American Chamber of Commerce in India, AmCham Eastern India organized a breakfast session in association with Deloitte on the Goods and Services Tax (GST) at Hyatt Regency on Friday, 19 June 2015. The members and guests of AmCham and Deloitte participated in the event and it turned out to be an interactive and educative session. The Regional Director of AmCham Eastern Region, Amada Kidwai opened up the session and introduced the speakers, followed up with welcome remarks by Mr. Dinesh Agarwal, Chairman, AmCham, Eastern Region and opening remarks by Mr. Joydeep Datta Gupta, Regional Practice Leader, Deloitte.

The first presentation was taken by Mr. Muralidharan, Senior Director – GST Lead Partner, Deloitte. He covered the “Operational Impact of GST” on businesses. In relation to GST, he highlighted the current state of play, key features of proposed GST including taxes to be subsumed, credit mechanism and additional tax for inter-state trade in goods. He also gave an overview of impact of GST on business and stakeholder challenges. The second part of the session was taken by Mr. P.S. Easwaran, Senior Director – Supply Chain Strategy Partner, Deloitte on “Transformational Opportunities”. He explained the opportunity to relook supply chain network from various dimensions using center of gravity methodology.

The third part of the session was taken by Mr. Joydeep Ghosh, Senior Director – SAP Partner, Deloitte on “Technology Alignment”. He highlighted the impact of GST on ERP systems with emphasis on processes such as record to report, procure to pay, order to cash and plan to stock. He also gave a synopsis of migration considerations for IT systems in order to transition to GST regime.The three presentations were followed by an interactive Q&A session where the speakers addressed questions from the members.

The event ended with a vote of thanks by Mrs. Leick-Milde, Vice Chairperson, AmCham, Eastern Chapter