Profile
mjunction services (formerly metaljunction), a 50:50 venture of SAIL and Tata Steel, is India's largest e-commerce company and world's largest e-marketplace for steel. Taking full advantage of information technology and the internet, it has brought efficiency, transparency and convenience to the steel and coal supply chain in India in the way these products are bought and sold. It aims to bring about a similar advance in the sale of automobiles and fixed-priced branded products with the launch of autojunction.com and straightline.in respectively.

Founded in February 2001, mjunction has e-transacted business worth Rs20,517 crore till date, and has seen its business volume in terms of transaction value soar from Rs94.35 crore in 2002 to Rs8,053 crore in 2007.

mjunction's growth has not only been in terms of transactional value, revenue and profits, but also in its geographic spread. In a period of just five years, it has set up offices at 10 locations all over the country. Starting out with a team of less than six people, the company today employs 260 people from different professional and academic backgrounds.

Today, mjunction offers a wide range of selling, sourcing and knowledge services across diverse industry verticals that empower businesses with greater process efficiencies. The selling and sourcing services offered by mjunction do not just stop here, but go all the way to providing fulfillment services in inspection, logistics and finance.

Areas of business
mjunction offers services that span the entire e-commerce spectrum and operates through the following online websites — metaljunction.in, buyjunction.in, coaljunction.in, autojunction.in, and straightline.in

www.metaljunction.in

• Launched in 2002, metaljunction provides e-selling services for the following materials:
  • Steel
  • Ferro alloys
  • Minerals and metallics
  • Non-ferrous metals
  • Obsolete capital goods (idle assets)
• Also provides e-selling services on a BPO mode.
• Provides finance to distribution channels / direct end users in association with leading banks.
• Is the world's largest e-marketplace for steel, having sold 5 million tonne of steel for its clients.

www.buyjunction.in

Launched in 2002, buyjunction offers:

• Innovative e-sourcing services and solutions encompassing the entire spectrum of supply chain management through:
  • Reverse auctions (RA)
  • Aggregated rate contract (ARC)
  • Sourcing KPO
  • Enterprise procurement system (EPS)
• Provides an electronic platform to steel (and other) industries to source their direct and indirect material requirements. It has procured goods and services worth over Rs3,350 crore till date.
• Specialises in logistics, packaging, and steel verticals.

www.coaljunction.in

Launched in 2005, coaljunction:

• Deals with the following products online: raw coal, washed coal, hard coke, coke breeze and crude coal tar. It also sells imported coal.
• coaljunction was instrumental in implementing the new coal e-booking system for Coal India Limited.
• Provides e-booking services to coal companies for selling to non-core consumers.
• Has sold over 18 million tonne of coal for Coal India Limited and all its subsidiaries.

www.autojunction.in

Launched in 2006, autojunction offers its online sales services to businesses for repossessed automobiles of auto finance companies to dealers of used cars. The service is on an as-is-where-is basis.

www.straightline.in

Launched in 2006, straightline is a web store selling fixed-priced branded products / materials:

• Materials are sourced directly from the manufacturers and have fixed prices.
• mjunction has tied up with ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Punjab National Bank (PNB) to offer complete e-payment solutions.
• Also has tie ups with leading transporters for doorstep delivery of products at customer premises.
• Currently prime branded steel (TMT bars, GC sheets and pipes) from renowned manufacturers is sold.
• Will soon offer synergistic products like aluminium, cement, paints, sanitary ware, etc.

Other services:
Other service offerings of mjunction include:

Financial services:

• E-bill presentation and payment collection: Recognising that there is much inefficiency in systems for collection of payments of clients from buyers spread across the country's geography, mjunction has designed a process for the swift and secure collection of money from all across the country, with the following advantages: reduced float (since there is instant credit), faster receipt of payments, and ease in making payment for the buyers. In addition, faster receipt of payments results in faster issue of orders and dispatch of goods.
• Buyer finance: In order to provide our buyer community easy access to finance at competitive rates, and facilitate purchases through our portal, buyer finance was launched by the financial services division of the company in association with ICICI Bank. The availability of this service has helped the buyers increase their buying capacity, which has led to greater participation by them on the company portals. This in turn has helped mjunction generate higher revenues.
• E-cash management system: Buyers can now directly log on to the mjunction website and view payments due from them. They can print pay-in slips and deposit cheques at the local branch of partner banks for depositing payments.

