http://www.rediff.com/money/2007/jan/24inter.

htm
Sanjeev Bikhchandani epitomises this. His is a classic story of spotting an opportunity and chasing it with guts,
determination, lots of hard work and a little bit of luck.Naukri.com (the company is listed as Info Edge India Ltd on the
Bombay Stock Exchange) is India's number one job portal at a time when there is a serious scarcity of employable people in
just about every sector of business and industry.

It is also an extremely successful dot-com, having weathered the 2000 meltdown. How much better can it get? Naukri's CEO
spoke to MoneyLIFE editors Sucheta Dalal and Debashis Basu about the road he took and its various turning points.

Shall we start with a little bit about your background and your upbringing? When and how did you decide to be an
entrepreneur?

There are no business people in my family. My father is a doctor and he was in the government from 1950 to 1983. So we
were brought up in government colonies. I studied at St. Columbus School in Delhi, so did my brother. There was no
business background in the family, no great financial acumen or anything.

My brother went to IIT, Kanpur, then IIM Ahmedabad and then did his PhD from Stanford. It was forgone in our family that
one would do engineering or become a doctor -- the standard middle class aspirations of parents in government service. So
I dutifully prepared for IIT entrance, took the exams and qualified.

Then two or three things happened. My rank wasn't great. I wouldn't have got the top three or four departments.

Secondly, I went for a medical test and found out I was colour-blind -- partially. Thirdly, it was a five-year course. So, I
decided it was a better option to go to Delhi University and study economics.

Meanwhile, my brother had passed from IIM and he told me not to do an MBA right away because it is useless unless you
work for a while. Then Lintas came to college for hiring in 1985. I joined as an Executive Trainee and worked in advertising
for three years.

Lintas was hiring graduates those days?

They were hiring MBAs as Management Trainees who would be given a one-year training and graduates would be given two
years of training and they would be equalized after three years or so. We were actually the first batch of graduate hires.

For a year I was in Delhi then I was transferred to Mumbai. I then wrote the CAT and went off to IIM Ahmedabad. Typically, in
an ad agency you have this thing about meeting clients and then wanting to be on the other side of the table since an Ad
Agency executive is typically at the lower end of the food chain. So I decided I want to be on the other side and in Marketing.
I got a job at HMM, which is now Glaxo SmithKline.

I was in brand management, handling Horlicks. I was there for a year and a half. But all along, ever since I was in school, I
was pretty clear that I was going to do my MBA, I was going to work for a few years and then start my company. This was
there since I was 12 or 13.

Were you clear even in those days what was involved in running a company?

No clue! But I knew that I didn't want to join government service, after my father's experience, because in government, you
are financially very badly off if you are honest. There was no way I was going to be dishonest, because those were not the
values we were brought up with.

Since I wanted independence, it had to be in a business. This was my dream, a distant goal till I passed out of college and
joined Lintas. By then I had decided that I would work for 2-3 years and then start out on my own. So I worked at HMM,
came back to Delhi and within a year-and-a-half I quit.

I started a company called Info Edge. That is still the name of my company, Naukri is the brand. I started it with a partner
and we soon set up two companies, one was for salary surveys and one was a database of trademarks on which we were
doing searches.

In October 1990, we were operating from the servants' quarters above the garage at home and were paying my father Rs
800 as monthly rent.

What form of searches were you doing?

They were trade mark searches. We launched a salary survey in Info Edge and with the money we made from that, my
partner had another idea.

He said the trade mark registry in Bombay has a library where you can see pending trade mark applications. The
government takes five years to approve or reject a trade mark application so if you thought of a brand name today, you apply
for it, launch it in six months and five years later if the government rejects your application you are dead, especially if
somebody else is already using it before you.

People used to hire a law firm which sent out people to do a manual check in the library and assess whether the trade mark
is likely to be accepted or rejected. This library is opened to public inspection. So we sent in 20 college students to note
down all information filed under pharmaceuticals in all 134 classes.

We dumped this data in a computer and we wrote software to search it. We then began to call pharma companies -- there
were 5,000 of them -- saying if you are making a trade mark application talk to us. For Rs 350 we give you a printed search
report. This was a massive hit.

How did you deliver this?

We put the information in a computer. There were no online database searches then. So we said, you tell us what you need,
we do a search, prepare a report and send it to you by courier. In 1993 my partner and I decided to go our separate ways.

I kept the salary survey company Info Edge and since the trademark thing was his idea he kept that. I moved back to the
servants' quarters and started afresh. Over the next three years I kept costs low and made some money.

How did the survey work?

We used to do entry level salary surveys -- what companies are offering MBAs and engineers at the entry level. We would
do a report and send it to maybe a 100 companies. It was not customised. It was a standard survey sold at Rs 5,000 to
maybe 100-200 companies. As the price went up we sold at may be Rs 10,000. We used to speak to students who got offers
usually from top ten engineering colleges. It worked well.

Where did you get the idea?

When I was in HMM we didn't have offices with partitions like we do today. It was an open hall where you could see, hear
and speak to everyone. I noticed that when an office copy of Business India came in, everybody used to read it from back to
front. It had 35 to 40 pages of appointment ads in every issue.

At that time Business India was the No.1 medium for appointment ads for managers. And people would openly talk about
jobs that were available or slipping out of their hands. They discussed opportunities. Nobody was applying, nobody wanted
to leave because they were in a comfortable MNC job with good brands, good pay packages etc., but they used to talk about
it.

From these conversations I figured that even if you are not looking for a job, you look at a job. You are constantly looking for
a new benchmark and checking if you are missing out on anything.

Also, every week 2-3 head-hunters would call offering jobs. There must have been 100 headhunters out there and each of
them probably had four to five clients. These jobs were never advertised because we never saw them in Business India or
elsewhere. I figured, what is appearing in the newspapers is the tip of the iceberg. There is a massive market below the
surface, highly fragmented and scattered across HR Departments and placement consultants.

