Leadership can spur startups bloom into unicorns: India Inc

The mantra to build a sustainable unicorn lies in allowing a startup to grow organically while focusing on retaining its customer base and building a strong leadership.

Ujwal Bommakanti
  • Updated On Dec 14, 2022 at 02:29 PM IST
Read by: 100 Industry Professionals
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The mantra to build a sustainable unicorn lies in allowing a startup to grow organically while focusing on retaining its customer base and building a strong leadership. That’s the broad road map that experts and top investors laid down for fledgling firms on Tuesday, as part of a discussion at the TiE Global Summit.

While dissuading enterprises from rushing into an initial public offering (IPO) before achieving consistent profits, tech firm Nazara founder Nitish Mittersain and EaseMyTrip founder Prashant Pitti suggested that instead of that, spend more time on innovation and curating ways of catering to customers for a longer period of time.

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According to a report highlighted by moderator Gaurav VK Singhvi, co-founder of the We Founder Circle, only 18 of the 107 unicorn startups are currently profitable in India. The panel stressed the need for sustainability to make these unicorns a success in the long run.

“A job of an entrepreneur is to optimise their business for a decade, not just for a few years,” said Pitti sharing how his venture started as a B2B (business to business) travel agency business, turned into a B2C (business to consumer) venture in three years.

“Today, it is the second biggest online travel business in the country with an over 3,600 crore turnover,” he added. Pitto also underlined the need to do the “right thing for the consumer, and do it profitably” to serve them for a long period of time.

While Mittersain had the early mover advantage when he set up Nazara in 1998, it also came with a disadvantage. Hence, he had to be patient with its growth.

“Being a decade too early in the market makes it difficult to monetise. It needs a lot of perseverance and understanding of the industry to build a long-term sustainable business that later won an investment of 200 crore from the late investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala. Now, we are a stable ship in a stormy sea,” he said.

They emphasised on customer retention being more critical than customer acquisition and need for strong leadership. “As leaders it is important to reflect on failures and understand why things didn’t work out,” said Pitti. They emphasised to focus more on ‘core metrics’ and not to fall for ‘vanity metrics’.

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  • Published On Dec 14, 2022 at 02:28 PM IST
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