Sachin unveils new Adidas shoes

Batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar, along with his teammates Virender Sehwag, Zaheer Khan and Ashish Nehra, launched a new series of Adidas sports shoes in Mumbai on Thursday.

The four cricketers are the brand ambassadors for Adidas in India.

Tendulkar praised the shoes for their comfort, saying that he had been associated with Adidas for the past six years and it manufactured excellent, comfortable and durable shoes.

Adidas India, meanwhile, is all set to become the German sportswear maker's third largest subsidiary in Asia after China and Japan, according to Andreas Gellner, the newly appointed managing director of Adidas India.

"The business environment here is certainly very positive. If everything goes well, India could be our number three market in Asia, and that is my mandate," Gellner said.

He said that Adidas is seriously considering of increasing its apparel sourcing from India. The company is also evaluating the idea of launching a low-cost range targeted at the Indian market.

"I haven't made up my mind on it but I'm told there is a big market for such products," he said.

Adidas recently had a change of guard after Tarun Kunzru stepped as the managing director. In his previous assignment with Adidas, Gellner was the MD of the company's Malaysian subsidiary.

According to Gellner, his top priority will be to restructure the Indian operations to take on the competitors.

The Indian subsidiary has been separated from Adidas' south-east Asia business cluster and will now report directly to the regional headquarters in Hong Kong.

In the next two years Adidas plans to add nearly 60 more exclusive showrooms to its 75 existing ones in the country's top 10 cities. The company is also planning to triple it's advertising spends in the next two years.

Indian cricketers Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Zaheer Khan and Ashish Nehra during the launch of Adidas's new sports shoes in Mumbai on Thursday. Photo: Deepak Salvi

With inputs from Business Standard