Logistics services
mjunction offers logistics services to various steel plants and buyers on the metaljunction.in platform. This service is beneficial to outstation buyers who do not therefore need to visit the plants in order to get the materials transported.

Content and conferences
The content division of the company publishes three magazines: Coal Insights, Steel Insights, and Sourcing Insights catering to the three primary segments it serves. Each of these magazines serves to keep its readers abreast of the latest news and developments in the concerned industry and provides them with valuable research and analysis of market trends. The continually increasing readership and advertiser base of the magazines bears evidence to their popularity and richness of content.

mjunction has entered into agreements with Metal Bulletin of London and the Informa Group of Sydney, to collaborate on conducting world-class conferences. The conference division organises international conferences focusing on issues that concern the industry verticals. mjunction also serves to provide a platform to promote e-commerce.

The company has so far organised various world-class conferences including:

• The Australia-India Resources Investment Conference in Sydney, Australia, in association with the Australian Journal of Mining in 2005.
• Indian Coal Conference 2006 at Kolkata.
• First and second Indian Steel and Steel Making Raw Materials Conference at New Delhi.
• Indian Non-Ferrous Metals Conference, Mumbai.
• Indian Coal Markets Conference with McCloskey - 2006, New Delhi.
• Indian Metals Conference, Mumbai, April 2006
• Indian Coal Markets Conference, New Delhi, December, 2006
• Indian Steel Conference, New Delhi, February 2007
• Indian Metals Conference, Mumbai, April 2007

Awards
Business excellence

In financial year 2005, mjunction was awarded the ISO 9001:2000 certification by Det Norske Veritas, Netherlands. In financial year 2007, the ISO 9001:2000 certification was awarded to eight of its branches: New Delhi, Mumbai, Bhilai, Bokaro, Jamshedpur, Rourkela, Chennai and Durgapur. The certification covers the quality management system standards of the company for e-sales, e- sourcing, channel financial services, and software solution services.

mjunction has constantly striven for business excellence, following best practices in all functional areas. To keep itself in the forefront, the company institutionalised the Tata Business Excellence Model (TBEM) that is based on the internationally recognised Malcolm Baldrige Model. It has provided the company with a methodology for setting goals and measuring performance.

As a part of its efforts towards quality management, the company has implemented the Japanese Kaizen philosophy of '5S' across business units and functions to bring about effective workplace organisation and standardisation of work procedures leading to greater efficiency.

The industry verticals that mjunction serves have been positively impacted through its pursuit of business excellence and the company has won many awards in its journey:

• Excellence award presented to mjunction for outstanding performance in the field of industrial development in the country, and 'Udyog Rattan' Award to Viresh Oberoi, managing director of mjunction, by the Institute of Economic Studies, New Delhi, in 2005.
• First prize at "Innovation Day 2006" meet organised by TBEM Eastern Region Forum for its presentation entitled "Re-engineering the Coal Supply Chain".
• Final prize at the eastern regional finals of All India Management Association's (AIMA) National Competition for Business Simulation 2006.
• The Institute of Economic Studies, New Delhi, conferred the 'Bhartiya Shiromoni Puraskar' to Viresh Oberoi, managing director of mjunction, and a gold medal to mjunction in 2006 in recognition of their enhancing the image of the country.

As a socially responsible corporation, mjunction believes in doing its bit for the society at large through various activities. The company has been supporting various NGO's like WWF-India and the Shishu Niketan Trust and also conducts medical camps at far-flung villages. The company also supports various sporting events like basketball and archery tournaments that are often neglected in the country.

Contact
mjunction services
Tata Centre
43, Jawaharlal Nehru Road
Kolkata 700 071
India
Phone: + 91 (33) 6610 6100
Fax: +91 (33) 2288 2078
Email: deep.banerjee@mjunction.in
Website: www.mjunction.in