Mukesh Ambani, on the 27th of June, resigned as the Director of the Reliance Jio Company. He announced the appointment of his son Akash Ambani as the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited, which holds the digital & telecom arm business of RIL. Mukesh Ambani, however, will continue to be the Chairman of Jio Platforms Limited but the announcement is hinting towards the succession plans for RIL.
Akash Ambani and Isha Ambani are twins and were running RIL’s telecom market in India. Now that Akash has been given the new responsibility, the father Ambani is on its way to acquire the retail world for daughter Ambani.
Isha Ambani is all set to take over Reliance Retail
An MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business, Isha Ambani is interested in business management. She had earlier worked at McKinsey & Company as a business analyst. Reports suggest that Isha Ambani, who is currently holding the director post of Reliance Retail Ventures Limited, will soon be announced the Chairman of the retail ventures.
Isha has been focusing on the retail expansion of the Reliance. The area of business includes consumer electronics, food, grocery, fashion, jewelry, footwear, and clothing. Notably, Isha has a strong business acumen not only across the retail business but telecom too. She was actively involved in handling the deal between Reliance Jio and big tech giants including Meta and Google in 2020 worth $25 billion. For those unversed, Reliance Jio is the brainchild of Isha and Akash Ambani which makes it quite evident that Isha is a good business woman with the intellect as that of her father.
Isha and the Retail world
Isha’s journey as a businesswoman in her father’s company began in 2014. The 30-year-old is the brand and marketing face of Reliance. It was her passion for fashion as she, herself, is a fashion enthusiast that she launched the online fashion retail store AJIO in 2017. It was the same year when she was promoted as the director of all companies under Reliance Retail Ventures Limited such as Reliance Fresh, Reliance Smart Point, Reliance Digital, Reliance Trends, Trends Footwear, Reliance Brands Limited, Reliance Consumer Brands, Reliance Smart, JioMart, Jio Stores, Project Eve, Reliance Jewels, Hamleys, Reliance Mall and 7-ELeven. As of now, there are over 12,000 stores of Reliance retail across more than 7,000 cities in the country and it has registered a profit of a whopping $2.6billion in the March quarter.
Father Ambani acquiring the world for daughter Ambani
If the sources are to be believed, Mukesh Ambani is paying extra attention to his daughter’s retail business. He wants to ensure that Isha’s retail venture maintains the lead over her rivals in the industry. While Isha worked as the director of the company and was learning how to run the business, her father was occupied expanding the portfolio of Reliance Retail and bringing a range of international brands to India. These brands are believed to be managed by Isha later.
Read more: Forget about Shark Tank India, Mukesh Ambani is the real Shark!
Recently, Reliance Retail partnered with American fashion brand Gap Inc in a long-term franchise agreement. With the agreement signed, Reliance Retail has become the official franchise partner of Gap across all outlets in India. Moreover, last week, Reliance also shook hands with UK-based Pret a Manger—a popular sandwich and coffee chain.
Moreover, the company has also gone for several strategic partnerships in order to provide the best customer experience. It launched Jio World Drive in Mumbai in 2021. Spread across 17.5 acres in Mumbai’s Bandra area, it has stores of international fashion brands such as Armani Exchange, Bally, Brooks Brothers, Calvin Klein, Coach, Diesel, Emporio Armani, Ethos, G-Star Raw, Gas, H by Hamleys, Hugo Boss, Kate Spade New York, LensCrafters, Marks and Spencer Lingerie, Michael Kors, Mothercare, Onitsuka Tiger, Paul & Shark, Paul Smith, Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids, Replay, Superdry, The White Crow, Tommy Hilfiger, Under Armour, Vero Moda etc.
Read more: Who will become the Anil Ambani of the future Reliance?
At Jio World Drive are also the stores of international beauty and perfume brands such as Byredo, Clinique, Dior, Jo Malone, Kiehl’s, MAC, Maison Des Parfums, Ethos, Montblanc, Muji, Ritu Kumar, Samsonite, Satya Paul, Steve Madden, Sunglass Hut, Tumi, and Vision Express.
The company also has partnerships in India with the brands such as Forest Essentials, Forever New, Fresh Pik, Kama Ayurveda, Manish Malhotra, Mulmul, Netmeds, POP Up, and Raghavendra Rathore.
The speculations that Mukesh Ambani is all set to take a backseat and this is why he is handing over the telecom and retail businesses to his children, the Ambani siblings. It would be interesting to watch how the siblings carry forward the business and whether they will be successful to reach another height of growth.
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