The E-Commerce industry has progressed in leaps and bounds in the recent past. With huge discounts and free offers ruling the e-commerce industry, it is hard to say who stands profitable at the end of the day. Is it the customer, who in the lure of getting cheap or free products are shopping more and more each day or is it the e-commerce giant, who is making big bucks out of the whole scheme of things? Either ways, what has resulted is half finished or damaged products being delivered to consumers, dissatisfying them and creating a bad name (user experience) on the part of the provider/ marketplace.
To identify, discuss and understand wholly, this e-commerce business, the School of Business, Public Policy and Social Entrepreneurship, Ambedkar University, New Delhi organised an E- Commerce summit in 2014. The Summit began with a Panel Discussion on the theme titled, “E-Commerce and the Untapped Sections of the Society”, chaired by Mr Amitabh Pandey (Former President, Thomas Cook India, and Ex-General Manager, IRCTC). The Panelists included Mr Abhishek Logani (Associate Director, MakeMyTrip), Mr Rohit Chaddha (Managing Director, Foodpanda) and Mr Sandeep Sheokand (Co-Founder, InsuringIndia.com).
The discussion covered issues on how the e-commerce in India today is getting flooded with pushy start-ups even while web-based sales remain a sliver line of the overall retail market. The speakers talked about the essential mission of electronic retailing which always had four elements: getting the right product in the right place at the right price at the right time. Among the interesting questions that were addressed in the panel discussion included: ‘what does it take to start an e-commerce venture’, ‘what motivates a venture capitalist to start an e-commerce venture’, ‘where should the investments be made’, what does one do for customer retention’, and ‘what barriers does one need to overcome?’
The Business Plan Competition that followed on the same day saw participation of students from several Business Schools across the city. The summit concluded with an E-Biz Quiz in which more than 30 teams participated.