New Markets – Dutch Uncles

Will Harvard Alumnus Lead EdTech Startup Eruditus to become India’s Next Unicorn?

Vaishali Das — Fri, 07 May 2021 08:35:04 +0000

The energetic startup ecosystem is working towards boosting the investment domain domestically and globally. Praxis Global Alliance, a management consulting firm, came up with India’s soon to be Unicorns startup list, having 35 new businesses that can possibly accomplish a $1 billion-plus valuation (Unicorn) in near future.

Eruditus is in India’s next 35 Unicorns List, Why?

In a pandemic situation when Universities were closing down globally, Eruditus offered executive diplomas and other leading programmes from globally recognized universities and hence was well placed to grow.
One of the major reasons for Eruditus to grow is that they expanded their horizon, given the target universities they started enrolling students globally for their courses and shifted their focus from Indian classrooms to global classrooms which attracted more institutional capital. In 2015, Eruditus moved from offline to online platform and even before COVID-19, 80% of the Company’s revenue was coming from the online mode.

Eruditus Funding Journey, Current Evaluation and Recent Funding

Eruditus Education Executive started in 2010, after six years of inception, it raised its first ever funding of $2 million from Bertelsmann India investments. Slowly inching towards Unicorn club, it had $10-12 million revenue in 2017 when they raised a Series B round of $8 million. While it took six years to get $10 million in revenue, in four more years it has zoomed to $100 million revenues in FY20. Then later in 2018, Eruditus raised their series C round of funding led by global venture capital firm Sequoia Capital and raised $40 million. And in series D round led by Leeds Illuminate and Prosus Ventures along with Chan Zuckerberg initiative and other existing investors, Eruditus raised $113 million, doubling its valuation from $400 to $800 million in a jiffy.
Eruditus went from zero to $10 million revenue in just six years, $10 to $100 Million in three years, and after Series D round of funding, the startup closed its funding at an $800 million valuation.

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In a pandemic situation when Universities were closing down globally, Eruditus offered executive diplomas and other leading programmes from globally recognized universities and hence was well placed to grow.

Milestones in their ‘To-Be Unicorn’ Journey

Offline to Online

Having a post-money valuation of $410 million the startup can be envisioned to turn Unicorn in 12 months. Inching towards the unicorn club, growing slowly, steadily, without any fuss or hype, and increasing their base from offline to online changed the outlook of the tech company totally.

The First Failure

Even before starting their journey, the startup failed at their very first 3-months executive programme. From 2010-2015 they only launched partnerships with Harvard, Wharton, INSEAD, The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), persuading them one by one. This was not playing out well for Eruditus as it turned out to be very expensive and was only possible off-season for the universities.

Setback or Stepping Stone?

Ashwin Damera, the co-founder and CEO of Eruditus, could see a positive growth path amidst the supposed setbacks. Raising the money much later gave them the time to build their product, understand the market, and stay under the radar.

The ‘Unicorn’ Tag is Not the Goal

Eruditus decided on a cohort-based approach and dedicated themselves to take everything slowly and steadily. The CEO states is focused on a larger purpose. The main objective is not to become a unicorn, but to single-mindedly work towards doing the right thing for the company.

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Which are the New Customer Segments for Travel and Hospitality?

Aakash Sharma — Tue, 06 Apr 2021 02:35:04 +0000

With rising waves of COVID-19 across the world, the travel and hospitality sector is once again facing complex travel barriers and severe concerns for business plans. Despite a brief moment of reassurance with vaccines’ arrival, the industry still lacks a large pandemic plan. To overcome the challenges bearing out of the pandemic, the industry needs to understand the changes in customer behaviour during the outbreak and become aware of new tastes and dispositions that may become permanent.

Marketing segmentation methods can help identify new customer segments in the travel and hospitality industry. Essentially, it is a customer-centric approach that combines products of interest for consumers. These adaptations are designed to accommodate the unique characteristics and behaviours of a single class or group.

Here we tell you the new travel and hospitality customer segments to focus on.