If somebody could aggregate it, it would be a powerful product where you could somehow make money. I knew this by 1990.
When you are trying to become an entrepreneur there are a thousand ideas -- this was one of them.

Where would your money come from, in a model like this?

I had no clue. This was only an idea and I knew something would come out of it but I didn't know how. It was just one of a
thousand ideas -- file and forget kind of thing. By then I had quit my job.

The Department of Telecom had put an ad on the front page of a newspaper saying it was looking for private information
providers to launch a video text service, like the one in Paris. They would put up a server. . . I didn't even know what a server
was those days. . . and there would be terminals in 45 telephone exchanges and 50 other public places from where
information can be accessed for a fee.

They said, we want people who will own and maintain the databases and will not charge us anything; but when the user
pays we will do a revenue split. I spoke to my former partner and said let's make a proposal where we get jobs from the
company head hunters free of cost and put them here and charge 50 bucks per search, so Rs 25 will be DoT's and Rs 25
will be ours. He agreed we put in an application, were short-listed and they called us.

We found that around 30 to 40 people had turned up, some wanting to put up tenders, others planning something else. So
they said, fine, we have plenty of proposals so now we can move to the next stage and get into details. We got a plan ready,
produced documentation and end user schemes with classifications for every industry type.

That was in 1991, before the Internet came to India. They approved our proposal and said they will get back to us on
implementation. But the project was cancelled. So we had this concept ready in 1991-92 and didn't know what to do with it.

But by then I was charged up on the idea and wanted to try it out. We tried franchise models, couriered floppies, etc. We
kept getting data but whatever we tried it didn't look like it would work. It was too cumbersome. Meanwhile, I and my partner
had parted. This idea came along with me while he kept the trademark thing.

In October 1996 I attended the IT Asia exhibition in Delhi which is held every year. Usually at IT Asia they have one pavilion
with 100 or more tiny stalls where one always found a lot of interesting things. I saw one stall with www written on it. So I
asked this guy what it meant, he said it was the World Wide Web. I asked him what that meant and he said it was the
Internet and explained it to me.

At that time there was no TCP/IP access, only black and white monitors on which he gave me a demo. He was a retailer,
reselling VSNL e-mail accounts. I said I don't want e-mail, show me the Internet. So he took me to a site called Yahoo!,
showed me how to search, browse, check other sites -- there was lot of information.

I asked him how many users are there in India. He said 14,000. So I said, 'Wow!' I told him I don't want an e-mail account
but I want to set up a Web site, show me how to do it. He said I can't help you there because there you need a server and all
servers are in the US.

My brother is a professor at the UCLA business school, so I rang him up and told him I wanted to start a Web site. I told him
to help me hire a server, but didn't have the money and said I would pay him later. We were really struggling financially those
days because in 1996, if you recall, there was a recession. He said, no problem, I will pay for it and you pay me when you
can.

You didn't ever regret having moved out of a cushy MNC job and the long struggle?

I struggled for 10. . . no, 13 years. I had moved out of the MNC job rather early. My salary was Rs 80,000 per annum. This
was decent in 1990 but I was not giving up a Rs 20 lakh (Rs 2 million) job to come to a zero rupee salary. In those days you
could not buy a car for three to four years even after you passed from IIM Ahmedabad.

I had a two-wheeler. I had not seen the higher salaries so I didn't miss it. What happened over the years when I was
struggling is that my friends changed because they were doing different things. They used to go on foreign holidays, visit
hotels and bars, which I simply could not afford. Over time, of course, I have re-established contacts.

Were the adjustments easier because of your family background?

Well, for the first three years, my wife was in Nestle and the company couldn't pay me. The next two years, the company
could pay me and my wife was still in Nestle so we were okay. She quit in 1995 and around 1996 I became the Consulting
Editor of The Pioneer's career supplement called Avenues. That gave me a monthly cheque; we were not well-off but we got
by.

By that time my reference group had changed, so I was not seeing what my batch mates were getting. In 2000 when we got
venture capital from ICICI, I had been through the second round of not taking salary for three years -- 1997 to 2000. That
was tough.

During that time my wife was not working, so I had to do a second job. I got up at 6.00 in the morning, dropped her to the
bus stop, was in the office by 7.00, worked till 12.00 then would go to The Pioneer come back and work till midnight again.
This went on for three years.

That was tough, but the thing about doing your own business is that you are probably very happy even though you are not
making money, for the simple reason that you are in control of your life and priorities and that is important to me.

Was there the fear factor -- wondering how long you would have to keep struggling?

I got over the fear factor in the first two years. I realised that for an entrepreneur the real risk is often a lot less than the
perceived risk before you jump. You learn to cope, to manage -- you find your cushions and buffers.

But sure, you have to be willing to say that I won't have a fashionable lifestyle, I am okay not buying a big car or owning a
house. And it is easy if it is early in your career. So, in 1997 my brother paid for the server and I gave him 5% in the
company. At $25 a month he got a good deal for the server.

I went to another friend who is a very good programmer and I told him about my idea to start a Web site. I gave him the old
file and I asked him to do the programming. Since I didn't have the money I gave him a 7% share in the company. He was a
freelancer working from home.

Then there was another friend, a year junior to me, called Saroja. She was also doing an independent consulting project. I
told her that I am doing a second job in the afternoons and will she be interested in coming in for six hours a day. I offered
9% in the company and she agreed. Then we had some data entry guys and support staff from our other regular business.

We went to the Central News Agency and brought back some 29 newspapers with appointment ads. We built the structure
of the database and told them to input the jobs. We got a thousand jobs, then I took a floppy to my techie friend and told him
here is the menu and the navigation we want and he built the Web site -- Naukri -- in one week.

We launched on April 2, 1997. It was a very rudimentary site. If you look at it today it was really embarrassing. For the first
six months I did not have an Internet connection.

But a good thing happened to us then. We were the first site that was targeting Indians in India. All others like rediff.com,
Khoj and Samachar were all targeting Indians in the US. At around that time, journalists in India had begun to write about
Internet and were looking for Indian examples to talk about.

