History

Titan Industries was established in 1984 as a joint venture between the Tata Group and the Tamil
Nadu Industrial Development Corporation. The company brought about a paradigm shift in the
Indian watch market, offering quartz technology with international styling, manufactured in a
state-of-the-art factory at Hosur, Tamil Nadu. Leveraging its understanding of different segments
in the watch market, the company launched a second independent watch brand-Sonata, as a value
brand to those seeking to buy functionally styled watches at affordable prices. In addition it
focused on the youth with its third brand – Fastrack. It has also premium fashion watches by
acquiring a license for global brands such as Tommy Hilfiger and Hugo Boss, while. It has also
in its portfolio its first Swiss Made watch brand – Xylys.

In 1995, the company diversified into jewellery under the brand – Tanishq to capitalize on a
fragmented market operating with no brands in urban cities. In 2005, the company launched its
second Jewellery brand, Gold Plus, for capitalizing on the opportunity in small towns and rural
India.

The company has now diversified into fashion Eyewear by launching Fastrack Eye- Gear
sunglasses, as well as Prescription Eyewear. The Company leveraged its manufacturing
competencies and branched into Precision Engineering Products and Machine Building from
2003.

Today Titan Industries is India's leading manufacturer of watches and jewellery . Titan and
Tanishq are among the most admired brands in their categories.
Titan – be more

Means; Titan is trying to connect with new consumers who are yearning to be 'more'. they are
reinventing the brand through new designs, retail strategy and advertising with New logo and
tagline - “Be More”

Products

Watches
Their main products lines of Watches are: Currently manufactures four main watch brands viz.

 Titan for the premium segment,

 Fastrack – focused on the youth and trendy fashion space,
 Sonata for the mass market and Sonata has launched the Yuva collection, a series of
colourful watches
 Xyly s for the premium market.

The Titan brand architecture comprises several sub-brands, each of which is a leader in its
segment. Notable among them are:
Titan Edge – The world's slimmest watch which stands for the philosophy of "less is more";
Titan Raga – the feminine and sensuous accessory for today's woman,
Nebula - crafted in solid gold and precious stones and several other collections like Wall Street,
Heritage, Regalia, Octane, Orion, Diva, Zoop, WWF and the Avist or series, all of which form a
part of the Titan wardrobe.
.
Brand extension

Jewellery :
Tanishq is India's largest and fastest growing jewellery brand with a premium range of gold
jewellery studded with diamonds or coloured gems and a wide range in 22kt pure gold. Platinum
jewellery is also a part of the product range Tanishq is one of India's largest speciality retailers
and is transforming the jewellery market in India102 boutiques in72 cities across the country.
‘Gold Plus' is the recent retail offering for the mass market with plain gold jewellery selling
through19 stores in19 towns. The jewellery division has its own design studio.

Eye wear :
Titan Eye+ is currently on a pilot mode and has Sunglasses under Fastrack brand and
prescription eyewear consisting of Frames, Lenses, Sunglasses, Accessories and Contact Lenses of in-
house brands and other premium brands

Precision Engineering
The company's Precision Engineering Division supplies precision components to the avionics
and the automotive industry. It also manufactures dashboard clocks as OEM to car manufacturers
in Europe and America. The division also provides fully integrated Automation solutions
Multibranding strategy
Titan has used multibranding strategy where they do marketing of two or more product similarly
and competing product by same organizationunder different unrelated brand for eg Titanis the
parent and manufacturer of Xyly, Raga ,fastrack and sonata.

Co-branding
Composite co-branding
Amir Khan as brand ambassador for Titan Watches, hear Titan and Amir Khan both are brand and they
form a composite brand building which help the product like Raga to enhance

Ingredient co-branding
Another form of co-branding is same-company co-branding. A Titan watch from the house of TATAs

Licensing
The company's first Swiss Made watch – Xylys is for the hi-end connoisseur and new age
achiever. It also markets Tommy Hilfiger watches under a licensing arrangement and is
introducing Hugo Boss. The company has 225 The company has 255 exclusive showrooms
christened 'World of Titan', making it amongst the largest chains in its category. Titan watches
are sold through over 12,000 outlets in over 2,500 cities and internationally in over 30 countries,
primarily in the Middle-East and Asia Pacific. It’s after-sales-service is itself a benchmarked
operation with a network of 750 service centers and amongst the world's fastest turnaround
times. The company has a world-class design studio for watches and accessories.
Positioning

Since its introduction, Titan has been positioned as a premium brand, providing high quality
products. With its numerous sub-brands catering to different segments, the challenge that Titan
faces is to create a strong brand image. It follows different positioning strategies, these strategies
can also be analyzed as given below:

Attribute Positioning:

When the company launched its products, it was the first to bring quartz watches to the Indian
market. The company successfully leveraged this to penetrate the market and gain a market
share. Raga, Classique and Regalia come under this strategy. Classique has been positioned as
elegant corporate wear that leaves a quiet, but definite impression and fusion of function and
sophistication. Power dressing now has a new weapon! As Magic in gold and bicolour look, the
'Regalia' range represents the essence of dress-wear. Raga has been differentiated and positioned
as exclusive watches for women. The Raga and Silver Raga collection is elegant, delicate and
feminine with each piece being truly unique.

User Positioning:
Titan caters to several user groups- children (the Dash), sportspersons and adventurers. The
Fastrack range is seen as being contemporary, sturdy and reliable. The advertising, packaging
and merchandising of this range is young, vibrant and ‘cool’ (the ad line says “Cool watches by
Titan”)

Benefit Positioning:
The Fastrack Digital range offers the customer a functional watch that is also attractive. The
digital watch has a “techno-geek” image, but Titan seeks to differentiate its offering on the basis
of superior style and attractiveness.

