The Dukaan-Tech Wave in India
This story is about the wave of startups building Shopify for India, interestingly coined as 'Dukaan-Tech'
by Harry Kapoor
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Do you know how valuable is Shopify?
~ $112 billion dollars is the current market cap of the player which makes it easy for anyone to build their online shop in few hours. You may ask why that value? It is not simply a software but a platform. Read this piece to understand the power of platforms like Shopify vs. marketplaces like Amazon and why the world is bullish on Shopify.
https://stratechery.com/2019/shopify-and-the-power-of-platforms/
But more important to note is that Shopify cannot be easily used by the 65M MSMEs in India who are not the most technology-savvy and in many cases not as well educated.
These could be your Dukaan wale bhaiya, parlour wali aunti, or an interior designer in your family. Indian entrepreneurs have built technology that allows these individuals to create their own online shop (read: a site/ app/ landing page) with features like listing goods & services, ordering, payment etc. in literally few minutes. Without any requirement of knowing coding or tech. In multiple regional languages.
And we have seen not one but tens of new companies/ apps come up that allow users to create their own shops.
To name a few key ones- Dukaan, Okshop, Dukaan by Khatabook, Bikayi, Digital Dukaan by Dotpe.
Did you observe how close and competitive these players are getting to win the MSMEs of India. Hardly any of them have a business model to earn revenue yet, but they are banking on building distribution first and get as many 'Dukaans' on board.
Here's a humorous take on how 'Dukaan-Tech' players are fighting it out.
Here's how some of them are seeing initial traction:
If it interests you, you should deep-dive into the hot startups in the MSME space, Khatabook, OKCredit, Bharatpe among others.
What do you think is the future potential of these players who are banking on making money in future through various forms like lending to these MSMEs, bringing them into the digital fold and upselling etc.
Harry, thanks for the piece and insight. So I am curious specifically on the value gained by online social sellers (no offline store, sell via FB , Insta, WA). Given that they already have an online touchpoint, how have this apps addressed their pain-points or created value? or this yet to occur in a major way? Thoughts?