Why Cardekho and Infra.Market bet on a strong foundation for rapid growth

Amit Jain, co-founder and CEO of Cardekho Group, said startups also need to focus on building strong foundations.

“It took us 8 years to get to the first one ₹1 million. This is a bootstrapping company, so we didn’t raise funds until 2014. That’s when we actually get funding. Therefore, as a self-deceiving company, we have clicks ₹The scale of 1 million is not actually utilizing any cash, and it is profitable everywhere. ” He spoke at the Mint India Investment Summit in Mumbai.

“Since we don’t have money, we have to develop a strategy to get transportation for free, and I think a lot of innovations have happened,” Jain said.

The trajectory of Infra.Market is similar. The building materials platform began in 2016 and it wasn’t until 2020 that the company reached its first ₹10 billion sales landmark. That is, the founders of the company know their market.

“What was unique to India at the time was that most building materials companies were single-product companies. We started with our vision and were a one-stop platform for building construction companies around building materials,” said Souvik Sengupta, co-founder and CEO of Infra.market.

Since then, the company has expanded to include retailers as well as business-to-consumer focus.

However, the journey to get there wasn’t easy for Infra.market, and Sengupta and his co-founder Aaditya Sharda have been launching. “We built every entrepreneur who is not a startup in India. We mortgaged everything. We mortgaged our parents’ house. I think Aaditya mortgaged his in-laws’ home.”

Beyond the first ₹1 million

Cardekho Arrives ₹Jain’s 1 million sales target realized that the company only penetrated a certain percentage of the market. This led to his search for an issue with his existing business at the time, which eventually led to Cardekho’s increase in financial markets.

“We entered the insurance market. That’s how insurance companies were formed. We help dealers sell insurance to customers who buy used cars. In this segment, there is no 50% of the cars insured.”

Insurancedekho now has 20,000 insurance agents on its platform. “The thinking process is very simple: how can we occupy the adjacency. Every time we enter the adjacency, there is a new TAM (total addressable market) open. This is a new TAM that helps us grow,” Jain said.

As for Infra.market, the company has made a series of acquisitions to expand its business. “It’s not a dominant decision,” Sengupta said, referring to the company’s growth strategy, adding that it’s about the ability to know what the company can build for itself rather than what it wants to get and “master”.

With Infra.Market heading to the open pathway, the company is now committed to increasing its profitability and improving cash flow.

“Considering the expenses India has made on construction every year, and considering bookings over the past few years, the way real estate construction will be overcome,” Sengupta said.

Learn from failure

Jain said Cardekho had several successes but also saw some failures.

“We started using auto retail, where we were going to buy a car, refurbish, put it in our own showroom and sell it. We were already a digital platform and we were integrating the purchase process backwards to try to pull out more margin pools. Honestly, we failed honestly, and we couldn’t find a profit pool,” Jain said.

He said that despite the company’s losses in the used car business, he never allowed to collect money to chase bad money. “You can tolerate the fact that a business is not exercising and you have learned because every failed founder will honestly learn a lot.”

However, Jain warns that while founders are sometimes excited about building several things, it is a better idea to come up with the focus. Jain has begun building business on auto parts, roadside assistance. “After a year and a half, I realized we had a very mediocre job because I personally am very thin on all these projects and have little concentration and you don’t build something great.”