Competitor Positioning:
With the entry of several foreign watchmakers into the market, Titan had to counter
the threat. Most of the entrants are catering to the upper end of the market- Omega, Tissot
Cartier etc. Titan already had the Tanishq brand in this segment. However, it has tried to
reposition this brand by increasing the price range to encourage more customers.

Quality or Price Positioning:

In the overseas market, especially in Europe where it is competing with Swiss and Japanese
watches, it is positioning itself as ‘value- for- money’: reasonably priced (less than Swiss
watches and higher than Japanese), attractively styled and of good quality. In Indian market,
Sonata is a perfect example of Price positioning, titan came up with this segment when it was
facing heavy competition from lower end segment.
5.2 Men’s segment: With Titan positioning its range of watches as a life-style, the Indian market
started viewing watch more as a complement to dress than just a time showing machine. They
are also realising that, unlike other forms of art that are meant to be admired, high-end jewellery
watches have that added bonus: practical luxury with a function other than beauty. Watches have
joined the list of tie, deodorant and shoes to represent the occasion and flaunt your status.

Dress Wear
Titan has three brands positioned for this segment: Nebula, Regalia and Insignia. Nebula:
Marketed as the “Jewellery collection from Titan”, Nebula is targeted towards affluent men who
consider wearing gold jewellery a symbol of status. Magical blend of most coveted of metals,
Gold and craftsmanship; Nebula is more of a connoisseur watch with the lowest price model at
Rs.5500. It is marketed as a “watch for discerning individual” positioned as a gold jewel.
Regalia: “Incredibly eye-catching…. magic in gold”.The watch uses the unique combination of
gold and bicolour looks representing the essence of dress-wear. In India, gold-look is associated
with status but at the same time, the silver-look is the fashion of the day in international watches.
With the combination of both, this watch is targeted towards affluent businessmen. The elegant
looks and colours make it a strong competitor to the foreign brands like the Tissot, Piaget and
Rado.

This is also marketed as a watch for gift “Special Watch for special occasion”, positioning this as
a costly gift. Insignia: ‘The World Watch from Titan.’
The watch with fascinating designs and precision engineering was targeted towards the European
markets. The complexity of this watch is 10 times more than a regular titan watch. Though it
didn’t meet with much of a success in Europe, this tag line and keyword “International” are used
to position this watch as a world-class watch for international traveller with European tastes.

Classic Watches
Watches that are for every-day use and those with less frills and more value are classified as
Classic watches. These watches are normally targeted towards middle and upper middle-income
class consumers.
Classique:
“Power dressing now has a new weapon!”
“Timeless elegance captured on the wrist.”

Sports Watches
In the Indian scenario the sport awareness is not quite there. And the market is not mature
enough that consumers buy special watches for sporting except in the super-premium and
segments above that. A sports watch in the mind of an average Indian is a polyamide watch with
stopwatch and trendy look. So there is no clear distinction between sports watches and casual
watches. But in the available market Timex, Casio, and Titan are major players and after the
lifting of QR restrictions, world famous Tag- Heur has also entered India but in the Connoisseur
segment of sports watches.
Titan has introduced a range of contemporary Precision Sports watches. The brand is marketed
as tough, outdoor, adventure brand. (Psychographically segmented) Ranging from 800 to 7500,
these watches are in direct competition with foreign brands like Swatch Irony.
Casual Wear The segment of watches that has a variety of brands and models to appeal to the
youth and mentally young people is casual wear. The watches in this segment are mainly sporty
watches, which are unconventional and typically symbolize the attitudes of younger
generation.
Titan Fast Track
“Cool watches from Titan”.
The target audience for this watch, in the 20-35 age group include working adults and
postgraduate students of both sexes in metros and mini metros. The Fast Track user, in terms of
attitude is one who wears an informal dress, wears branded jeans, shirts, sunglasses and branded
informal shoes. The Fast Track personality is that of a young, energetic, achievement oriented
person, who seeks to express his or her individuality by braking free from constraints of formal
environment, without being a rebel. Built around the Cool concept, this watch from Titan has
virtually very few competitors because no one offers the feature combination and price but Casio
(in digital range) and Espirit and Swatch (in the analog range) can be considered as competitors
feature-wise.

Fastrack for women

The woman's collection presents the all-new international 'Frosted' look, which is trendy and
chic. The ad line : ‘Fastrack- ‘Cool watches from Titan’, aims at building the brand around the
‘cool ‘ concept.
Fastrack is targeted at a personality that is young, energetic, achievement-oriented, who seeks to
express her individuality by breaking free from constraints imposed by formal environments,
without being a rebel. The positioning of Fastrack for men and women is almost the same.

Children’s Segment
Titan has a brand called Dash! for kids. These are bright, colorful watches targeted at children
aged 6-14 years. These watches are priced Rs.250 onwards to Rs.495 and are marketed under the
ad line: “Wow! Watches from Titan”. The three main collections from Dash include the ‘Popeye
Collection’, which feature cartoon character Popeye, and his friends. There is also a Digital
Range, which has features like Ellight, compass, Velco straps. So Titan is positioning Dash
watches as ‘Fun’ watches for kids. Its features such as comic characters also appeal to the
frivolous nature of the children.

Brand equity

“Brand Titan has a deep emotional connect with millions of Indian consumers and tremendous
brand equity. Our study identifies key elements of this equity and endeavours to make them
relevant in the future.”