“Some women are lost in the fire, some women are built from it” this quote has been proven very well by Malavika Hegde. V G Siddhartha, husband of Malavika and the founder of India’s largest chain of coffee shops, Cafe Coffee Day took his life by suicide in 2019. The tragic event happened all of a sudden when the CCD founder asked his driver to take him to the bridge near Mangaluru. As per the driver, Siddhartha went outside for a walk but didn’t return. After that, the body was recovered later from there.
A note was released by ANI according to which there was what seemed to be an apology letter from Siddhartha for “failing to create the right profitable business model.” The letter told that the pressure from private equity partners and other lenders, and harassment from the tax department was unbearable, which led him to take this decision.
After her husband, Malavika Hegde was appointed as the CEO of Coffee Day Enterprises Ltd (CDEL), the owner of the Café Coffee Day chain. All the responsibilities were on Malavika including a debt of Rs 7,000 crore as of March 31, 2019. It was clear that Hegde has a mountain of debt, but Hegde, heartbroken yet courageous took all the responsibilities instead of running from them.
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The odds were against her. Yet, she has managed to script a wonderful success story.
Cafe Coffee Day wasn’t just a retail chain but it was very popular amongst the youth too. CCD owns 572 cafes across 165 cities in the country. It is a very huge business with a total of 36,326 vending machines. Malavika had to reduce the company’s debt to keep it moving and her husband’s vision to success. With that, she also had to keep her thousands of employees safe.
Hegde did not just manage to handle the position of CEO, but also, she has proven her talent with the growth. She was able to reduce the debt by a significant amount. With that, she managed to bring the company back on track for improvement.
According to the annual report, the net debt of CDEL was at Rs 1,731 crore as of March 31, 2021. The total loan funds were at Rs 1,779 crore which comprises long-term borrowings of Rs 1,263 crore and short-term borrowings of Rs 516 crore.
This was a considerable improvement in CDEL’s financial health. The company’s debt had stood at Rs 2,909.95 crore in FY 2020. CDEL would still want to improve further. It was not successful but definitely, it reduced a significant portion of debts. If it continues in the same way, the company will soon be out of the debt zone.
The odds were against her. Yet, she has managed to script a wonderful success story…
Malavika Hegde did not just manage to handle the position of CEO, but also, she has proven her talent with the growth. She was able to reduce the debt by a significant amount. With that, she managed to bring the company back on track for improvement after her husband took his life by suicide.