So we began to get massive coverage. In the first year itself we had two fat files of press coverage and that really helped us.
Because we got coverage without trying, we also got traffic. Our contact strategy was very good -- we would always allow
you to log on free. Because we were sure that with 14000 people accessing the Net, we had a small base of users and we
had to get people to keep coming back.

So where did your revenue come from?

We were doing salary surveys still remember? In year one in Naukri we did Rs 2.35 lakh (Rs 235,000) of business and 80%
of the jobs were free. In year two our figures jumped to Rs 18 lakh (Rs 1.8 million) and that is when I realised that we had a
serious business possibility here, although I was not able to pay myself a salary.

The company was, quite frankly very very stretched even though we broke even. What I did was to shut other parts of the
business and all workstations and people were working on Naukri.

The next year, turnover jumped to Rs 36 lakh (Rs 3.6 million) and we made Rs 1.8 lakh profit, but that was because I did not
take a salary. I was now clear that I would grow to make Rs 50 to 60 lakh (Rs 5-6 million) and then the profit could be around
Rs 10 lakh (Rs 1 million) and I could even take home Rs 5 lakh (Rs 500,000). In 1999-2000 we did Rs 36 lakh, but by
October we were sure we would go to Rs 40-50 lakh.

So we were very optimistic and thought we will do well after 10 years of struggle.

Then, around May-June 1999, we began to get phone calls from people saying 'we want to invest in your company, why not
take money from us'? We found it surprising, but I said we don't need your money, we are going to break even and are
concentrating on profits next year, so please go away.

Then we learnt that funded competition was coming in and the game was going to change. Suddenly, I realised, you cannot
be a Rs 50 lakh Web site and make a 10 lakh net profit; you will have to be a Rs 5 crore (Rs 50 million) Web site and make
a Rs 1 crore (Rs 10 million) net profit -- that is the only way you will survive or else you will die, because the game is going
to change.

Sure enough, Jobs Ahead was launched on the India-Pakistan Sharjah Cricket tournament. We didn't know what the budget
was but somebody told us it 'it is twice your turnover.'

That is when we called back the venture capitalists and said look we have changed our minds. So they said, sure thing,
write your business plan. So we went back to them, the terms sheets were signed and due diligence done and April 8, 2000
we signed the agreement and they cut their first cheque.

We got lucky. If we had taken the money six months earlier we would have spent it foolishly. The market melted down
around that time. We were the last or second last dot-com in India to get funded. By March the meltdown had started but
people did not officially acknowledge it till September-October. They kept saying it is a technical correction. We got the
money on April 8th and we just put it in fixed deposit.

We had done business for three years and we knew how tough it was surviving on the Net so when the market crashed we
knew it was a real crash. We knew of it six months back because we were in the business so I told ICICI that this is a real
crash, we have to build the business slowly.

ICICI, to their credit, never ever asked us for revised valuation and did not hold back subsequent tranches.

Was this only for you or for everybody else?

For us. For whatever reason -- I don't know what their thinking was and why us, but the fact is they gave us the final cheque
at the same valuation a year and a half after April 8th.

We began to invest in servers, technology, people, products, sales offices and we began to focus on growing the business -not just by spending but through better products and a feet-on-the-street approach. Around this time the IT meltdown began.
This was in November 2000.

Then 9/11 happened and although we continued to grow, we were very scared. There was a time when we had only two
years of money left. And then slowly the revenues caught up. We made two years of losses and then we broke even and
made a one crore profit.

Going forward, we see there has to be solid emphasis on product and technology so in the last two years we have invested
a lot in these and will continue to do so. We need a lot of innovations and scaleable technologies because funny things
happen when traffic suddenly goes up. It is easy to run a Web site when there is low traffic but you are really tested when
traffic goes up.

Does your application still perform and your service still deliver? You don't realise that until you face the problem. We have
invested a lot in scaleable technologies, in new products and features and in bringing mobile and Internet together as well as
voice and SMS.

In our scheme of things, the first priority is the product, the next is the brand -- we spend a lot of money on advertising both
online and offline. The third is the sales force and sales network in order to sell. We have 400 sales people all over the
country so we can reach many more companies and service them better.

Where are you vis--vis your competition?

There are two publicly available sources of checking who is bigger. One is Alexa.com where you can check out the traffic of
various sites. The other is a paid site called Matrix. As per Alexa we got over 75% to 80% share of job traffic in India and
according to Matrix we got between 60% to 65%.

In terms of revenue share -- we roughly estimate that we have around 55% of the market. But the metrics we really look at is
how many CVs we are adding everyday, how many applications are going daily from our Web site? On all these metrics we
have no competitive data but we estimate we are ahead by 30% to 40%.

How are you advantaged or disadvantaged vis-vis well known brands such as Times which is also in this business
now?

Times of India obviously is a big company with a huge print presence and they are able to support their online presence
through print. However, so far we have not been challenged in our market share or traffic share.

I think with online media a lot depends on your product instincts and qualities. How fast is the site? How many CVs do I get?
How many finds do I get? We are in a situation where it is very easy for the customer to evaluate competitive offerings
because you can measure how many responses you get and how many you hire.

But what about your original insight that people look at Business India from the end, even though they are not
really looking for a job. Are you able to give that window shopping experience?

Yes, some people are looking for jobs, some people are just looking around. While you can browse through the site we do
have an issue about the window shopping experience for passive job seekers. We recognise that.

A newspaper goes into the house for some other reason and you see jobs there. You don't have to make a separate effort.
What we are able to do with technology is that if you register your resume with Naukri, the headhunters will call you.

But newspapers have a massive reach within the city on a given day. So if you are doing a walk-in interview, thousands will
be walking in, after reading a newspaper ad. But then the Net is not expensive and will deliver results over a week, ten days
or two weeks and it will deliver the results from all over the country.

So, it is not as if the Net will replace print, it's just some of the stuff which is going into print will rather be on the web.
Besides, employees can themselves search nearly 2 lakh (200,000) job listings -- they can search, they can browse, they
can set job alerts -- there are a lot of things the Net can do that print cannot.

