Right man for the job

Sanjeev Bikhchandani, founder-director of Info Edge, the parent company of Naukri.com, tells Sukalp Sharma and Sarika Malhotra that ?entrepreneurship is not a rational choice. It?s something that you want to do?

Sanjeev Bikhchandani?s job, for most part, has been to find you a better job. This dot-com poster boy has given many a ?Hari Sadu? sleepless nights by throwing a world-wide-web-full of naukris at their employees. And how? Today, the parent company of Naukri.com, Info Edge (India) Limited has a market cap of over R3,200, and has scripted an extraordinary story out of a sheepish and an ?ordinary? dot-com start-up. As Bikhchandani himself gets down to narrate the story of this ?almost-garage? start-up, his calm persona and his grounded middle-class upbringing are the first impressions that strike us. And as he begins to talk, we realise that Bikhchandani speaks exactly the way he does business?sharp, precise, and certainly fast?for it takes some effort to keep up and take notes.

?It was as close as it can get to a garage start-up. I started out in 1990 in the servant quarter of my father?s house. For the first seven years, I dabbled with quite a few things, from salary services, reports, database and feasibility studies, to teaching at management institutes to make an extra buck. Surbhi (wife) was working with Nestle and we had an assured salary coming home. This allowed me to explore ideas rather than going for the conventional corporate life,? he says. For the first six to seven years, there was no big idea taking shape in Bikhchandani?s head. ?Even when we launched Naukri.com, there was no grand vision. It evolved later after we figured that we have stumbled upon a big opportunity,? he tells us.

But he did spend some time at an advertising job at Lyntas and then at Hindustan Milkfood Manufacturers (HMM), now GlaxoSmithKline, after his post graduate studies from IIM Ahmedabad. And it was at HMM, where he was working on the brand Horlicks, that he sniffed an opportunity in the jobs space. ?Every time an office copy of Business India would come in, my colleagues would read it from the back as there were 35-40 pages of appointment ads. Then they would have animated discussions in spite of the fact that they were not really looking for jobs. So I figured that even if someone is not looking for a job, they will be looking at a job. Also, headhunters would regularly call and hit at my colleagues. So I also realised that there maybe hundreds of headhunters out there, each with many clients having different briefs. So there must be this massive job market that is highly fragmented,? he adds. So Bikhchandani started thinking of ways wherein these jobs could be aggregated and made available, but since Internet was not yet a reality in 1990, it ended up as ?just another find and forget idea?, only to be redeemed seven years later. But after studying at IIM-Ahmedabad, why did he give a pass to cushy corporate jobs? ?It was very hard for me to walk away from a monthly salary cheque. But having done that, within a few months I learned to like the independence so much that there was never a question of going back. Entrepreneurship is not a rational choice. It?s something that you want to do,? he answers. And after a short pause, he adds, ?Fundamentally, I wanted to be independent and wanted something more creative. I did not want a boss on my head.? In other words, a ?Hari Sadu? (character of a ruthless boss in a memorable Naukri.com ad campaign) for Bikhchandani was someone he could do without.

And after seven years of building the bridge, Bikhchandani had finally arrived at the other end, aided by the advent of the Internet. ?I saw Internet for the first time in 1996, at the IT Asia fair in Delhi, and that?s when I joined the dots and said ?Hey, maybe one should do a job site,? and that?s how Naukri.com came about,? he quips. Naukri?s initial operation involved collecting job listings from the 25-odd newspapers and magazines from across India, and then putting them up on the website. And bingo! As traffic began to swell, it vindicated the customer insight about jobs being a high interest category that Bhikchandani had hypothesised seven years earlier, and more importantly for business, caught the eye of HR managers. ?As Naukri got popular, HR managers began to enquire about listing jobs on the site, so we said, ?You pay us!?. And that?s how the revenue model came about. It took us six months to get our first cheque,? reminisces Bikhchandani. So what were the first listing rates for the site? ?It was just R350 for a single job listing and R6,000 for unlimited listings for a year. To increase volume, we incentivised people to take up the unlimited listings offer,? he says.

And then there was just no looking back. In 2000, ICICI Ventures invested R7 crore as venture capital in Info Edge, just a couple of weeks before the dot-com meltdown. ?Because of the meltdown, we didn?t have time to spend the money foolishly and we simply put it in fixed deposit and used it slowly. There was a point when we were losing R25 lakh a month cash and we were left with less than a year and a half?s money. Our sales effort lifted revenue and the deficit was narrowed and removed. And we grew really fast?from a turnover of R3 lakh per month to a crore a month in three years. It went up more than 30 times in three years,? he explains. But annals have that he was not very keen to go for venture capital (VC) money. ?I was quite happy running a small business. Bigger is not necessarily better. Also, VC was a brand new concept in India. I thought it might not be the path we?d want to take because the moment you take someone else?s money, you become responsible to what happens to other people,? he says. However, it soon dawned upon him that growth capital was an opportunity that was fast becoming a necessity. ?We figured that we can?t be a R50 lakh company making a R10 lakh profit. Soon we?ll have to be a R5 crore company making a R50 lakh profit and a lot of investment is required for that,? he says.

And in 2006, the phenomenal success of the company?s IPO announced its arrival in the big league. ?We knew it would be good but frankly it surprised us completely. We didn?t expect the price to double within day one. Had we known that we would have priced the share a little higher. But that?s luck, you can?t second guess the market!? he quips. But even before the IPO, as things got comfortable with Naukri, the entrepreneur in Bikhchandani was itching to play it bigger and better. The company started diversifying in 2004 in other genres, from matrimonial site Jeevansaathi.com to a real estate portal like 99Acres.com. The story didn?t end there. Today Bikhchandani is dabbling with VC investments himself, investing out of Info Edge?s balance sheet, and is concentrating completely on the external investment wing of the company. Hitesh Oberoi, his longtime associate and current CEO of Info Edge looks after the internal businesses. Today, Info Edge, as a strategic investor has an investment portfolio with six websites, including Policybazaar.com and Zomato.com, and has invested over R100 crore. ?We see ourselves as strategic investors and, therefore, we like to stay in a company for as long as it takes for them to succeed. We?d like to put in the second and third round,? he says. And has the VC model tested ground in India? ?There have been a few successes. Some VC investments fail, some succeed. Overall, VC funds have got positive rate of returns. There is a lot of money in India in the private market,? he says.

Being someone who broke away from the comfortable herd of corporate black suits, started from scratch and took almost seven years to get it right, Bikhchandani emphasises that filial support is paramount for an entrepreneur?s success. ?Entrepreneurs need a very supportive home environment given that the path will be ridden with sacrifices. I have been fortunate. My family kept the faith, saying, let him work, something will happen,? he says. And how are the family dynamics now? ?I love to spend time with my two children. In fact now I get to spend more time with my family than before. Earlier I had to do most of the work myself. Now there is a larger team. My work life balance has improved,? he says. Interested in reading non-fiction, blogging, and bird watching, Bikhchandani is now working hard on starting a university. ?It?s called Ashoka University on which I am working with four friends. It will be a philanthropic liberal arts and science university. We have floated a not-for-profit company, bought land in Rajiv Gandhi Education City in Kundli and have applied for permission for a private university in Haryana. Hopefully the dream will come true in three years,? he says.

Coming back to business, given the gloomy economic environment, how does he see the days ahead for Naukri.com? ?We are better placed than any of our competitors. Even during 2008-09 slowdown, our traffic and market share improved. Even if our topline growth gets impacted, we will be focusing on increasing market share. Market leaders tend to get stronger in a recession,? he forecasts. And talking of expansion plans, Bikhchandani spells out that investment in complementary and allied businesses is his mantra, rather than going for a pure substitute of the core business. ?So going for another job site won?t add any value. But if we go for a niche or a specialist job site, we may end up getting some value,? he says. As we wind up the almost rapid-fire question and answer session with him, we can?t help but ask if it was difficult to forgo the CEO?s job in order to concentrate of the external investment business of Info Edge, considering the company is his baby? ?I am very much attached to Naukri.com, but the company has to go the next level, so one must delegate. Leaving the CEO?s job wasn?t really difficult. It?s all about taking the company to the next level and ensuring that the person you?re handing over to would take it to the next level. Once you are convinced about that, it becomes easier,? he answers.

Profile

Sanjeev Bikhchandani

Executive vice-chairman, founder and director, Info Edge (India) Ltd

Date of birth

– June 29, 1963

Marital Status

– Married with two children

EDUCATION

– St Columba?s School, Delhi

– BA (Hons) Economics from

St Stephen?s College, University of Delhi

– PGDM from IIM, Ahmedabad