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Companies in the travel industry can also do their small customer analysis to understand changes during the pandemic and provide practical strategies and plans for each specific category.

Periodic Holiday Travellers

Periodic Holiday Travellers are one of the most sought after customer segments in the travel and hospitality industry. These customers are relatively indifferent to safety or budget, and even when they consider a new travel destination, the vacations and travel continue to happen regardless of the goal. Business’s existing strategies and motivations might still work to cater to these travellers’ needs, but new safe innovations can help them lead this segment better.

Health and Safety Conscious Travellers

This group of travellers has a bad rap for businesses and start-ups in the travel and hospitality sector. These current customers continue to spend on travel and accommodation but at a lower level. Impediments like long haul flights, traffic, reports of pollution at domestic or short-haul destinations, etc., deter these travellers from their journey and spending on travelling resources. If this segment does not feel encouraged and confident to resume travel at the pre-pandemic safety levels, their travel habits and consumption rate may decrease significantly, therefore hurting businesses.

The Expected Increase in Hardbound Travel Enthusiasts

This customer segment of the travel and hospitality market consists of customers expected to respond safely and continue their traditional travel and lodging methods. These reactivated customers had lapsed due to stringent safety protocols earlier but reverted to an imagined holiday experience in the face of lockdown conjecture. These travellers will also explore their options of travelling through new sources and businesses – come what may. Discounts, rewards, premium services and incentivisation on the business’s end can help renew loyalty well after the pandemic ends.

Renewed Criteria for Targeting Travel Sites

When selecting the accommodations, sights and destinations for the travellers’ itineraries, the marketing mix components are expected to be considered by travellers in a post COVID world. For the selection of hotel accommodations, the most relevant attributes that people might look at are the physical environment, price, safety and adherence to protocols, and people.

What should Travel and Hospitality Start-ups watch out for next?

For companies in the travel and hospitality sector, the customer bases and segments mentioned above can provide valuable information for planning future business strategies. Companies in the travel industry can also do their small customer analysis to understand changes during the pandemic and provide practical strategies and plans for each specific category.

It is now clear that the pandemic will continue to intensify over the coming months, and the response from countries and consumers will continue to vary as well. As a result, people’s outlook towards travelling can change from time to time, and therefore, travel and hospitality business strategies need to be reviewed regularly to monitor the progress, or decline, of the industry.

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If you are an Education, Coaching and Training Start-up this is How you Can Enter New Markets?

Roopali Kotwal — Thu, 01 Apr 2021 02:35:04 +0000

New Market: Learning Forms and Offerings

What does education, coaching and training have in common? Learning requirement which means your audience is anyone starting from a kinder-garden kid to high school or a working professional which means a vast audience. So gathering an audience may not be an issue but as an entrepreneur, you must decide on your offerings before you enter the new market.

Decide if you shall be focusing on coaching a particular subject, offering a career counselling platform, personality development courses, personal grooming sessions, entrance, academics, foreign language lessons, or any specific niche.

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Technology based education, coaching and training models have transformed the learning platform.

New Market: Entry

As an entrepreneur, when you think of entering a new market you would always strive for growth. You intend to grow and expand your business. However, there are a couple of things which should be taken care of before taking the plunge to ensure you dive deep as intended to enter the new market:

Choose a market – Find out the new market volume in terms of your target audience, look out for any possible initial barriers to ensure there is no hindrance for your business development. For instance, any language barriers, infrastructure and logistics issues and legal compliances

Market Survey/Research – Survey to know the preference, why and what the audience wants to learn in the new market. Understand their problems and analyse if you will be able to meet their demand and provide solutions through your project. Also, observe learning trends and identify the needs of the market in detail and survey for best locations to expand your business

Evaluate your competition – Type of services you will be providing and what your competitor is offering and evaluate the gap if any. Analyse how can you simplify or provide solutions to your target audience

Decide on the mode of learning whether it would be offline or online. Though the demand in corona times grew and the focus also shifted to online/e-learning. However, in case you wish to have a physical centre for the future, decide on the best locations as per the target audience in the new market. Also, freeze on the business model. For instance, making a subscription-based business model for an online study centre

Brand Awareness and Recall – With a very focused approach, use enough channels and use them extensively to raise brand awareness and brand recall. For instance, use of influencers through social media or local partnerships, public relations or any local ambassadors and seek feedbacks

Figure out the capital requirement as in how much money will be required to start an Ed-tech and see the return on investment after deciding on the learning mode and model of the business

What’s in it for me?