Do you expect Jeevan Sathi and 99 acres to be successful as well?

As of now, Naukri accounts for over 80% of my turnover. Jeevan Saathi and 99 acres are plays for the future. If you look at
our strategy there is a pattern. We started with Naukri -- a classified listings kind of business, a database search kind of
business.

The market structures of the other two are very similar. There is big market in print, there is a segment which is run by
consultants, there is an intermediary in the market -- a placement consultant, there is a job seeker, there is a final employer.
We are creating a platform. Our job is to enable a handshake and we are charging for the prospect of enabling a handshake.
Jeevansathi.com is similar. There is a large print market, there are two parties who frequently use the services of marriage
brokers.

So again there are similar players. It is the same in real estate. So we have actually gone after markets which are very
similar in structure and are financially viable in print and hence not risky. So we expect to do well, but don't know how well.

Jeevansathi is the No. 3 matrimonial site in the country; when we bought it in September 2004 it was distant No. 3 and now
we have narrowed the gap substantially and I think we should be No. 2 in the not too distant future. For 99 acres, there was
nobody else of any significance so we launched in August 2005 and we are No. 1 already.

What is your special input in 99 acres? Why have other property sites not done well?

I don't know. May be they were too early in 1999-2000, may be their strategy was different from ours, maybe they were not
neutral platforms, may be they did not aggregate enough content. We have 55,000 listings on our site right now and have a
whole tele-calling team which calls up brokers asking for listings on the phone and give them free trials. So it is a question of
intuition also.

The basic funda is the Naukri funda -- we have got the most jobs so we get the most traffic, we get the most traffic so we get
the most response, we get the most response so we get the most clients, we get the most clients so we get the most jobs -it is a virtuous circle like in any other media market. It is the same in newspapers and the same in Jeevan Sathi or 99 acres.

Looking back, what advise would you have for young entrepreneurs with your mindset?

I would say that frequently the perceived risk is lower than the real risk but nevertheless you should understand the risk and
try to reduce it.

It is a myth that entrepreneurs are not risk averse. I must be the most risk averse person I have met in my life. I am really
scared of risks. The point is to keep de-risking at every opportunity. So first, I did not quit my job until after I got married
knowing there is income in the house. I began to teach on weekends.

If I had been single, or my wife was not working -- in fact she was the fist angel investor -- it would have been a lot more
difficult. I may not have done it. These were all de-risking strategies. When you start out you don't know where you are going
to end up.

When we launched Naukri and you had asked me what is your vision I would say there was no vision. All I thought was, if I
get a thousand companies to pay me Rs 500 a month to list a job and this would be every month I can do a Rs 60 lakh (Rs 6
million) turnover in three years time I will multiply the turnover of the company five times, that was the opportunity I felt.

Somewhere down the way this dot-com thing happened, then venture capital happened, the meltdown happened and if
somebody had told me that I would do a Rs 84 crore (Rs 840 million) turnover five years from now I would say he was
joking. Our projection to ICICI in our business plan was Rs 25 crore (Rs 250 million) for this year. So a lot of things are also
unpredictable.

What do you see happening in the business in future?

I think there is lot of growth left in the company, there is more business that we can do. I think that there is a lot of
improvement to do in product and technology to make it a world class company.

I don't see us diversifying significantly outside the Internet, at least as of now. We are not evaluating a fourth portal. The
reason is we want to at least make sure that Jeevan Saathi breaks even and makes a profit. If we were only in Naukri and
Quadrangle -- the recruitment part of business -- our pre-tax profit would be about Rs 28 crore (Rs 280 million) just last year.

So we don't want to spread ourselves too thin, particularly from the management point of view. In our business, the
constraint to growth is not money but execution and leadership.

http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/money-sanjeev-bikhchandani-naukricom-iimahmedabad/1/222570.html

Sanjeev Bikhchandani traces his journey from dreamer to achiever

A graduate of Economics (Hons) from St. Stephens College, Delhi University and Indian Institute of Management (IIM)
Ahmedabad, Bikhchandani's favourite college moments were not inside busy classrooms but on the lawns doing nothing. In
1990 he quit his comfortable marketing job at GlaxoSmithKline and went on to set up his own company.
His motivation? A passion for entrepreneurship and running his own business. Ten years after he launched his company,
Naukri.com became the first Internet firm to be listed on the Indian Stock Exchange. From earning no salary for over six
years, to running a Rs.3,000 crore company-Bikhchandani has done it all.
Humble beginnings
I grew up in a regular middle-class Indian home. My dad was a doctor at a government hospital and mom was a
homemaker. I was always told that one should study hard in order to achieve success. And that's what I did. I studied hard
and went to IIM-Ahmedabad.
Then I found a job in marketing at a leading multinational based in Delhi. But I wasn't satisfied with just monetary success. I
kept wondering what it was that I was looking to achieve at the end of my career. Did I study so hard just to sell one
product? So I decided to stop working for others and start something on my own in 1990.
Starting out a fresh
The first 10 years of running the business was the most difficult. The biggest problem we had was money-we were always
falling short. I went without a salary for months and worked twice as hard. I bought second-hand computers, furniture and
set up my business headquarters in a servant quarter in my father's house.
Looking back I realise that I was lucky that my wife, Surbhi was working at the time. We had been classmates at
IIMAhmedabad. She had a decent salary which helped us scrape through the hard times.
The big break
The idea to launch a job portal came to me when I realised that all my friends usually read business magazines back to front
because the job ads appeared on the last pages. I came to the conclusion that in those days (this was around 1996) people
had no one source for job ads.
We thought that if we could collate job ads onto one accessible platform, then maybe we would be able to attract some
customers. In April 1997 we launched Naukri.com with 1,000 ads taken out of various magazines. We were hoping that over
time companies would begin to approach us directly for advertising jobs if we could gather sufficient traffic.
On money and dreams
I passed out of college in 1984. Looking back at life 30 years later, I can come to just one conclusion. We have only one life,
there's no point wasting it living someone else's dream. One should manage risks, get experience and make transitions
when necessary. But stay focused on your dreams and passion.
If you do what you love then you will always be happy even if you are making no money. That is another valuable lesson that
I have learnt in life. One should look for meaning not money. Money is a happy outcome if you are really good at what you
do. It should not replace your dreams and become your sole motivator.
Guiding light
I follow no particular philosophy. I believe that one should keep improving on the past. You should be happy with what you
do. What motivates me in particular is serving our customers and helping people find jobs.
Working with the right people is important. I also believe in the whole virtuous circle of action, achievement and self-esteem.
If you take action, you will achieve something. Once you achieve a goal, it will reinforce your selfesteem and vice versa. But
I learned this philosophy only in hindsight.

