; 3-D visualization; Augmented Reality; Stock Keeping Units; Automated Storage and Retrieval System; Robotic Warehousing