YouTube Icon

Can YC-Backed Bikayi Shine In India’s Crowded Kirana Tech Market?




Can YC-Backed Bikayi Shine In India’s Crowded Kirana Tech Market?

Not only have mounted gamers like Amazon, Flipkart, Swiggy, Zomato have thrown their hat in the small retail tech ring, more recent youngsters inside the block have emerged like MyStore, Dukaan.Io, DigitalDukaan, OKShop

The online grocery opportunity in the usa became pegged at $500 Bn via a 2019 record of management consulting business enterprise Redseer. Of this half one trillion dollar opportunity of transporting 13 Mn mother and pa shops to the digital age, simplest zero.2% had come on line on the time

Bikayi is betting in this large opportunity with a SaaS-primarily based subscription version for services including cataloguing and order control for small shopkeepers

The Indian startup ecosystem has constantly grown in spurts across the key desires of the marketplace.  There was the ecommerce wave while startups raced to be India’s Amazon. Then there has been a food transport wave; a bills wave; a lending tech wave. And now it’s time for dukaan tech. 

Every couple of years within the closing decade has visible a new zone attracting the eye of techies and VC cash has followed the invention of the subsequent ‘exact marketplace’ — a time period used by the cash guys for describing markets wherein returns are positive to observe regardless of how effective the product is.

Also Read:- Pros and Cons of AI Chatbots: All You Must Know

With Reliance entering the ecommerce fray and betting huge on bringing kirana stores to the web space, digitising grocery shipping has turn out to be the subsequent forestall of entrepreneurs searching out a trouble to resolve.  The on-line grocery possibility inside the usa turned into pegged at $500 Bn by means of a 2019 file of control consulting corporation Redseer. Of this half of one thousand billion dollar opportunity of transporting 13 Mn mother and pa shops to the digital age, best zero.2% had come on-line on the time.

Not simplest have set up players like Amazon, Flipkart, Swiggy, Zomato have thrown their hat inside the ring, new youngsters on the block have emerged like MyStore, Dukaan.Io, DigitalDukaan, OKShop, Bikayi — in a phase wherein retail tech gamers such as Peel Works, Nukkad Shops, Snapbizz and others have jostled for area for some time. A cursory search of the phrase ‘dukaan’ on the Google Play Store throws up as a minimum 50 outcomes of apps that bear names with some variant of dukaan or kirana.

On the other give up of the digitisation spectrum, we have some retail tech startups that have been round since the hyperlocal wave, targeting the maximum sophisticated set among shops and keep proprietors. These are offering more matured offerings together with procurement, charge-guards, two-facet marketplace aid, automatic stock mapping and more. 

Will YC-Backed Bikayi’s SaaS Model Find Takers In India’s Increasingly-Crowded Kirana Digitisation Market?

SaaS In The Hands Of India’s Kiranas

Striding these two worlds is Bikayi, a Hyderabad-primarily based fintech startup based in January 2019 that featured amongst Y Combinator’s Summer 2020 batch. Founded by means of IIIT Hyderabad batchmates Sonakshi Nathani and Ashutosh Singla, the center concept of the platform changed into to attempt to create a set of state-of-the-art customers such that SaaS will become 2nd nature to them in the destiny. 

In a way, Bikayi is not handiest seeking to bridge the adoption gap but additionally trying to sell value-brought offerings over and above what different new “dukaan-tech” apps are doing, however to the equal target market.  

 “While many gamers are trying to build a Shopify for small merchants, we felt that those characteristic-heavy packages weren’t cellular friendly enough for them to undertake”, stated Nathani.

Bikayi’s minimal possible product launched in March last 12 months enabled neighbourhood stores to make the online transition with a catalogue that might be shared on WhatsApp. As the reaction to the app grew and the startup started out receiving feedback from shopkeepers, it began including greater functions which include included login for storefront workforce, order monitoring via SMS, consumer evaluations, stay analytics of variety of orders and traffic each day and month-to-month, and stock control, amongst others.

Will YC-Backed Bikayi’s SaaS Model Find Takers In India’s Increasingly-Crowded Kirana Digitisation Market?

While the startup wanted to make the UI/UX easy sufficient for this unsophisticated target market, that doesn’t suggest it changed into prepared to sacrifice on the function the front.  “Once a shop starts ecommerce, its aspirations upward push and we don’t need to be a tool that they bypass at some point. Initially, anybody started as a cataloguing platform but now everyone is attempting out exceptional models. Today we are a SaaS-primarily based subscription model that solves cataloguing and order management and that could be the important distinction among us and others,” Nathani stated.

