Eating away to health

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And while Bansal isn’t averse to the comparison with Patanjali, despite the obvious difference in product styling, the differences don’t stop there. The user segments the two are looking at are very distinct: Cure.fit wants to garner 3-4 million customers in urban India over the next five years. “We can build a billion-dollar business with … Read more

The $700 million bet on Treebo and FabHotels

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Vaibhav Aggarwal, the founder, and CEO of FabHotels sits quietly in his cabin in Udyog Vihar, Gurugram. He has an unopened bottle of cold-pressed juice sitting on his table and an uneaten apple lies forgotten on a chair leaning against a laptop bag. His glass-walled cabin has a table and a few chairs. Offices emptying … Read more

Monoculture – Begun the clone wars have

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But consider how this scenario plays out in India. Let’s take Kalaari’s last fund of approximately $300 million for instance. An annual fee of 2% means that the firm gets nearly $6 million (Rs 37.5 crores) every year as management fees. That is a big chunk of change for a company operating in India, especially … Read more

Nine years and $30 million later

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AppsDaily is dead. The Mumbai-based company, according to an investor report accessed by The Ken, is currently in the process of selling off its assets to repay its dues. The mobile protection (insurance and anti-virus) company, which was one of the first to pioneer the online to offline (O2O) strategy in India, stopped operations a … Read more

Flipkart’s zugzwang moment

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When I was younger, chess was one of my favorite games. I was not particularly good at it, but that didn’t deter me from enjoying the almost magical twists and turns, the myriad permutations and combinations that could emerge from a simple-looking 8/8 board. Of these, one of the most fascinating positions was the “zugzwang”. … Read more

Why are restaurants inclined towards Zomato Gold?

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As the most expensive and sought-after restaurants either refuse to honor Zomato Gold members or put in place drastic quotas on how many they might serve in a day, Zomato will then need to deal with irate customers. This means complaints like “None of the restaurants I signed up for are still around” or “Restaurants … Read more

Dunzo’s battle to become India’s ‘Uber of X

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“Tap a button, get a ride.” That almost comically simple idea would lead to the origin of Uber in 2008. Hundreds of startups globally have tried to surf in its wake by positioning themselves as ‘Ubers’.’ Uber for parking’. ‘Uber for dog walkers’. ‘Uber for lawyers’. ‘Uber for ice-cream’. ‘Uber for laundry’. ‘Uber for groceries’. … Read more

Flipkart First, Part Deux: The anti-Amazon alliance

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Remember Flipkart’s golden days? The original golden days, that is. The times when it had the Midas touch? (Well, at least it thought it did). It was a few years ago. Around 2012-2015, if you think about it. Everything it did was cheered on. Thinking of the products In February 2012, it launched Flyte, an … Read more

This is not fashion, it is just clothes

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First, a look at the annual filings of Shopclues. In April 2016, Radhika Ghai (earlier Agarwal) resigned from the company board. “She has resigned from the directorship of the Indian entity. She is still our chief business officer,” explains Sethi. Shopclues is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Clues Network and Radhika continues to hold her board … Read more