Professional Documents
Culture Documents
1. INTRODUCTION
2. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
3. METHODS AND METHODOLOGIES
4. DETAILED REPORT OF THE PROJECT
5. ANALYSIS OF THE DATA
6. CONCLUSION
7. DISCUSSION
8. OPINIONS AND SUGGESTIONS
9. BIBLIOGRAPHY AND REFERENCES
INTRODUCTION
Entrepreneur is a person who sets up a business or businesses, taking on financial risks in the hope of profit.
Flipkart, which is regarded as one of the most popular and successful e-commerce ventures in India, was started
by Sachin Bansal in 2007, post his job at Amazon. What initially started off as a Website that sold books,
quickly expanded into a platform offering products in various categories, ranging from electronic goods to
stationary supplies. Since its launch, Flipkart has gone from 5 to 4500+ employees, 4 acquisitions, 5 payment
options and was even listed as the top 20 Websites in the country.
Sachin Bansal shares his journey from Flipkarts inception to what it is today in the following interview.
OBJECTIVES
To get acquainted with the different entrepreneurship skills required of running a company.
Informational interviews are terrific for finding out more about what it takes to be a
successful entrepreneur.
Entrepreneurial spirit is characterized by innovation and risk-taking. This project will help learning this
spirit by hearing stories from such entrepreneurs.
Entrepreneurs are leaders, willing to take risk and exercise initiative, taking advantage of market
opportunities by planning, organizing, and employing resources, often by innovating new or improving
existing products. This project will have an impact on the reader as the interview will give valuable
insights for the development of these qualities.
The interview will be an inspiration for budding entrepreneurs especially those in IT and e-commerce in
India.
METHODOLOGY
The method used for this project is a personal interview. Following are the list of questions asked in the
interview.
Q) When and how did the idea of Flipkart came into being?
Q) Initially Flipkart has started with books but now it also forayed in to products in other categories
such as mobiles, movies, music, games, cameras and computers. What is the strategy behind such
diversification?
Q) Flipkart started its Business journey from five people and now you have 4500 + employees. How do
you see this journey of success?
Q) What are the biggest challenges you faced at the time of starting Flipkart and what are the present
challenges you face in running it?
Q) Despite of being on online platform, Flipkart has started with word of mouth Marketing strategy and
now Flipkart is visible on TV and print medium as well. How well do you think the strategy of word of
mouth Marketing helped?
Q) What will be your suggestion for new startups or students planning to take up entrepreneurship in
online retail?
Moreover, when it comes to mediums like e-commerce, word-of-mouth Marketing works extremely well as
customers rely on the experience and feedback of their friends and peers before they try out a site.
Q) What will be your suggestion for new startups or students planning to take up entrepreneurship in
online retail?
A) Our suggestion for new start-ups in online retail will be to focus on keeping their customers happy. In online
retail, repeat purchase plays a big role as getting a new customer to buy from your Website is much tougher
than getting an existing customer to repurchase. By putting the needs of their customer first and listening to
what they have to say, companies can succeed in building up a loyal customer base.
ANALYSIS OF DATA
The Genesis
In an interview, Sachin had said, The idea itself is not new. The genesis of the thought to set up Flipkart came
from the bad quality service provided by competitors. Our business opportunity was to do better than our
competition in terms of service. Hence, our main mission was to focus on customer service. As a startup
company with ambitions in the ecommerce domain, we had to choose a category that could facilitate
getting started quickly. The low transaction size helped induce customer trials. With our strong technology
background, we could keep the initial costs low.
Power of E-commerce
Sachin believes that ecommerce has changed the way we live. He says, Recently when Motorola tied up with
Flipkart for the exclusive launch of Moto-G in India, they were launching the product in India before the rest of
the world. I would count that as an achievement for ecommerce. This would not have happened if there was not
an unparalleled access to customers around India. It took 5 seconds to get over with the whole stock of Xioami
Mi3 when the booking was opened for the second time for 20000 phones. This is nothing but the power of
ecommerce.
He proudly shares that Flipkarts delivery boys are almost like Santa Claus for many customers.
Drawing parallels
Sachin Bansal has always seen Flipkart as an Indian Alibaba rather than an Indian Amazon. Drawing some
parallels with Chinas Alibaba, he says, Yahoo had invested the same amount in Alibaba in 2005. It was the
inflexion point in China then, exactly where India is today.
He speaks about the possibility of an IPO, The world is different as compared to 10 years ago. Private
investors have more appetite and patience. Also, were figuring out stuff about our own business. When we
feel that the market is ready and our business model is not evolving (and stabilized), we will be ready for an
IPO.
If nothing, two things can be immediately understood from this comparison:
1. Sachin is eyeing for a similar valuation for Flipkart in the coming years.
2. IPO is uncertain as of now. It might well take more time as the founders seems to be in no hurry (with
enough support from current investors).
CONCLUSION
To conclude, this interview gave us a glimpse of how Flipkart, one of the most trusted e-commerce firms in
India was founded and what challenges it faced in the initial days. Flipkart co-founder Sachin Bansal shares his
vision of the company and how he expects the technology focus to help the firm compete with global players
and big Indian business houses venturing online, besides other domestic e-tail rivals.
I feel that this topic Interview with a famous Indian Entrepreneur will help me learn the foundational skills
required of an entrepreneur by knowing what it takes to successfully run a start-up and bring it to the next level.
To summarize, this interview with Flipkart co-founder Sachin Bansal covered the following points in detail:
DISCUSSION
After discussing the project with my friends and family members, I received the feedback that the project
highlights some of the key skills required as an entrepreneur and as Sachin Bansal runs a very successful
business which has transformed the online industry in India which they use them, the interview topic and the
report was well-appreciated by my friends and family members. Their opinions regarding the topic were as
follows:
The interview topic was well-chosen as it reflects the current trend of growing entrepreneurship in India
which is evident from the Startup India campaign launched by the Government of India.
Flipkart founder Sachin Bansal was an ideal choice for an entrepreneur to interview as he is one of
Indias leading businessman today with the necessary knowledge and expertise to run a big corporation
and inspire millions of others who wish to emulate him.
The project covers all the important factors that played a role in Flipkarts journey from an online
bookseller to one of Indias most valuable e-commerce brand.
REFERENCES
The main interview was referred from http://www.letsintern.com/blog/interview-sachin-bansal-flipkart/
The sources and references for other content is as follows: