Sorry, my room is a bit cluttered. Can?t help it; I am a collector,? says 41-year-old entrepreneur Deep Kalra, as he extends a warm welcome to his corporate office, where we are to meet for coffee and biscuits, his persona strong even amidst the clutter.
Kalra?s travel portal MakeMyTrip similarly not only stands out in the congested online space, but has been a game-changer of sorts. From surviving the dotcom bust to being synonymous with online travel and from the fairy-tale listing on Nasdaq to eyeing acquisitions in foreign markets, Deep Kalra has tailored an interesting itinerary for his online travel business.
A good academic record and an IIM-A degree is not what immediately prompted Kalra to set up his own travel shop. In fact, he says it?s by elimination that he realised that this is what he wanted to do. He started out with a banking job at ABN Amro and also did a stint at GE Capital. He also worked for an American bowling company before realising his calling. And it was still early days when he was joined by MakeMyTrip?s two other co-founders, Keyur Joshi and Rajesh Magow.
?There is a very fine line between resilience and stubbornness. If it works out, you can look back and say I was resilient. If it doesn?t, you say I was stubborn,? says Kalra, sipping his coffee.
But then, to be an entrepreneur, you need to have that streak of stubbornness, at least that?s what Kalra?s story suggests. In 2000, MakeMyTrip was started as a travel company focused only on NRI travel. It was only much later in 2005 that the portal entered the Indian market. ?In the Internet world ten years back, it was really hard to start on your own. We started with a niche NRI model as we thought the Indian market wasn?t ready then and why burn money here,? he says, adding after a brief pause, ?Whoever forayed into the Indian online travel market at that point of time?companies such as nettotravel, travelmart-india, travelgenie?perished.?
But the story of this suave businessman is of survival. Early 2000 was the time when SARS broke out and 9/11 impacted travel and economies. During the dotcom bust in early 2001, MakeMyTrip?s incubator eVentures exited the company. ?That was the hardship period. We were living hand to mouth and salaries were not paid. From a team of 42 members, we were reduced to 24 as people quit,? recalls Kalra. But he was stubborn and strongly believed that quitting too early was not his style. ?You learn from your failures more than your success. Why quit? The opportunity of becoming an entrepreneur comes to very few people,? he says.
In 2003, profits started trickling in and finally in 2005, with the low-cost carrier (LCC) boom in India spear-headed by the entry of Air Deccan, MakeMyTrip set foot in the Indian market. ?The lesson there is to be nimble and ready to change. Read the market and keep your ears on the ground.
Before the LCC boom we realised the Indian market was not ready. There were a lot of lookers but very few bookers. Once Deccan launched, followed by other LCCs, traditional travel agents faced a very big problem?cheap tickets offered by the no-frill carriers were not available on the global distribution system (GDS). That?s when we came into the picture, solving the problem by making tickets of various airlines available at a platform where you could compare real-time rates,? he explains. Today, one out of every ten air traveller books tickets on the portal.
Not surprisingly, being an entrepreneur is what truly delights Kalra, who has 900 employees working for his company. ?Last year we were ranked second in the ?great places to work? survey. That gave me great joy, even more than the Nasdaq listing,? he recalls. Interestingly, of the initial lot that witnessed the hardships of the Internet market in India with Kalra, around 16 people are still with the company. Their rewards have been the eSops that were shared with them.
No wonder then that this avid traveller has photographs of his team mates having fun at hip (read wild) offsites pinned all over his office cubicle walls. A people?s person alright, but who does Kalra look up to for people management? Well, it?s telecom czar Sunil Bharti Mittal. ?I admire the way he re-shuffles his team every few years; it?s quite interesting. Clarity and team strategy is brilliant,? says Kalra, his coffee lying forgotten.
The man who is behind several holidays himself prefers the lesser explored jaunts in India?Andamans, the pristine north-east and Kashmir. These days, though, he is busy globetrotting with CFO Rajesh Magow, scouting for acquisition targets. He agrees that the Nasdaq listing has clearly given him an edge in the global sphere. In August last year, it was the first company to get listed on the Nasdaq after 2006. MakeMyTrip raised $70 million by pricing 5 million shares at $14 each and also exercised the green shoe option for another 15%, bringing the entire amount to $80.5 million.
It was a start that startled many. In a blockbuster debut, the shares surged by almost 80%. He chose Nasdaq for listing his company and not India because he thought that?s where many top Internet companies are listed and investors clearly have an appetite for Internet stocks in the US. But more than excitement, it was relief that Kalra felt after the listing. ?If you are passionate about doing something, everything will be right. I was relieved after the listing. So many people had blind faith in us. I had promised so many things to so many people. I am glad we could take the company to the next level,? he sighs. Here too, Kalra emphasises that having the right people in the company helped and how his leadership team of ten people was the key in realising the dream listing.
Outside his company, too, Kalra admires many businessmen, be it Narayan Murthi for creating a value-driven company and his principle of sharing wealth, or Ashok Soota and Subroto Bagchi of MindTree. But he is closest to Sanjeev Bikhchandani of Naukri.com, with whom he has been acquainted since when he was preparing for his business degree. Incidentally, Kalra shares the same academic record as Bikhchandani?an economics degree from St Stephen?s College, followed by IIM-Ahmedabad. That they both run successful Internet companies is purely incidental too.
As e-commerce is witnessing its second wave in India, with bargain websites burgeoning, Kalra, who is on the board of quite a few sites, forecasts that soon the boys will be separated from the men. Meanwhile, the big daddy of the online travel market is out there, ready to seal more deals post its acquisition in Singapore. Of course, the fresh capital will only come in handy.