Every business usually has an interesting story about its inception. Sripal Bachawat’s story of how he co-founded C-Square Info Solutions with Sajith T is especially captivating. In the early 2000s there were two strong competitors, Covenant Pharmassist Inc., founded by Sripal & Cybix Info Systems founded by Sajith. The two companies offered a complete range of business management solutions to the pharmaceutical industry across all segments. Going by the adage that the best way to beat the competition is to collaborate, the two founders decided to join hands in 2002 to create C-Square Info Solutions, positioned themselves as leaders in the industry and the rest as they say is history.

In the past decade C-Square has emerged as a one-stop solution company that streamlines, automates & optimizes workflow of their clients in the pharmaceutical & healthcare sectors, by using a proactive & collaborative approach.

In conversation with GlobalLinker (GL), Sripal Bachawat (SB) traces the journey of his business over the past 14 years.

GL: Tell us about your business and how it came into being.

SB: C-Square’s inception was the result of collaboration between two leading pharmaceutical solution providers, Covenant Pharmassist and Cybix Info Systems. C-Square has emerged as a notable provider of ERP software and BI tool for the pharmaceutical industry in India over the past 14 years.

Our first solution was PharmAssist, which was positioned for Pharma Wholesalers. The major concern for Pharma wholesalers in 2002 was exercising process control on a distribution business where the volumes are high due to the high number of brands in each company’s portfolio. This process control needed to be extended to the batch level of each stock keeping unit. This added a dynamic situation every time as the number of batches in circulation kept increasing. Reverse logistics was another area where we ensured clean process discipline. The process adherence was essential keeping in mind the tenets of the drug rules in India. Our deep knowledge of the pharmaceutical industry helped us to create an all encompassing solution.

GL: What are the challenges you have faced in establishing your business?

SB: Building trust in the application and us was essential as we were actually handling core business processes, and we had to wean the wholesalers from the traditional methods to a high level of automation and control. One of the major speed breakers we had to manage in addition to supplying the solution was the hand-holding of the users during the change management process. This actually made us more customer-centric in our approach and the resultant versions were extremely user-friendly. Once the reference customers were set, we were actually on a roll. Our decision to map the entire supply chain with pharma specific solutions has kept us very customer focused. Progressing to  B2B online solutions looks very natural today on hindsight. 

GL: What is the USP of your business?

SB: The USP of C-Square is:

• Building solutions which act as force multipliers to the pharma demand side business players.
• Ensuring sales focus with concentrated actions and concerted response consistent with the need of the market.
• Delivering solutions that are customer-centric and scalable with the needs of the business
  
  

GL: What are some of the achievements of your business?

SB: The fact that our customers recognise us as their growth drivers/ partners rather than as a software provider is probably the biggest achievement in our history of 14 years.

A recent milestone we achieved was the conceptualisation and implementation of an entirely paperless warehousing solution for a 100000 sq ft warehouse for the pharma retail chain M/s Wellness Forever. This solution is a benchmark for anyone attempting to build a multi-brand warehouse in India. As pioneers of this in India, we would like to acknowledge Wellness Forever for their implicit faith in our committed deliverables for ZEDC, their warehousing unit at Bhiwandi, Maharashtra. 

GL: Who are some of your major clients?

SB: Our clients include:

• In the B2C segment we partner with path breaking companies like Protea Medical, Zigy, Netmeds, Practo, Medlife, PharmEasy, SastaSundar among others.
  
  
• In the distributor segment our partners include Meher Distributors, Vardhman Pharma Distributors, Palepu & Co, Rajsons Pharma Distributors, Paras Pharma distributors who are among the  900 clients in this segment.
  
  
• In the retailer segment we have more than 4000 customers across the length and breadth of India and have clients like Wellness Forever, Emami Frank Ross, Nobel Chemist, Aushad. We are also part of the government initiative to deliver subsidised medicines through pharmacies in major hospitals like AIIMS, New Delhi.
  
  
• In the Centralised Warehouse and Primary billing segment we have close to 500 operatives from major companies like M/s Hegde & Hegde, Ban Labs, Rusan Pharmaceuticals.
  
  
• In the SFA segment we have close to 30,000 users with services offered to companies like M/s Alkem Laboratories, J B Chemicals, Abbott India, Hetero Drugs, Alivira, Apex Laboratories, Icon Pharmaceuticals.

GL: What role do you feel GlobalLinker plays in connecting and assisting SMEs?

SB: GlobalLinker, in my opinion plays a stellar role in building a medium for exchanging views and learning from the experiences of other SMEs. The insights given by the featured entrepreneurs will definitely shorten the learning curve for aspiring entrepreneurs and also the established ones.

GL: What is your big business dream?

SB: Our vision is to create a seamless connect from top to bottom of the pharma supply chain and a B2C connect for maximising the healthcare industry deliverables to the end user.

GL: What is your message to aspiring entrepreneurs?

SB: Dream big, persist and have a meticulous detailing of all time bound actions and a systematic “check list” approach to ensure the thoroughness of work. The benchmark of our business approach is that we adhere to our commitments however small they may be.

Disclaimer: This article is based solely on the inputs shared by the featured member. GlobalLinker does not necessarily endorse the views, opinions & facts stated by the member.