2023 03 Rangesh Nallan

 6th March 2023 at Cowdray Park

Rotarians had a superb meeting at Cowdray Park. Our own Rangesh spoke to us with humour and made what was a very difficult concept for some of us to understand entertaining.

The following are notes we received from Rangesh before the meeting.

Thank you Rangesh!.

Rangesh Nallan is an entrepreneur. After completing a Masters degree in Law in the university of Madras India, Rangesh moved to Singapore to start a Trading business. Later he met a Korean gentleman who took him to South Korea, both of them set up a Electroluminescent signboard manufacturing unit near Seoul. Rangesh was in charge of procuring orders especially in the USA. After some years ,the company started doing well and clients included the likes of Coca cola, Pepsi, Intel, Motorola. There was no competition at that time as very few companies were making this product. Having established a good business model in the US, the company secured their first order in Europe which was Guinness in Ireland. This made Rangesh move to the UK in 1998 to expand the European side of the business as well. After 20 years in operation the company was forced to close due to world financial crisis and also the emergence of internet based signage which made the business model unviable.

Rangesh had other business interests as well during this time- he was associated with Aston Hotels Plc as non-executive Director representing Far Eastern investors. for nearly 15 years. The company had hotel operations in Sheffield, Darlington and Dumfries. This gave him knowledge to manage medium and large size operations.

With the help of the Korean connection/manufacturing capabilities, Rangesh tried to establish a solar powered signage business in South Africa/ Ghana which did not succeed due to many reasons, however he managed to win a Lagos Airport contract which helped him to understand the business culture in Africa. These activities took him to many countries in Africa/Asia/America as a result he gained a lot of contacts and experience.

Rangesh is now semi-retired and has settled in Midhurst since 2016. Currently he does  voluntary work in Chichester/Midhurst in many capacities. During Covid Lockdown he established a business in Ghana called Digi Ticket which is a mobile phone payment processing company using text messages. Rangesh is planning to replicate this operation in Nigeria with his old contacts, currently awaiting government permits/approvals.

More info can be found in www.digiticket.com.ng  Currently Rangesh has a small business operation in Singapore as well. He has knowledge to market products in Singapore/Malaysia/Korea and Shenzhen in China.

About the Talk- A major change particularly in the financial world is happening  using mobile phone based Technology to make payments or transfer of money.

QR code was started as a barcode in 1994 in Japan,and was subsequently used  to direct people to a particular location on the internet or to a website. The QR code is now taking another step for transferring money, bypassing the middlemen like the credit card companies, Banks etc. There is a silent revolution taking place which is unknown in the UK even though it is being used in a small way. On the other hand Asia has become a market leader and this system has percolated to all walks of life in a big way. Rangesh is not projecting himself as an expert in this field  but has knowledge in this technology and he plans to use this in Africa being the next stage of his current business. Fundraising activities in UK will eventually use this method including Rotary, as we are seeing the emergence of a cashless way of fundraising. Rangesh’s  talk is being aided by Powerpoint and movie clips to demonstrate a change in the behaviour patterns of people. One of the reasons for banks closing their high street presence could be perhaps due to these changes taking place in payment platforms ? Please join in for this demonstration & discussion to explore more by Zoom or in person.