Essilor India is a subsidiary of Essilor International and is the market leader in the Indian plastic lens segment. It entered India in 1998 through a joint venture and now has over 42,000 employees across 54 countries. In India, Essilor has launched rural initiatives like testing villagers' vision in Karnataka using a mobile van and dispensing affordable glasses. It has also partnered with B-Able to launch the Eye Mitra program to train local entrepreneurs to provide low-cost eye care in rural areas, with a goal of serving over 2.5 million people by 2016. Essilor sees these rural business models as the beginning of its efforts to expand vision care access to India's large unserved rural

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2. Essilor India
• Essilor India is a 100% subsidiary of Essilor International.
• Excellent services, quality products and a wide network of distributors and franchise labs.
• Essilor entered the Indian Market through a joint venture with SRF Limited, New Delhi in
1998.
•
The company has since risen to the position of market leader in the Indian Plastic Lens
segment of the Ophthalmic Industry.
• After the exit of SRF Limited at the end of 2004, the company changed its name to Essilor
India Private Limited.
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3. International Presence
Essilor is an international group and now has 42,704 employees in 54 countries.
It’s success remains closely linked to the way Essilor works to meet requirements around the world.
Essilor also has brought international best practices into India in the areas of training and promotional activities
Essilor’s international presence is more than a strategy; it reflects a philosophy – knowing how to fit in
with local customs and characteristics.
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5. Market Share
“Essilor is the first company in the ophthalmic
industry to use Sensory Analysis to make a
connection between scientific data and eyeglass
wearers’ perceptions,” he added.
Essilor eyes 10% market share in Indian lens
market
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6. Profile of a Rural consumer
Size
Location
Literacy
Rural Income
Rural Savings
Reference Groups
Media habits
Brand Loyalist
High Degree of Involvement
Inter-Personal Communication
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7. India has set foot into rural India.
A project in Karnataka, Essilor is testing the vision of residents of 600 villages
and dispensing spectacles at subsidised rates through a van equipped with
testing equipment and an edger to cut the lens as per the prescription.
The company has tied up with the Chennai-based Sankara Netralaya for this project
The personnel in the van will provide the spectacles to the patient within an
hour of testing, in 70 per cent of the cases The rest will get it in a day or two.
A pair costs around Rs 200.
Good sight will also aid the economy do better as people can go about their
jobs more efficiently.
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11. India’s Eye Mitra : A potential of 2.5 million
people by 2016
India is one of the first countries to implement these new business models on a
large scale.
The signature last March of a partnership with B-Able, a local skill development
agency, marked the launch of the Eye- Mitra programme
(Eye Mitra means “Friend of the Eyes”).
It aims at bringing vision care to the doorstep of people in rural and semi urban
areas thanks to the development of local micro-enterprises by unemployed
villagers.
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12. The Present and the Future
Young entrepreneurs joining the programme are trained and equipped so they can
start their own business, performing basic vision testing and spectacle dispensing
in their outlets.
They also conduct mobile “eye- camps” with the support of Essilor and a B-Able.
The goal is to train more than 2200 Eye Mitra in the next 3 years. This will lead to
equipping 2.5 million new spectacle wearers by 2016 and 7 million by 2020.
Today, in India, 550 million people need vision correction. The total productivity
loss due to uncorrected vision is estimated to be 37 billion US$ per annum.
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13. The Rest of the world
Several business models are currently being implemented in India, China
and Brazil and could soon reach a broader scope.
These business models are based on new channels that enable the
uncorrected population to meet eye care practitioners who offer vision
testing as well as simple and affordable products.
In China, the models target the rural population as well as the employees of
manufacturing companies. In Brazil, the models focus also on urban poor
people.
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14. Essilor India has a 5-year plan
for this initiative,
which is just the beginning of
its rural marketing
programme,
Mr Jayant said.
-Managing Director, Essilor
India.
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