Online fashion retailers Myntra and Flipkart are in a position to take up any big foreign entrant, according to Mr. Mukhesh Bansal, founder of Myntra Designs.
But, Mr. Bansal said, the next ten entrepreneurs in India’s e-commerce industry may stand a chance if a dozen foreign entrants are allowed to set up shops. For any emerging country, government should give some times for indigenous companies to come up.
About any change of visions after its acquisition by Flipkart, Mr. Bansal said, “Unless we could see the value in merger, we did not pull the trigger. Myntra’s vision has got more realistic. Post-merger, we have a clarity that the business have to be executed independently and preserve a different culture.
Independently we see both Myntra and Flipkart’s fashion as billion dollar businesses each into two-three years. While Myntra’s fashion offering continuous to be more on the premium size, Flipkart offers an array of discounted fashions brands. Our goal at Flipkart is to win the horizontal battle while at Myntra, we are striving to win the vertical battle. Teams will remain different for both, the 37-year old noted entrepreneur, Mr. Bansal said.
About his reaction if Flipkart goes public, Mr. Bansal said, “I see myself at Myntra for atleast the next 4-5 years. IPO is not an immediate focus for Flipkart. Of course, it may happen one day. The focus for us is to create an extremely differentiated experience for our users. Any kind of financial exit will just be a reward on top of it,” he said.
Mr. Bansal said before starting Myntra he used to visit India very often as part of startups, he was working with. The more “I came here, more I got convinced that India held great potential. The biggest hurdle I faced initially was recruitment. Everyone wanted to work for big MNC. Trend is now reversed as talented people work only for startups,” Mr. Bansal added.
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