http://businesstoday.intoday.in/story/dotcoms-poster-boy--sanjeevbikhchandani/1/1174.html

Dot-com's poster boy - Sanjeev Bikhchandani

Eight years is a long time in the life of a dot-com entrepreneur. In 1999-2000, Sanjeev Bikhchandani
was struggling, and probably the worst off from his batch at the Indian Institute of Management,
Ahmedabad (Class of 1989). Then, Mammon smiled and opened his purse strings. And how? Today,
he is among Indias richest people, and a rupee multi-billionaire to boot, via his stake in Info Edge,
the countrys only listed dot-com company. But he does not want to stop there. Info Edge is not
going to stop growing, he says. Over the past few months, it has launched Brijj.com, a professional
networking site modelled on LinkedIn, which is expected to leverage Naukris jobs database. Earlier
in 2007, as part of his desire to build Info Edge into a world-scale company, he launched
Naukrigulf.com, which does exactly as the name suggests, and it is already gaining tremendous
traction. Sometime next year, the company expects to launch Shiksha.com, an educational website,
about which he is reluctant to share details.
Then, with a market capitalisation of over Rs 4,200 crore, and an earnings multiple of over 80 (based
on Info Edges projected net profit of Rs 50 crore in 2007-08), the company is well placed to mobilise
large sums of money to fund new businesses or acquisitions.
Bikhchandani does not categorically rule out acquisitions, but believes that Info Edge has the
capability to innovate. Thats why we are still an entrepreneurial company, he says. Already,
Naukri.com, the core of Info Edges business model, is Indias #1 job-search portal.
Bikhchandani is now worth about Rs 1,800 crore, courtesy his 43 per cent stake in his flagship, but,
until recently, drove around in an old Opel Astra. Though he has now upgraded to a new Honda
Accord, he has no problems taking the battered old office Innova if his children hijack his car. In fact,
he gets upset when money talk comes into the picture. We not only created wealth but also built an
institution, he says.
At a recent conference organised by The Indus Entrepreneurs in New Delhi, he was one of the stars
of the show. Potential entrepreneurs, young and old, walked up to ask him for advice. Its a role
Bikhchandani enjoys. If he inspires a 100 people to do their own thing, it will be worth it. If one of
them succeeds, thats even better, says Saurabh Srivastava, a serial entrepreneur and nonexecutive director of Info Edge.
Bikhchandani surprises you with his infectious energy, and seems to live in a state of perpetual
excitement, which is why getting him to stand still for a picture is quite a challenge, but he is also an
honest man. Believe me, I was very introverted until I became an entrepreneur, he says.
His transformation to the extroverted, socially affable man he is today was a result of him teaching at
a couple of management institutes and MBA-prep classes in the early years after he set up Info
Edge in 1990. I started teaching in order to earn some extra cash so that I could go out for the
occasional drink or dinner, he says. Incidentally, he launched Info Edge as a searchable trademark

database in his fathers garage in Delhis not-so-glamourous eastern district (making Info Edge a
garage start-up in the truest sense of the word). But what makes Bikhchandanis story so interesting
is that he is not your typical entrepreneur who had oodles of funding from the outset.
He readily admits that he lived off wife Surbhis salary for the first three years and held down two
jobs. He helped Chandan Mitra when he took over The Pioneer in 1996, assisting in both managerial
and editorial roles, something, Bikhchandani claims, helped tremendously with his PR skills.
Sanjeevs business skills were crucial in those early years; he took ownership of his roles and even
though I couldnt afford to pay much or at all at times, his enthusiasm was an inspiration, says
Mitra.It was in 1997 that Bikhchandani set up Naukri.com on a server in the US, which his brother
paid for. Internet connectivity in those days was still very patchy; the first Naukri page was literally a
text-only page; graphical internet access was an even rarer commodity than internet access, which,
in those days, cost Rs 15,000 for 500 hours from the then state monopoly Videsh Sanchar Nigam
Limited (VSNL). The graphical version of the site had a bright yellow background, which
Bikhchandani, ironically, could not even see. I used to wonder why we got so much hate mail about
bad layouts from the US, he jokes today.
But while holding down two, or rather three, jobs, since he
Future plans
effectively had two jobs at The Pioneer, Bikhchandani
Turn Info Edge into a world
displayed another of his remarkable traitsan ability to
scale company
attract talent that he largely managed to retainamong
Expand the companys offline
them, Hitesh Oberoi, Chief Operating Officer, Info Edge, and
Ambarish Raghuvanshi, Chief Financial Officer, who, along
offerings
with Bikhchandani, are co-promoters of the company.
Move into the professional
networking area through brijj.com
Bikhchandani, by his own admission, is now more of an
Start a new portal in the
ideas man, the public face of the company; and Oberoi runs
education sphere called shiksha.com the day-to-day operations of the company. The three of us
still discuss everything, and yes, we do argue about what to
Establish a college that will
do, but we always find a compromise, says Raghuvanshi
become a centre of excellence in
with a smile.
education
It is to Sanjeevs credit that he created a start-up without anything by way of funding and with only a
solid team to back him, adds Srivastava, and that is what should inspire future entrepreneurs.
Between 1997 and 2000, Info Edge did not get any funding. In 1999, several people approached
Bikhchandani with cheque books in hand, but he said no. If we got money, I would have to work full
time on the website, but I quite enjoyed working at the newspaper, he jokes. There was a more
serious reason as well: he wanted a good deal. However, competition from Jobsahead.com, which
started in 1999, forced him to accept funding from ICICI Venture in April 2000. They were better
than us in every respect, Oberoi admits. That was when we decided to take the money to fund our
future plans, but even then, we werent certain about what would happen.

