Winner of the 2019 Relocate Award for Best Serviced Apartment Country/Specialist Provider

Above: Rohit Kumar, IKAN Relocation Services

Awards Winner: IKAN Relocation Services India

Building a home away from home in a place often a physical, cultural and linguistic world away is the essence of relocation. The Relocate Awards, therefore, celebrate those individuals, teams and companies who innovate, overcome challenges and smooth the transition for relocating employees.

The winner of this Relocate Award, IKAN Relocation, also highlights the significant scale of the objectives service providers are often presented with. And the depth of vision, tenacity and expertise required to bring such projects to fruition.

This serviced apartment award is particularly fitting for a company with the strapline “bridging boundaries” and one perhaps best known as a mobility management, PEO, global immigration services and destination service provider (DSP). It also rewards the truly inspirational distance that IKAN Relocation will go to ensure a client- and relocate-centred service; in this case, during a Suzuki plant-construction project.

From Japan to India 

India is increasingly afforded preferred status as a manufacturing centre by global companies. Motor company Suzuki’s decision to build a new site in Vitthalapur, Gujarat, a hot, semi-arid state on India’s west coast, reflects India’s growing economic influence on the world stage. Such developments bring with them the need to support the ranks of globally mobile employees delivering investment projects like Suzuki’s.

It was Japanese company Kumagai that engaged the services of IKAN Relocation after winning the contract to build Suzuki’s factory. The brief was to create acceptable board and lodging for a team of Japanese technicians coming to this remote and challenging greenfield site for the three-year project, so they could perform effectively and deliver their objectives for Suzuki.

Creating a cost-effective and comfortable home from home 

Faced with a timeline of just four months from engagement to delivery, the 15-strong IKAN Relocation team swung into action to deliver this accommodation project to deadline and Kumagai’s expectations.

The Delhi-based destination service provider – which has seven offices and 34 remote service locations across India – oversaw the completion of a building shell into 20 expat-quality serviced apartments, complete with a bespoke Japanese kitchen and dining area.

IKAN Relocation’s team also identified how
to equip, staff and sustain the serviced apartments
once operational. This included the tricky logistics around both food transportation and the expats themselves to this remote site in an industrial zone 100 kilometres away from Gujarat’s commercial capital, Ahmedabad.

Before completion of the Kumagai Vitthalapur serviced apartment project, expatriate technicians stayed at a local hotel. However, the expatriates found the service quality and availability of Japanese cuisine challenging.

Once the new complex was finished, the nightly accommodation cost per apartment practically halved. Life also became more comfortable for the technicians. A key aspect of the ongoing success of the project is its team off acility managers, interpreters, chefs, butlers, housekeeping, drivers and security onsite who run the serviced apartments day to day. IKAN Relocation recruited people both locally and nationally, committing to training and developing people’s skills, including around intercultural awareness.

Making a difference across the world 

Congratulating IKAN Relocation for successfully navigating the challenges, including the remoteness of the site, the judges commended the company for its involvement in this “huge, brilliantly managed project for Japanese technicians in a remote location in India.”

“This is clearly an impressive effort that successfully overcame tight timelines and immense cultural differences,” the judges continued. “The organisation had to create a home away from home in order to ensure that its people could perform effectively at work. As a result of the actions taken by IKAN Relocation, the client’s project will be completed on time.”

Receiving the Relocate Award, Rohit Kumar, co-founder, co-owner and managing director of IKAN Relocation, said, “We are very excited to have won. What we are doing in the sector is extremely unique in India. We are a DSP provider and involved with housing projects in a very niche segment of Japanese relocation in very remote areas of India and in really greenfield projects.

“This award is for all the team members in India who have worked so hard to achieve this. Thank you Relocate Global for recognising this initiative. ”

www.ikan.com