The great Indian startup battle: Founders vs Investors
27 Feb 2019 1:16 AM GMT
Founders of Indian startups are increasingly challenging the power of large investors in order to retain control over their firms.But the relatively small size of startup successes in India means that investors are likely to continue to be in the ascendant
- The company is doing all of this amid a boardroom standoff that involves two of the most powerful investors in the startup ecosystem, SoftBank Group Corp. and Tiger Global Management Llc.
- Though Ola has maintained a slender lead over Uber in the ride hailing market, reduced losses per ride, seen a huge increase in sales, entered international markets and diversified into new businesses, the company’s valuation has moved only slightly higher from the valuation of $5 billion that it had secured in 2015.
- Last May, Flipkart co-founder and then chairman Sachin Bansal was forced to leave the company ahead of its sale to Walmart Inc. after Tiger Global managing director Lee Fixel and other board members opposed Bansal’s attempt to return to a bigger operating role at Flipkart.
- With this wealth creation, some entrepreneurs like Sachin Bansal, Binny Bansal and Bhavish Aggarwal became entrepreneurial icons.
- Around the same time, Aggarwal blocked a proposed sale of Ola shares by Tiger to SoftBank.
- If Softbank was involved in Ola as much as it is in Oyo, Paytm, Policybazaar, etc it would have seen a much higher valuation.
Next Story
