The Right Way

The most popular go-to-market models for international expansion and scaleup involve working with and through distributor partners in different go-to-market models. Such markets are often described as 'partnership' or 'distributor' markets and are prevalent in emerging markets. Such markets offer good opportunities for growth and expansion. The challenge for many companies operating internationally through distributors can be summarised as: 'How to deliver and achieve a scalable critical mass within five years'. Success and scalability have eluded many seniors operating in distributor markets. The typical results experienced by so many company seniors often result in clusters of small value businesses that barely grow or make any impression on the numbers presented and agreed in the investment case. Such numbers are defined as 'the critical mass' to be achieved. In short, many executives fail to deliver their agreed numbers over successive years. Anyone can be forgiven once for missing their numbers. But it becomes a habit when they fail to deliver their numbers over several years. In short, they could not find 'the right way' to succeed. This book explains why so many executives failed so often and how to find 'the right way' to succeed in international expansion and scale-ups. Amit Vaidya proposes that success is down to three key factors: 1. The design of the Go-to-Market Model. 2. Finding and selecting the best-fit distributor partner in that model. 3. Having the right talent to deliver the critical mass in international scale-up. He explains in detail: - The importance of both a quantitative and a qualitative assessment in selecting international markets for scaleup. - The different models available for international scaleup and their pros and cons including legal affiliates and local manufacturing options. - Why some models and people can deliver critical mass and others can't. - The distributor models that have the best chance to deliver a critical mass and why. - How to find good distributor partners. - The difference between wholesalers, distributors and distribution service providers and their ability to deliver a critical mass. - The key situations that should trigger a review of your distributor relationship. - How to find and pick good international business managers to lead the international scale-up. The content is entirely based on his experience and real life, not textbook theories. This makes the book rather unique in its offering and content. With this practical guide to designing the best international go-to-market models through distributors, readers will learn how to avoid the mistakes made so often by so many and will discover 'the right way' to succeed. Read on......

Amit Vaidya is a life science graduate with the degree of B.Sc. Biological Sciences and holds joint honours in Biochemistry and Microbiology. He is a United Kingdom citizen having been born outside the UK in India but grown up since a young age in the UK. He has enjoyed a corporate life in the pharmaceutical industry for over forty years which led to a huge accumulation of expertise and experience in the UK, Europe and International Markets as well as global manufacturing. He started as a salesperson at ICI Pharmaceuticals which was de-merged from ICI to create Zeneca in 1993 and then merged with Astra AB of Sweden in 1999 to create a global Premier League Pharmaceutical company called AstraZeneca. He progressed quickly through increasing roles of responsibility across sales management, commercial business development, sales training, international change manager, and programme manager in a Europe-wide implementation of a new business process ERP platform and then with such a broad base of coalface experience, for his last seven years at AstraZeneca in a career spanning more than twenty years, he was appointed as Territory Director Africa in the Europe Middle East Africa (EMEA) Region based out of the UK. The role was a General Management (GM) role that carried full Profit and Loss (PandL) accountability for 18 markets in Africa where he reshaped and redesigned these 'distributor markets' to exceed sales and profit targets consistently each year above budget and grew the business at high double-digit figures exceeding budget year-on-year. He set up Samkoman Consulting Ltd in 2009 drawing on his pan-African experience to help the global top 20 pharmaceutical companies with their issues and pain points in Africa. After more than a decade of consulting with these clients, he decided to capture his experience and expertise in this book to help others meet the challenge of international scaleup and expansion. What clients paid in fees and the learnings that he shared with clients are captured in this book at a mere fraction of those fees. He currently works as a Boardroom Advisor working with senior executives in small-to-medium enterprises on international scaleup and expansion drawing on his corporate and consulting career to guide and challenge and advise seniors on their strategies and plans.