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The Indian ecommerce industry is expected to cross $100 billion in the next three to four years from the current $30 billion. This growth will need constant innovation driven largely by technology and innovation. 

And, Flipkart — India’s leading ecommerce marketplace — is driving innovation both from within the company and collaborating with outside players as it seeks to implement new ideas. 

Jeyandran Venugopal, Chief Product and Technology Officer at Flipkart, says, “Innovation quotients can be blunted if one starts focusing only on delivering on things they already know. We want to change that.” 

The company has created several structured programmes to help unleash creativity without the fear of failure, including Project 1K, Hackday, SlashN, Flipkart Grid, Wired, Trail Blazer, Girls Wanna Code, etc.

For Flipkart, perhaps the most important step taken to raise the level of innovation, especially in its engagement with the startup ecosystem, was its Leap programme, launched in August 2020. 

The startup accelerator programme helps selected startups undergo a 16-week mentorship with an equity-free grant of $25,000. 

Jeyandran says, “To improve digital commerce in India it was imperative on our part to do this. Based on the response of our first cohort, we have been inspired for the next.”

The Interview

India’s tryst with the internet can be traced back to the 90s when VSNL first brought it to the country on August 15, 1995. More than two-and-a-half decades since, it has changed the face of the Indian economy, the way we do business, and the social sector. 

In a conversation, Anil Kumar Jain, CEO, National Internet Exchange of India (NIXI), speaks about the organisation’s vision to provide a domain name to each Indian just like an Aadhaar card and how it is vigorously promoting the adoption of IPv6.

Editor’s Pick: 100X Entrepreneur podcast

Mitesh Shah, Co-founder, Inflection Point Ventures (IPV), says his learnings and experience from his job as the Chief Financial Officer at Ola, and the Head of Finance at BookMyShow, helped him become an angel investor. 

In 2018, Mitesh, along with Vinay Bansal and Ankur Mittal, co-founded Inflection Point Ventures. In this episode of the 100X Entrepreneur podcast, he talks about his experience at Ola and BookMyShow, why early-stage founders require the most handholding post the investment, and more. Read more.

Startup Spotlight

Why this cancer survivor decided to start a wellness brand

Close to 12 years ago, Radhika Iyer Talati was diagnosed with first-stage breast cancer, followed by uterine cancer. While she followed the regular route of allopathic medicines and treatment, she also tried finding alternative therapies to change her lifestyle to cope with her cancer treatment. In 2019, after she realised a growing demand among people for an organic and sustainable lifestyle, she decided to start a food-based startup called Anahata. Read more.

News & Updates

Before you go, stay inspired with… 

“Innovation is always about something new and is also risky. We do not want people to do only safe things. There is still very little acceptance of failure; we want to change the narrative.” 

— Jeyandran Venugopal, Chief Product and Technology Officer, Flipkart

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