Also Read:- How To Make Your Business Website SEO-Friendly

This perception inside the aspirations of small organizations has led Bikayi to adopt a subscription-based totally SaaS model with a couple of pricing points catering to distinctive forms of corporations. While there’s a basic plan that customers can use without cost, there also are monthly plans starting from INR 167 to INR 667 which customers can select relying on their catalogue extent and feature necessities. While these are early days in terms of revenue, most apps concentrated on kiranas might not have a clear concept of the revenue streams and going past what WhatsApp does for them. 

The SaaS play is a part of Bikayi’s strategy to consciousness more on attracting small agencies that are already the use of WhatsApp or other small retail tech answers, than trying to cater to first-time customers. To pressure adoption among SMEs and provide them a flavor of the bigger ecommerce pie, the startup has also commenced capabilities such as supplying referral codes and social media integration of catalogues and gives. 

Will YC-Backed Bikayi’s SaaS Model Find Takers In India’s Increasingly-Crowded Kirana Digitisation Market?

Can Bikayi Be A Gamechanger In A Crowded Space?

Its largest differentiator however is imparting a shipping integration with companies like Delhivery and Shadowfax in geographies they're found in. In places with out logistics carriers, agencies can price distance-based shipping expenses and use the local community. 

With WhatsApp making plans to move big in retail tech and JioMart having already onboarded lakhs to small shops, these integrations might assist Bikayi find a footing in a market with coins-rich conglomerates. According to Nathani, even as WhatsApp Payments will ease the payments integration for small shopkeepers, the use cases are too huge to offer commercial enterprise length-specific solutions and provide customer support.

However, it’s not most effective tech behemoths that are final in on this territory — competition within the dukaan tech space are selecting up VC investment at a fast clip amid the pandemic. In contrast to the $2 Mn seed spherical for Bikayi that Mantis Ventures, Y Combinator, Pioneer Fund and angel investors participated in, Dukaan has raised a $6 Mn round, OkShop is sponsored through OkCredit that has $84 Mn in its funding kitty,  MyStore is subsidized via Khatabook that has raised $111.Five Mn as yet.

“Money gained’t count number in this example as this space is not distribution-first or advertising-led. This product has actually desirable intensity in phrases of tech and whoever has the satisfactory tech will win the market,” Nathani stated.



Author Biography.

Editorial Team
Editorial Team

Content Writer

Join Our Newsletter.

Subscribe to CrowdforThink newsletter to get daily update directly deliver into your inbox.

CrowdforGeeks is where lifelong learners come to learn the skills they need, to land the jobs they want, to build the lives they deserve.

CrowdforGeeks

CrowdforThink is a leading Indian media and information platform, known for its end-to-end coverage of the Indian startup ecosystem.

CrowdforThink

Our mission is "Har Koi Dekhe Video, Har Ghar Dekhe Video, Ghar Ghar Dekhe Video" so we Provide videos related to Tutorials, Travel, Technology, Wedding, Cooking, Dance, Festivals, Celebration.

Apna Video Wala
CFT

News & Blogs

aeb22a2d8e5da0572c6e4c0d53626f01.png

How Baby Amore Is Bringing Organic, Eco-Friendl...

Founded in 2019, Baby Amore was born out of the need to deliver top class baby care products with...

e46eae2e35fe61e876dcf9e46155b7e3.png

How Simpl’s BNPL Strategy Is Enabling Higher Co...

The buy-now-pay-later segment has been witnessing an extended increase as new gamers like Amazon,...

97bda2f9f8316af55918d303402bd8e5.png

How Meghalaya-Based D2C Startup Zizira Is Spici...

D2C emblem Zizira is bringing Meghalayan spices and herbs like Lakadong turmeric and valerian tea...

Top Authors

Lamia Rochdi is the Marketing Manager at Bell Flavors & Fragrances EMEA. A successful family-...

Lamia Rochdi

I’m Mertin Wilson a technician in a camera company and certified expert of different P...

Mertin Wilson

Zakariya has recently joined the PakWheels team as a Content Marketing Executive, shortly after g...

Zakariya Usman

Pankaj Singh is a Senior Digital Marketing Consultant with more than 2 years of experience in SEO...

Pankaj Singh
CFT

Our Client Says

WhatsApp Chat with Our Support Team