INTRODUCTION Amazon.com, Inc. is an American international
electronic commerce company with headquarters in Seattle,
Washington, United States. Amazon.com started as an online
bookstore, but soon diversified, selling DVDs, VHSs, CDs, video and
MP3downloads/streaming, software, video games, electronics,
apparel, furniture, food, toys, and jewellery. The company also
produces consumer electronicsnotably the Amazon Kindle e-book
reader and the Kindle Fire tablet computer. Amazon is considered
the fourth most successful startup company of all time by market
capitalization, revenue, growth and cultural impact
BUSINESS MODEL MISSION: TO BE WORLDS LARGEST CUSTOMER CENTRIC
COMPANY. TWO FACTOR: GROWTH DIVERSITY IN SELECTION PLATFORMS FOR
MERCHANTS AND ASSOCIATES.
ASSOCIATES
INNOVATION COMPANY DONT BELIEVE IN INNOVATING NEW THINGS. BUT
RATHER INNOVATING IN THINGS THAT DONT CHANGE. E BOOK READER AND
AMAZON KINDLE ALL ENERGY IS USED IN IT.
Acquisitions 1998: PlanetAll, a reminder service based in
Cambridge, Massachusetts; Junglee, an XML-based data mining startup
based in Sunnyvale;[Bookpages.co.uk,a UK online book retailer,
which became Amazon UK on October 15, 1998. 1999: Internet Movie
Database (IMDb);Alexa Internet, Accept.com, and Exchange.com[34]
2003: Online music retailer CDNow. By 2011, the website cdnow.com
was defunct and in use by a different company. 2004: Joyo.com, a
Chinese e-commerce website.[ 2005: BookSurge, a print on demand
company, and Mobipocket.com, an e-Book software
company.[CreateSpace.com (formerly CustomFlix), a distributor of
on-demand DVDs, based in Scotts Valley, California. CreateSpace has
since expanded to include print on- demand books (POD), CDs, and
video. 2006: Shopbop, a retailer of designer clothing and
accessories for women, based in Madison, Wisconsin. 2007:
dpreview.com, a digital photography review website based in London;
Brilliance Audio, the largest independent publisher of audiobooks
in the United States. 2008: Audible.com; Fabric.com; Box Office
Mojo;AbeBooks; Shelfari; (including a 40% stake in LibraryThing and
whole ownership of BookFinder.com, Gojaba.com, and FillZ);Reflexive
Entertainment,a casual video game development company. 2009:
Zappos,an online shoe and apparel retailer Lexcycle, SnapTell, an
image matching startup, Stanza, a rival e-book reader to Amazon's
Kindle. 2010: Touchco., Woot,Quidsi, BuyVIP, Amie Street. 2010:
Toby Press[ 2011: LoveFilm, The Book Depository, PushbuttonYap,
2012: Kiva Systems,Teachstreet Evi 2013: IVONA Software,
GoodReadsLiquavista
FOUNDERS SACHIN BANSAL & BINNY BANSAL
INTRODUCTION Flipkart is an Indian e-commerce company
headquartered in Bangalore, Karnataka. It was founded by Sachin
Bansal and Binny Bansal in 2007. In its initial years, Flipkart
focused on online sales of books, but later it expanded to
electronic goods and a variety of other products. Flipkart offers
multiple payment methods like credit card, debit card, net banking,
e-gift voucher, Cash on Delivery and Card Swipe on Delivery
THEN & NOW Flipkart was founded in 2007 by Sachin Bansal
and Binny Bansal, both alumni of the Indian Institute of Technology
Delhi. They worked for Amazon.com before quitting and founding
their own company. Initially funded by the Bansals themselves with
Rs. 4,00,000. In its initial years, Flipkart focused on online
sales of books. Today , Flipkart is amongst the top 20 Indian Web
sites and has been credited with being India's largest online
bookseller with over 11 million titles on offer. In 2012, Flipkart
added A.C, air coolers, stationery supplies & life style
products to its product portfolio. As of today, Flipkart employs
more than 4,500 people.
RISKING IT ALL ON THE LINE There was huge risk taken by both
the Bansal's as both of them got a high profile job in the worlds
biggest e-commerce website named Amazon. Leaving Amazon to start
their own company with just Rs. 4,00,000 involved a huge risk as
there was no guarantee that their idea would succeed or not. It was
result of this risk taking only that today Flipkart generates Rs
1.5 Crore a Day. It has a record user base of 1 Million in India
only.