One month after ICICI Venture had put in Rs 7 crore into

Info Edge, the dot-com meltdown occurred, and several
dot-coms went belly-up. It was a difficult time,
Bikhchandani recalls. But we just hunkered down and
prepared to last it out.And while Bikhchandani has basic
tips for all entrepreneurs, he is the first to admit that he got
lucky. How? The first, of course, was his wife, who
supported him through the rough times. Then, he says, it
was his job at Hindustan Milkfood Marketing (HMM), now
GlaxoSmithKline, which he took up after graduating from
IIMA in 1989, that gave him an insight that he later
leveraged. He noticed that his colleagues always read the
last pages of business magazines, where the placements
ads were. It was a voyeuristic tendency more than
anything else. I remembered that when I started a job
search site in 1997, he says.

Peers to watch

Anupam Mittal, shaadi.com

Reason: Mittal is an extremely
successful web entrepreneur, having set
up Indias leading matrimonial site,
shaadi.com, in 1997. Since then, his
company, People Group, has ventured
out into several other areas, including
film-making, and also set up Indias first
popular friendship site,
Fropper.com.
Deep Kalra,
MakeMyTrip.com
Reason: Also a veteran
webentrepreneur, he has founded
Indias first and leading travel portal,
Bala Deshpande, Director (Investments), ICICI Venture,
MakeMyTrip.com, and considers
and a member of the Info Edge board, is more rational.
Bikhchandani a friend, philosopher and
Luck is just a series of consequences of your previous
guide. He has innovated by building
actions; what counts is what you do with it.
off-line support for the travel business
Info Edge and Sanjeev have always been very clear about and also a travel portal,
their plans and very honest. They have gone against our
advice, but they have had the courage of their contrarian
conviction, and that is the biggest lesson other people
should take out of this company," she says. It was a winwin partnership. When ICICI Venture finally divested the
last part of its 10 per cent stake in 2006, its investment had oktatabyebye.com.
Rohit Agarwal, TechTribe.com
grown 28.5 times over six years.
Reason: The founder and CEO of
The final piece of luck was the fact that Naukris biggest
TechTribe.com, a professional social
competitor, Jobsahead.com, sold out to Monster.com in
networking site targeted specifically at
2004. They were one year behind us in revenues, but they IT professionals is on a high. This
had some solid technology on their side, says Oberoi.
magazine nominated TechTribe as one
There were some integration issues, and while the
of Indias Cool Companies earlier this
competition stumbled, Naukri consolidated its position at
year and this dot-com is definitely one
the top of the internet pile. That is when Bikhchandani
to watch. Incidentally, this is a market
decided that the company should go back to its
Info Edge itself is targeting with
entrepreneurial roots and venture into new businesses. In
Brijj.com.
2004, it acquired Jeevansathi. com, a marriage portal, and
in 2005, started 99acres.com, a real estate listings portal.
Bikhchandani has also earned the respect of his peers.
Sanjeevs story is inspirational, says MakeMyTrip
Founder Deep Kalra. He has been a friend, philosopher

and a guide for the past few years, and has both the breadth and the depth of knowledge that few
people have. Not only does he have a 30,000-foot view of things but he also knows the ground-level
stuff. And the best thing about him is that he has not changed a bit.
Bikhchandani is now looking ahead, and taking steps to ensure that he stays ahead of the pack. Info
Edges model of depending on IT recruitments leaves it vulnerable to a downturn in the industry.
To insure his company against this, he has, as mentioned earlier, taken naukri.com to West Asia.
The plan now is to dramatically ramp up penetration in that market. Then, Shiksha.com could initially
be an educational classifieds site, connecting students to institutes, but Bikhchandani does not rule
out offering more services.
Then, he expects initiatives like Quadrangle and allcheckdeals.com, which contribute minuscule
amounts to the companys top line now, to gain critical mass going forward.
And finally, Bikhchandani, who rails against the politics of reservations in Indian colleges, and a
group of friends have decided to establish a college. The plans are still embryonic, but educational
excellence is what will drive India forward, not the mediocrity that is doled out today, he says
passionately. Wouldnt it be a nice fitintegrating backward
from a job portal to an education portal to a college
renowned for academic excellence? Now, thats an
interesting idea.

http://startoholics.in/2013/08/lessons-to-learn-from-sanjeev-bikhchandanisentreprenuerial-journey/

Lessons to Learn from Sanjeev Bikhchandanis

Entreprenuerial Journey
Rightly said, there is no shortcut to success, but indeed there are experiences to success which
motivate several young minds to aspire and dream high. Here is the story of Indias renowned
internet entrepreneur, Sanjeev Bikhchandani. The purpose of starting his own company was to be
his own boss. His urge to create something made all the difference.
At the age of 12, when other kids were busy playing cricket, he dreamt. Dreamt of an idea of
starting his own company someday. He had a mind of his own which supported his careless
confidence to buck the trend. He left a fairly comfortable job to set up his companies-Indmark
and Info Edge along with a partner. To stay in business, he did every bit of business that came
along. Soon after he and his partner parted ways, Info Edge was the only thing left behind with
Sanjeev. There came a eureka moment in his life when in an IT ASIA exhibition, Sanjeev was
introduced to Internet for the first time. One has to take a contrarian step many a times, but one
has to have it in his own way, thats what makes an entrepreneur. Soon Sanjeevs naukri.com
jingled all corners of the country making it a big media coverage. He based his business on deep
customer insights and revenues climbed. Sanjeev soon got success, publicity and everything he
had ever dreamt of. He got everything that made his naukri.com a major hit as well as an epitome
of inspiration for young entrepreneurs!