Technology-based education, coaching and training models have transformed the learning platform. The traditional model has changed to e-learning and especially during corona times, it turned out to be the biggest saviour. It has defined the path of the education system in India and worldwide. According to HolonIQ, the global Ed-tech market is growing at 16.3 per cent and will grow 2.5 times from 2019 to 2025, reaching a total of $404 billion in global expenditure.

Mobile learning, Video-Based Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Learning Analytics, Personalized Learning and Micro-Learning Platforms and adoption of virtual training are among the key trends in 2021 in the education sector.

As entrepreneurs, you must pay close attention to the new development and trends to enter the new market. A start-up’s focus on Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality in training sections can actually pay off very well. No doubt that with online education mode as a preferred mode, the start-ups like Unacademy, BYJU’s, etc. are already doing well.

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If you are a Consumer Tech start-up, this is how you can enter new markets

Aakash Sharma — Tue, 30 Mar 2021 00:35:04 +0000

For 2020, the most successful companies in the consumer technology (consumer tech) industry include the US-based video conferencing platform Zoom and Indian conglomerate RIL’s Reliance Retail and its technology division Jio. Naturally, health and safety technology remained more important than ever in 2020. One of the tech community’s primary goals has been to allow people from all over the world to operate and attend their work remotely and support their increasingly housebound lives.

Let us note and explore some ideas and concepts you can follow to enter the growing Consumer Tech industry as a new Consumer Tech start-up or entrepreneur.

In today’s changing time, experts recommend not go into a physical model of a business, like retail stores and logistics, because they have high capital requirements and limited profit margins. But, on the bright side, segments like consumer electronics are a substantial entry-level market. As of 2020, the global consumer tech and electronics market is valued at $838.85 billion.

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After introducing high-tech equipment technology in 2020, the consumer tech smartphone industry seems to have undergone a significant change.

Essential building blocks for an E-commerce and Consumer Tech start-up

Wholesale contracts: E-commerce and retail businesses are based on buying wholesale products at the lowest possible price and selling them individually at a profitable price. Such contracts and wholesale acquisition are vital to establishing a business, and consumer tech solutions like website and customer support can boost advances.

Logistics and Transportation (L&T): In the retail sector, a lot of money has to be spent on logistics and transportation services. A long-term contract with a shipping company can help you make a profit and improve the overall way of running your business.

Storage and warehousing: An e-commerce business bears a high cost of storage. Regular retail segments do not include any inventory, which depends on the difference between sale and point of purchase.

Consumer Tech start-up: Trends for entering the industry

COVID technology

Recently, robust and technologically advanced measures have formed many companies’ core strategy to fight and resist COVID-19 and other potential future pandemic. Taking inspiration from companies like Kinsa, new age medical devices like smart thermometers that collect data from thousands of devices can be initiated or created by tech start-ups to break new ground in the devices and services industry.

Work and study from home equipment

One area in which business and innovation proliferated last year was working remotely and studying from home conditions. From furniture to computer makers, everyone looked for ways to bring technical solutions to the newly renovated home offices and classrooms that became a standard part of everyday lives.

Remote education is a new reality for many people, and companies are introducing new platforms in this field. For companies like Zoom and edtech and training ventures, there is, of course, enormous potential for growth in the years to come.

Video conferencing and other equipment used to restore the classroom environment are all the rage in the education industry, and tech entrepreneurs and start-ups might risk missing out on this opportunity for success if they don’t act swiftly.

5G technology

Almost all ‘cool’ new-age games and devices need data to run, and 5G is the future. This new consumer tech is expected to bring digital information channels into our lives faster than ever.