INNOVATION FLIPKART BROUGHT MAY REVOLUTIONARY INNOVATIVE IDEAS
TO MAKE ONLINE SHOPPING MUCH EASIER AND FUN THAN IT WAS A FEW YEARS
BACK. SOME OF THESE INNOVATIONS ARE :-
DELIVERY WITHIN 2 DAYS The first few e-commerce web sites broke
the trust of many Indian customers by not delivering the order
product on time. Flipkart realised this problem and in order to
bring the customer back to on line shopping it came up with idea of
delivering the product in 2 days & if there is a delay then the
customer is paid interest on the value of product.
30 DAYS RETURN POLICY In order to satisfy the Indian customer
after the product is delivered flipkart came up with idea of
providing 30 day return policy. This is done to ensure that the
product delivered to the customer is not faulty.
Card Swipe on Delivery Flipkart realised that most of Indian
customers are not comfortable sharing there credit card details
online. As there is always a risk of fraud. For solving this
problem it came up with the idea of card swipe on delivery i.e- the
delivery guy brings the card swipe machine so that all the
transaction happens before customer.
SALES PROMOTION techniques like --- Rebate Discounts Refunds
Quantity deals/gifts Usable benefits Full finance @ 0%
BUSINESS RESULTS In FY 20112012, Flipkart crossed the INR5
billion (US$100 million) mark as Internet usage in the country
increases and people get accustomed to making purchases online.
Flipkart projects its sales to reach INR10 billion by year 2014. On
average, Flipkart sells nearly 20 products per minute and is aiming
at generating a revenue of INR50 billion (US$1 billion) by
2015.
Acquisitions 2010: WeRead, a social book discovery tool. 2011:
Mime360, a digital content platform company. 2011: Chakpak.com is a
Bollywood news site that offers updates, news, photos and videos.
Flipkart acquired the rights to Chakpaks digital catalogue which
includes 40,000 filmographies, 10,000 movies and close to 50,000
ratings. Flipkart has categorically said that it will not be
involved with the original site and will not use the brand name.
2012: Letsbuy.com is India's second largest e-retailer in
electronics. Flipkart has bought the company for an estimated US$25
million. Letsbuy.com had been closed down and all the traffic of
Letsbuy is diverted to Flipkart.
Glowing reviews: AMAZON 80 percent of Amazons product reviews
were positive. people who received free products from publishers,
agents, authors, and manufacturers. FLIPKART The lesson: Encourage
reviews of your business, especially when youve got a happy
customer on your hands.
Niche Product AMAZON (E-BOOK) People are reading more than ever
because of the ease of E- books. E-books from Amazon are also
popular among those with iPads because of Amazons expansive
selection FLIPKART Lesson: If youve got a niche product that youre
known for, keep your focus on it and maintain a wide selection
Value-added differentiation AMAZON Amazon.com works hard to
achieve value-added differentiation through customer- focused
information services. Amazon.com's site retains customer
preferences and provides automated customization for users FLIPKART
Lesson : should focus on the customer preferences and give them
advantage of customization of product
Price Control AMAZON Amazon still manage to get a hold on its
price differentiation when compared to other physical or online
store FLIPKART But with flip kart , they are still not getting it.
Customer still find a wide gap in price b/w flip kart and other
online store.
3 possible scenarios Amazon buys Flipkart: (Probability: 40%)
This is the dream Flipkart founders /investors are hoping for day
in and day out. The question then will be about what the price will
be. If we look at history, it's similar to what Ramesh Chauhan of
Parle soft drinks faced when Coke was trying to enter India. He
sold off 4 brands: Thumsup, Gold sport, limca and one other for a
price of 750 crores when a reasonable value was more likely 275 to
300 crores. It's rumored that Flipkart founders have already asked
for 2 billion USD which Amazon thought was ridiculous and turned
down. This is the kind of exits current investors are hoping
for.
3 possible scenarios Amazon crushes Flipkart: (Probability:
50%) Amazon brings in its own expertise, processes, patents, IP,
brand and offers superior buying experience thereby wiping flipkart
out of existence. The problem which flipkart has solved( Logistics)
is a commodity and can easily be replicated. I am assuming that
flipkart doesnt have any IPR or patent ( In fact the founders
having worked with Amazon earlier might have exploited Amazon's IPR
). The customers quickly switch to Amazon. Finally, Flipkart is
sold for a small amount to Amazon. It would be disastrous for
founders and investors.
3 possible scenarios Flipkart does a Lagaan: (Probability: 10%)
Amazon is not able to find its feet in the country. Flipkart finds
the battle tough. If Bansals get the government to protect it. They
bribe Momota di / Fernandez who go on rampage and either drive
Amazon out of India or, just like the Naukri Versus Monster
showdown, Flipkart becomes #1 and Amazon is comfortable playing the
second fiddle.
