He didn’t want to do it but then….? The pioneer of Indian E-commerce

Deep Kalra, the founder of Makemytrip.com is one of the pioneers of e-commerce in India. He started his journey right at the dawn of the 21st century.

Most internet companies of this era are gone. Overtaken by bigger and better competitors. But MakeMyTrip has only grown stronger with time. And it continues to be a leader in the biggest travel markets in the world.

But all this seemed unlikely if you would have met the young Deep Kalra. Deep’s grandfather had a thriving dry fruits business in Chandni Chowk, New Delhi.?

But then neither his son nor his grandson, Deep wanted to do anything with it.

Instead, Deep wanted to do something fancy. And the best thing to do when you want to do something fancy is to do an MBA.

Once graduated banking seemed cool and it paid well. So he joined a bank.?

But soon enough realized that he didn't want to do it.

Then marketing caught his attention. It was the new cool. So he pivoted and worked in a marketing role for a few years.?

But eventually came to a point where didn't want to do it.

He wanted to do something with more freedom. More decision-making space. It was when an American company was introducing bowling as a sport in India. Seemed like a perfect opportunity. He joined. Despite working hard for three years the thing seemed to be too early to work in India.?

Once again Deep realized that he didn't want to do it.

It is 2000 and the dotcom craze is at its peak. Any company starting with dotcom in its name was raising money.

Around this time Deep was trying to sell off his wife's old car. He had some offers from a few car agents. But out of curiosity, he wanted to check if he can find a better deal on this thing called the Internet. Everyone was talking about it in those days.

He got an offer he couldn't refuse. All the fuss seems to be real about this internet.

There's a pivotal moment that every entrepreneur's life. A moment when they see an opportunity to build a business, which they can't then un-see. It was this moment in the life of Deep Karla.

With his banking background, he thought online trading would be a good idea. But quickly gave up on that. His research revealed the biggest chunk of business in online space was happening in the travel segment. This confirmed online travel platform as a perfect business opportunity.

He drafted a business plan.

Builds a website.

Hires his initial team.

Gets funded by the first investor he meets.

Everything was happening quickly.?

Making a mistake seemed impossible.?

And that's when he made a big blunder.

Not knowing any better, he gave away 70% of MakeMyTrip to investors for the investment money.

It was like owning a small share in a business but he had to do all the work.?

If he failed he would have lost his time, energy, and confidence.?

And if he succeeded, he would have made his investors fabulously wealthy.?

While earning peanuts for himself.?

Talk about a better lose-lose deal.

He thought he had made a fool of himself so it made sense to start the operations on April Fool's day in the year 2000.

He starts by targeting NRI’s booking flights to and from India. The company grew fast. Going from 1 person to 40 in no time. The business was looking good. Optimism was in the air. Nothing could stop the match of this original Indian internet e-commerce company.

But then exactly nine months into it the dotcom crash happened. It was a bloodbath and the first real disaster after the rise and rise of the Internet for almost a decade. A lot of dotcom companies went bust. No cash came that was supposed to keep the lights on. Every investor wanted to cut their losses. His investors wanted to pack their bags and sell their ownership to anyone who was buying. Deep was in deep trouble.?

Deep decided not to...Nah...

Deep loved the idea of Travel. He had given his blood, sweat, and tears to build this baby. Now it was the time to do it.?

Not giving up.?

So he decided to invest his life savings and bought the company back from his investors.

This caterpillar-to-butterfly movement is when entrepreneurs change their destinies. And of millions of others. It separates the men from boys. And our boy was finally not giving up.

But things were about to get really bad.

No new funds were available.

All his personal resources were exhausted.

Revenues were falling because of the market panic.

The times were scary. The question that popped into Deep's mind time and time again.

Do I want to pack my bags and look for a job? or

Do I want to put up a fight?

He chose to fight.

As the market continued to be in bad shape, he took a tough call to ensure make my trip survived.

He had to let go of 50%t of his workforce.

The big office was shifted to a small space to save on rent.

Salaries were difficult to pay but paid.

But Deep himself did not draw a salary for 18 months.

It was all about survival and living to see another day.

But as happens after every downturn things go back to being bright and right again.

In the next few years, two major developments tipped the balance of domestic tourism.

Indian Railways allowed booking its tickets online.

Low-cost carriers opened up the option of flying to millions of Indians.

And this opened up floodgates of the Indian travel market. Make my trip was right there to collaborate and capture to grow this market by leaps and bounds. From ditches of dot-com bust to the high of getting listed on NASDAQ in 2010.

It's not been a smooth ride after that in any sense:

Heated domestic competition Goibibo , EaseMyTrip.com Paytm

Aggressive moves by big boys of International travel Booking.com Expedia Group

A few more downturns

But Deep Kalra has held his ground with his astute leadership.

And he is in no mood to give up anytime soon.