Many of the primary device manufacturers are promoting new 5G compatible cell phones. After introducing high-tech equipment technology in 2020, the smartphone industry seems to have undergone a significant change. Companies like Motorola have introduced budget 5G smartphones. To meet tech giants’ needs, start-ups need to supplement the workload and gain from the opportunity.

Indian Consumer Tech start-ups who made it big in 2020

Pepperfry: This online furniture and decoration marketplace has raised a total of $240.5 million in eight rounds of financing.

Rentomojo: It is arguably India’s premier rental platform, offering a wide range of rental products. Rentomojo raised $48.5 million in total funding and is valued at $ 100 million after new financing in 2020.

Testbook: It is the ultimate website for online exam preparation and mock practice tests and raised $8.3 million in funding in the Series-B round.

Coverfox: This online insurance product collection platform raised $ 5.79 million in 2020 from many investors and VCs.

In a nutshell, as these companies made their mark in the industry by giving beneficial consumer tech solutions, they are also a pathfinder for new and upcoming businesses to make their presence felt in the sector.

Technology has been at the forefront for a long time, and it is undoubtedly the industry of the future. All that start-ups and entrepreneurs need to do is capture the gaps with viable consumer tech solutions and take the prize away.

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If You Are a Direct-to-Consumer Start-up, This is How you Can Enter New Markets

Shalmoli Sarkar — Mon, 29 Mar 2021 00:35:04 +0000

Changing customer preferences and consumption to digital content is paving the path of growth for the D2C startups in India. With new unique needs emerging, D2C startups are successfully catering to the pain points to build loyalty, eliminate middlemen and increase profits. With closure of malls and stores in lockdown, and strict government rules to e-commerce biggies to not sell non-essential items, customers are left with the only option to buy from D2C brands. However, since D2C startups are digital first stores the market dynamics works differently for them. The pandemic acted as a catalyst that significantly increased the online content consumption that led the D2C startups to flourish. A study as per Avendus Capital says, D2C startups soon will be a market worth $100 billion in India by 2025. With the future seeming bright for D2C startups, they have the strength to foray into newer demographics and markets. Here is how they can expand into new markets.

Entering the rural markets

Increasing aspirations to lead a better life, a deluge of affordable smartphones, embracing digital payments and inexpensive 4G data plans is causing people from tier-IV and tier-V cities to opt for online shopping. As per TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India ) the country has 1.15 billion mobile phone users out of which 520 million comes from rural areas. D2C startups being digital -first – brands should have constant consumer interaction on social media platforms and not forgetting that the story behind a brand is necessary for the customer to find it relevant. Hence, to establish a strong foothold in the rural market the brand content, vibe , language should have a touch of localisation. The content of your brand should be solving the pain points of a customer. The engagement rate, acceptance and conversion rate in rural India towards a D2C brand will skyrocket if the content is vernacular.

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As per TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India ) the country has 1.15 billion mobile phone users out of which 520 million comes from rural areas.

Offering a subscription based model

D2C brands such as NUA – a women’s personal wellness brand offers a subscription based model where it has monthly and quarterly plans to offer sanitary pads to women, thus freeing them from buying regularly. With a subscription model companies can build a long-lasting relationship with customers based on convenience, reliability and meeting their unique needs, this creates a recurring revenue and positive word of mouth in the community helping to expand.

Up the game of social media marketing

Paid marketing strategies help a business to collect relevant data points, for example finding audience from which location is interacting, their preferences, which social media are they most active and the sites they visit. After obtaining the data, startups should design the social media campaigns and optimize the every stage of the sales funnel. Starting the campaigns first with Facebook will be beneficial since its algorithms are more advanced and has lower cost per action as compared to google ads.

Leveraging social selling to enter new markets

D2C brands can collaborate with micro influencers on Instagram and Facebook to leverage the already established fanbase. Since customers spend more than twice as much time on social media other than browsing other websites, 62 percent of customers are likely to purchase a product from a brand they follow on social media as per Sprout Social. In social media, D2C startups have the liberty to customize their messaging and run highly targeted ads to target certain demographics.

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