His life story teaches young entrepreneurs to be early, early to make a mistake till it gets too late
to repent. One should strongly believe in over delivering and not exaggerating in the business
plans.
There will be times when you will feel that things are not working but you cant just say Ouch,
this is terrible, I give up. You have to keep trying. All startups face moments where things just
seem hopeless. You cant just let your dreams crawl off and die, you have to believe in them!
You might fail in your endeavour and if that happens, all you need to do is to rise up and work
again. If you fall behind, run faster. Never give up, never surrender and rise up against the odds.

http://www.thesmartceo.in/magazine/cover-story/sanjeev-bikhchandanis-search-fora-naukri.html

Sanjeev Bikhchandanis search for a Naukri

In some sense, Sanjeev Bikhchandani is the Sachin Tendulkar of the Indian Internet industry.
Bikhchandanis unique selling proposition, very much like that of his cricketing counterpart, is his
longevity. His ability to stay in the game long enough has been central to his success. In 1997, the
first year of operating Naukri.com, his annual revenue touched Rs. 2.5 lakh. In year two, it hit Rs. 18
lakh. In fiscal 2010, Info Edges (the parent company behind Naukri.com) net sales was at Rs. 232.22
crore with a net profit of Rs. 56.92 crore. Over the last five years, in spite of a big recession in
between, its revenue compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) was at 33 per cent.
In my mind, though, beyond Bikhchandanis ability to generate sales, raise venture capital, attract
and hire talent or deliver on product innovations, his longevity and ability to stay in business
through the dotcom bust and tackle downturns in the economy is what stands out. Twenty years in
business, through three different phases - the first six as a small business owner, the next four spent
building Naukri.com including countering the dotcom bust and next 10 years spent scaling up,
creating leaders and building a growth company is what made me take notice.
Late last month, as I was walking through the headquarters of Info Edge in Noida, I could not help
notice some interesting printouts that adorned the walls. The most interesting of them highlighted
Naukris first ever press coverage. A June 1997 issue of Business India carried a small writeup on
Naukri.com with a headline that read A tedious job. The writeup ended on a skeptical note. It
read,Who will advertise on a job site that was visited by the jobless? A few minutes later
Bikhchandani answered that question for me. He said, My thinking was fairly simple. If I could get
1,000 companies to pay Rs. 500 per job posting per month that would be Rs. 60 lakhs a year in
business. Thats it. I was not thinking too large scale.
Bikhchandanis answers are brutally honest and to-the-point. In this article, I plan to share insights
drawn from my conversations with Bikhchandani on the growth plans for Info Edge, the overall
Internet industry and what makes him tick and as an interesting aside, Info Edges foray into the
corporate venture capital space.

In quarter ending December 2010, Info Edge raked in Rs. 75 crore in net sales with a
net profit of Rs. 21 crore. Bikhchandanis flagship business Naukri.com contributed handsomely
to this revenue. Quadrangle, the offline executive search and recruitment services arm, played a key
role as well. His newer businesses, Jeevansathi.com, the matrimonial classifieds brand and
99acres.com, the online real estate listings portal, are growing as well.

While the jobs vertical continues to bring in most of the revenues, Bikhchandani is keen on
diversifying across the spectrum and recreating the Naukri.com magic across several verticals. Infact,
in fiscal 2010, Info Edges revenues from verticals outside of recruitment (a vertical that is highly
dependent on the economy) has increased to over 16 per cent from just 5 per cent in FY 2006. This
strategy stems from Bikhchandanis belief that Indias consumer Internet game is a long-term one.
He says, The success of Naukri.com came about because of several factors being an early mover,
taking advantage of being an early mover, strong branding, quality of our sales force and continuous
innovation to our product offering. Of course, Bikhchandani does not have the early mover
advantage in his other verticals. Jeevansathi lags behind Shaadi.com and Bharatmatrimony.com in
the matrimonial classifieds space, but is hoping to gain market share in regions where the other two
players do not have a strong hold.
However, there is one aspect of Info Edge that has probably gone unnoticed. Maintaining strong cash
flows and operating with negative working capital is one of its strongest points. Consumers enroll in
prepaid plans to avail any of Info Edges classified services. Negative working capital coupled with its
ability to maintain healthy operating profit margins has helped it accumulate Rs. 400 crore in cash
and liquid assets (as of February 2011). Today, its market capitalisation stands at a whopping Rs.
3,000 crore.
This kind of cash gave Info Edge the flexibility to start a corporate venture capital (VC)
arm. In July 2010, there was an organisational change within the company. Hitesh Oberoi,
previously the chief operating officer, took over as managing director and chief-executive. Oberois
focus was on the internal workings of Info Edge. Bikhchandani became executive vice-chairman and
started focusing on external investments. Till date, Info Edge has invested in three consumer
Internet ventures policybazaar.com, an insurance comparison site; meritnation.com, an e-learning
portal and zomato.com, a restaurant and food classifieds portal. Bikhchandani says, The corporate
venture capital model is a core part of our growth plans. We have identified growth strategies
internally as well.

The corporate VC arm operates like any other VC firm except that it is laser focused on the consumer
Internet space in India. We have started looking for some opportunities in e-commerce, adds
Bikhchandani. Like any other investor, Sanjeev now travels around the country spotting interesting
ideas from great teams. He looks for innovation, intellectual property creation and possibly an early
mover advantage. In each of its current investments, Info Edges understanding of the Internet space
is the biggest value addition apart from the money it invests.
Info Edge is also open to investing in intrapreneurs, people who come up with fresh ideas that can be
incubated within the company. AllCheckDeals.com, an organised real-estate brokerage that uses the
web for enquiry generation, came up the intrapreneurship route. The management at
AllCheckDeals.com was given a stake and it was spun off into a separate entity within Info Edge.
However, Bikhchandani admits that it is not something he plans for. If a new idea is suggested for
Naukri.com, it obviously stays within the portal, but fresh ideas do get heard by Bikhchandani.
As we speak about Info Edges growth plans, I divert Bikhchandani to talk about the
Internet landscape in the country. Indias Internet industry is unique in its own way. For
starters, advertising as a revenue model is just taking off. From jobs and matrimonial to real-estate
broking, deal making online has been the big success story so far. E-commerce is catching up with
the growth of companies like FlipKart and Myntra. I ask Bikhchandani, what he thinks about the
mobile and social media landscape in the country from an Info Edge perspective? Mobile is going to

be bigger than social, he says. Tapping into social media for customer acquisition is where social
media will come into play.

