The agenda for the 6th edition of VCCircle Agri & Food Investment Summit 2014 largely covers the emerging opportunities, technology led plays, innovations & review of private investments going into the upcoming and traditional investment heavy sub-segments of the Indian agri & food industry.
The event scheduled for October 28 at ITC Grand Central, Mumbai is just three days away.
Here is the updated agenda with names of speakers:
8:30am - 9:30am
Tea, Networking & Registration
9:30am - 09:45am
Introductory Note
09:45am - 10:30am
Pane l: Boosting the farm input sector - Seeds, fertilisers, irrigation, farm equipment & animal feed
With the government claiming to be focusing on agri-led businesses, how will policy initiatives, including the states relooking at the APMC Act, India’s GM crops policy and Food Safety Act affect the farm input sector? Are enough measures taken by regulatory bodies to improve soil health condition, stimulate scientific usage of seeds & pesticides, promote modern irrigation practices and disseminate high yield-disease resistant seeds? What the necessary measures are taken by financial institutions in improving access to flow of credit to farmers and farmer-producer organisations? What can be done to encourage private participation in the farm inputs & animal feed space? Considering the interest in professionally managed cattle farms, how can we meet the growing demand of high quality fodder? What are the innovations seen & challenges faced in catalysing modern technology in the field of inputs? How can the R&D infrastructure be strengthened? How can technology be brought from around the world to boost farm inputs? Can concepts like drift irrigation and precision agriculture help achieve the desired results?
Vikram Puri - CEO, Mahindra ShubhLabh Services Ltd
Mark Kahn - Founding Partner, Omnivore Partners
Peter Frykman - Founder and CEO, Driptech
Arvind Agrawal - Director, VNR Seeds Pvt Ltd
Shamender Sharma - Head Business Strategy, Khedut Agro Engineering Pvt Ltd
Girish Nadkarni - Partner, IDFC Private Equity (Moderator)
10:30am - 11:20am
Panel II: Scaling up warehousing, cold storages & agri-business supply chain logistics
Amid depressed margins and industry dominated by family-run businesses, how are entrepreneurs backed by private investors turning around the sector? Are there enough proven business models and margins to draw capital for scaling up businesses? Inhibitions, including inadequate supply chain, cold storage, warehousing, transportation, distribution and last mile connectivity, are chocking the farm-to-fork network. How do we see solutions to these bottlenecks? What are different innovative tools empowering supply chain management and controlled atmosphere systems? What are the challenges in attracting investments into cold-storage, refrigerated trucks and other modern logistics?
Sunoor Kaul - Director, Origo Commodities
Pankaj Joshi - CEO, Kelvin Cold Chain Logistics Pvt Ltd
Amith Agarwal - Executive Director, Star Agriwarehousing and Collateral Management Limited
Ananthan NS - Senior Investment Officer, IFC
Dev Lall - CMD, Bakers Circle (India) Pvt Ltd
Sanjay Kaul - Managing Director & CEO, NCMSL (Moderator)
11:20am - 11:45am
Tea & Networking Break
11:45am – 12:15pm
Presentation by Religare: Announcing a strategic initiative for the agri and food ecosystem
12:15pm - 1:00pm
Panel III: Evolving niche opportunities in organic foods, cattle farms, breweries & food ingredients market
Changing lifestyle and inclination towards healthy food are driving niche opportunities including organic food wherein the businesses are majorly driven by exports demand; professionally managed cattle farms producing organic/high quality milk; and craft breweries and functional food ingredients with therapeutic value. While demand is seen driving entrepreneurs & investment, how does one scale these niche businesses and make them profitable? What are the challenges in bringing quality, adoption, distribution & supply chain efficiencies to make business grow?
Dr. G.N.S. Reddy - Managing Director, Akshayakalpa Farms and Foods Pvt. Ltd
Leonard Menezes - CEO, Ace Alcobev Pvt Ltd
Srikumar Misra - Founder, MD & CEO, Milk Mantra
Manish Gupta - Associate Vice President, Investments, TVS Capital
Rajesh Srivastava - CMD, Rabo PE (Moderator)
1:00pm - 2:00pm
Lunch & Networking
2:00pm - 2:50pm
Panel IV: Innovations in primary & secondary processing: Food commodities, dairy & poultry and ready-to-eat packaged food
What product/process innovations are seen in primary & secondary processing amid increasing demand for good quality food commodities and processed and packaged foods? What is the extent of integration taking place in the value chain to improve efficiencies and deliver better products? How can the production, processing & distribution infrastructure be improved? What will be the key drivers of investments in the food processing value chain? What more can be done to meet the demand of value added products categories such as: grains, dairy products, meat, poultry, supplements, bakery ingredients, cocoa products, yogurts, desserts, etc? What innovations are seen across branding, packaging, marketing of the product in stiff competitive markets? How can product innovation help entrepreneurs tap opportunities at the food retail end including opportunities in smaller towns/rural areas?
Sonal Shah - Director, SMC Capitals Ltd
Viraj Bahl - Founder & Managing Director, Veeba Foods Services Pvt Ltd
Akshay Bector - MD, Mrs. Bector's Food Specialties Ltd
Rajheev Agrawal - Director & CEO, Nilon's Enterprises Pvt Ltd
Sarangdhar R Nirmal - CMD, Prabhat Dairy Pvt. Ltd.
Sanjay Sacheti - India Country Manager, Olam Agro India Ltd.
Deepak Shahdadpuri - Founder & MD DSG Partners Asia Pte Ltd (Moderator)
2:50pm - 3:20pm
VCCircle Showcase:
To showcase innovations happening in the food & agri industry, VCCircle will present select companies in agri infrastructure, warehousing & supply chain logistics, dairy & poultry, primary processing, processed food, food services & retail.
3:20pm - 3:50pm
Tea & Networking
3:50pm - 4:35pm
Panel V: Opportunities in farm fresh retail: fruits, vegetables & high value commodities
With retail finding its way in all our daily needs, farm fresh retail is driven by huge & regular demand from the market. While models are still to be proven in terms of reach, scalability & profitability, the business is getting traction from some major players which are opening up specialised retail outlets for fresh fruits & vegetables. How big is the opportunity and where does the profits lie? How are players managing the whole supply chain aggregation? What storage models are being tested? How does the tracking of the produce from farm to store happens and how efficient are the systems? Are the innovations seen in sorting, grading and storing driving the retail end?
Pankaj Khandelwal - CMD, InI Farms Pvt. Ltd
Sanjeev Asthana - Founder & Managing Partner, I-Farms Venture Advisors Pvt Ltd
P. Vijayraghavan - Director & C.E.O, Lawrencedale Agro Processing India Pvt. Ltd
Arvind Gangoly - CEO, Schedulers Logistics India Pvt Ltd
Karthik Srivatsa - Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Aspada Investment Advisors (Moderator)
4:35pm onwards
VCCircle Unwind
The session will provide more networking time to top entrepreneurs and leading investors over cocktails.
The event will bring together more than 150 CEOs representing top & emerging food & agri firms, management consultants, advisors, private equity fund managers and venture capitalists who are looking to do business in agri and food space.
Write to Sandeep/ Ipshita at register@vccircle.com or call 0120-4171111.