With a large cash pile of over $1 billion, Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal, co-founders of Flipkart, have gathered a war chest to fight the onslaught of Jeff Bezos' Amazon in India.
In response to questions from Radhika P Nair and Harsimran Julka, the Bansals outlined the areas where they will invest this money and what they regard as immediate goals. Edited excerpts:
What do you look for when evaluating an acquisition?
Team is the most important criterion for an acquisition. What they have done in the past, and if they have proven certain things in the market. Culture of the company is the second most important. These are just dating criterion. After that comes the potential to scale in future.
Is Flipkart thinking of an Initial Public Offer anytime soon?
We are not thinking of an IPO at least in the next two years. With this round we have sufficient capital for the business. IPO was just an option before. When we feel that we are ready as a company and the business model has stopped evolving, then we will think (about an IPO).
The precondition this time was to have long-term patient investors.
Is technology a big priority for Flipkart?
Technology-wise, commerce on mobile internet is new to everybody in the world. Not just new to India. The most interesting thing is that in India already 70% of internet consumption today is happening on mobile. In China it's less than 50% and in US even lesser at 30%. So we will invest in mobile platforms to make them robust for buyers and sellers. Some months ago, only 5% of our transactions were through mobile now it is more than 50% of our transactions.
There are investments to be made in encouraging seller ecosystem. Payment systems have to be evolved in India. Fashion technology is also an exciting space. We will closely watch and make investments in areas such as wearables, watches and eyewear.
How are the sales for the DigiFlip tablet? Will you also invest in creating content for these devices?
It's early days for the DigiFlip tablet right now. On the content part, we're not thinking on those lines, as of now, maybe in the long run. In the near future, the focus is about getting to market a great device at a lower price.
Is Fashion now the largest category for you after the Myntra buyout?
Myntra and Flipkart put together is now over 50% of the fashion retail market in the country.
Fashion has become the largest in unit sales for us since we bought Myntra. Over one third of our sales come from fashion category now. We are going to invest a lot in the fashion space and create fashion labels.
In response to questions from Radhika P Nair and Harsimran Julka, the Bansals outlined the areas where they will invest this money and what they regard as immediate goals. Edited excerpts:
What do you look for when evaluating an acquisition?
Team is the most important criterion for an acquisition. What they have done in the past, and if they have proven certain things in the market. Culture of the company is the second most important. These are just dating criterion. After that comes the potential to scale in future.
Is Flipkart thinking of an Initial Public Offer anytime soon?
We are not thinking of an IPO at least in the next two years. With this round we have sufficient capital for the business. IPO was just an option before. When we feel that we are ready as a company and the business model has stopped evolving, then we will think (about an IPO).
The precondition this time was to have long-term patient investors.
Is technology a big priority for Flipkart?
Technology-wise, commerce on mobile internet is new to everybody in the world. Not just new to India. The most interesting thing is that in India already 70% of internet consumption today is happening on mobile. In China it's less than 50% and in US even lesser at 30%. So we will invest in mobile platforms to make them robust for buyers and sellers. Some months ago, only 5% of our transactions were through mobile now it is more than 50% of our transactions.
There are investments to be made in encouraging seller ecosystem. Payment systems have to be evolved in India. Fashion technology is also an exciting space. We will closely watch and make investments in areas such as wearables, watches and eyewear.
How are the sales for the DigiFlip tablet? Will you also invest in creating content for these devices?
It's early days for the DigiFlip tablet right now. On the content part, we're not thinking on those lines, as of now, maybe in the long run. In the near future, the focus is about getting to market a great device at a lower price.
Is Fashion now the largest category for you after the Myntra buyout?
Myntra and Flipkart put together is now over 50% of the fashion retail market in the country.
Fashion has become the largest in unit sales for us since we bought Myntra. Over one third of our sales come from fashion category now. We are going to invest a lot in the fashion space and create fashion labels.
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