| Build Intec fair to see business enquiries worth Rs 50 crore. |
R. Yegya Narayanan, Coimbatore, Feb.17
As the real-estate market shifts its focus from the high-end segment to the mass market in Coimbatore, participation in the international construction trade fair Build Intec 2010, organised by the Coimbatore District Small Industries Association (Codissia) from Friday, will also reflect the shift in the focus of the industry, according to Mr K.Ilango, President, Codissia.
He expected the construction fair, which is basically a business-to-business (B2B) initiative, to generate business enquiries worth about Rs 50 crore, nearly double of what the previous edition generated in 2009.
Speaking to Business Line here, he said when his organisation conducted the first construction industry exhibition Build Expo in 2003, the real-estate market in Coimbatore was just beginning to enjoy the boom that lasted up to 2008. During the early years of the show, Codissia was looking at participants engaged in marketing/manufacturing fundamental building materials. Around 2005 when international trade opened up, imported materials started flooding the markets and the aspiration levels of the consumers began to change in terms of quality, aesthetic appeal, etc.
He said with the market heating up, the industry started focussing on luxury and high-end materials as builders, who were focussing in the early 2000s on apartments in the Rs 25-30 lakh range, shifted their attention towards apartments in the Rs 75 lakh - Rs 1 crore range, and the lower end of the realty market was ignored. But when the slowdown began in late 2008, the industry realised that the demand for high-end market could not be sustained because it was ‘speculation driven'.
Mr Ilango said the market is “now grounded more to reality” and the promoters have realised that they have to cater to the mass market. He said though the rest of the economy is on the road to recovery, the construction sector has “not started moving up” other than infrastructure sectors such as roads. But the market expectations, instead of being driven by ‘irrational exuberance', were more sober now and as the real wages of the workers go up, there would be greater demand for housing in the mass market segment.
He said the construction trade fairs organised by Codissia also reflected the changing preferences of the market. After going from low levels in the initial years to highly ‘euphoric levels' later, it is getting to reflect the ground reality of today. The products on display at the Codissia exhibition would reflect that trend. With growing mechanisation to cope with labour shortage, more machinery makers/people in automation segment are participating in the show.
He said the Codissia fair was more a B2B initiative than a property show that would be a B2C show. He expected visitors to come, apart from the Coimbatore region, from places such as Kochi, Mysore, Kozhikode, Tiruchi, Madurai, etc. A lot of new products on display at the exhibition would attract the attention of dealers in these cities and they may strike deals with manufacturers for distributorship in their areas.
On whether there was greater participation interest in the show this year compared with last year, Mr Ilango said unlike during the euphoric boom period when they could sell what they produced, companies are more ‘down to earth' in their expectations now and look for real users of the products for long-term growth.
Asked how the Coimbatore Codissia show was rated compared with similar exhibitions in other tier II cities in the region, he said there was a huge number of players in the infrastructure segment in tier II cities in the region. Build Intec was the largest among the fairs conducted in tier II cities in the South such as Madurai, Tiruchi, Kochi, Kozhikode and Mysore.
He said at the Jan 2009 Build Intec, it was estimated that business enquiries worth about Rs 25 crore-Rs 30 crore were generated. This year, this was expected to go up to Rs 50 crore plus. Source: Hindu BusinessLine
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