My thinking was fairly simple. If I could get 1,000 companies to pay Rs.
500 per job posting per month that would be Rs. 60 lakhs a year in
business. Thats it. I was not thinking too large scale

Bikhchandani has been a keen observer of the global Internet industry since the early 90s. His
conference room displays this big chart titled Trends and Technology timelines 2010+ that lists all
kinds of next generation technological strategies and ideas for several industries. My attention is
drawn towards some key words from the chart - personalisation of content and niche portals, which I
promptly cross-question Bikhchandani about. Both personalisation and niches are something we
are watching. We launched firstNaukri.com, which is a job portal for college graduates. We might
have a few niche portals, but a large number of niche portals are unlikely, he says.
Not every project that Bikhchandani touches succeeds. Brijj.com, a LinkedIn-clone in the online
professional networking space, was launched to supplement Info Edges other portals in the
recruitment space. Bikhchandani says, Brijj is certainly facing a challenge. It is getting registered
users, but not getting repeat usage. Info Edges deep pockets allow it to take certain risks. Pilot
projects are implemented to see if they work and losses are cut if the story does not pan out as
planned.
Another pilot project at the company was the offline matrimonial centers for Jeevansathi. It was
largely an effort to acquire customers who were not comfortable signing up online. Bikhchandani
says the offline centers are overall breaking even, but the jury is still out on whether an offline center
is needed or not.
As we speak about several of his portals, Bikhchandani is constantly talking about
several members of his team. We talk about Naukri.coms Hari Sadu campaign on television
and he credits his marketing manager, Oberoi and the creative team at Draft FCB Ulka. The team
page at Zomato.com, one of Info Edges investee companies, lists each and every team member at the
company. His emphasis on talent does not go unnoticed. Bikhchandani says, It is an ongoing
process. If this kind of growth continues, we will probably have a shortage of talent, two years from
now in our industry. So, attracting and managing talent is certainly crucial.
Within the industry, Bikhchandani is known for his strategic inputs. In some sense, hes seen as this
entrepreneur who beat it out the hard way, and came out on top without giving up. His learnings and
understanding of the Internet space from an Indian context is well respected. And this image is

certainly helping the corporate VC arm of Info Edge. Aligning with Info Edge gives startup
entrepreneurs insights into Bikhchandanis thinking.

Naukri.com is certainly the poster child of the Info Edge stable. Jeevansathi and 99acres are
catching on and so is AllCheckDeals.com. But, what will be interesting to watch is the growth of Info
Edges investee companies. These companies will have access to Bikhchandanis strategic inputs, but
probably not his day-to-day operational skills. Only time will tell, how Indias largest homegrown
Internet company continues to scale up with its unique combination of its internal businesses and
external investments. Having interacted with Bikhchandani, I certainly believe it will be an exciting
ride that will be filled with a lot of commitment and compassion. For me, its time to closely track
Bikhchandanis second innings as an investor and how the story of his portfolio companies pan out.

http://www.podtech.net/home/1824/naukricom-founder-sanjeev-bikhchandani-what-doesit-take-to-start-a-company

Naukri.com Founder Sanjeev Bikhchandani: What Does It Take to

Start a Company?
Info Edge (India) was the first Indian Internet company to go public on the Indian stock exchange in November 2006.
It owns internet properties Naukri, 99 acres and Jeevansathi.
CEO and co-founder Sanjeev Bikhchandani was a featured speaker at the recently concluded first TiE India
entrepreneurial conference in Mumbai. We caught up with Sanjeev at the conference and spoke to him on a whole
range of issue ranging from what it takes to go IPO on the Indian stock market, and what are the similarities and
dissimilarities when compared to an American IPO.
Info Edge was founded in May 1995. Sanjeev and his team bootstrapped their company before they landed their first
round of funding from the venture arm of ICICI. Sanjeev talks about how the environment for entrepreneurs has
changed in the past 10 years, and how organizations like TiE help foster entrepreneurship.
Sanjeev also offers advice to first entrepreneurs and some of the dos and donts when starting a business. Sanjeev
holds a bachelors degree in Economics from St. Stephens College, Delhi and an MBA from IIM, Ahmedabad.
Transcript:
Host: Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
Guest: Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
This is Kamla Bhatt for PodTech. Today, we have Sanjeev Bikhchandani, Founder and CEO of Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Info Edge recently went IPO. It was the first Indian Internet based company that went IPO. Info Edge owns properties
like Naukri.com, which is a job portal, Jeevansathi.com, a matchmaking portal, and 99 acres, a real estate portal.
Welcome to the show Sanjeev.
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Thank you.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
Congratulations on your fantastic IPO. You are the first Indian Internet company to go IPO.
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
On Indian markets.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
On Indian markets.
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Rediff and Sify went earlier in 1999-2000, on NASDAQ.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
What was the process for going IPO in India?

Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.

There are a lot of similarities between IPOs in India and the US. There you have the SEC here youve SEBI, which is
Securities and Exchange Board of India. There you have Sarbanes-Oxley, here you have Clause 49. You have
investment bankers in both places. Many of the investment bankers here are also there in the US for there are
Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, anybody. So, therefore, there are many similarities, but you know listeners (ph) in the
US, there are a couple of differences, which Id like to point out. The first difference is that by law in India, any Indian
company any company incorporated in India has to list in India before it lists overseas or at least, it cannot not list
overseas before it list in India.
So, therefore, if youre incorporated in India, you would IPO in India first. The second big difference is that there is no
open auction process in India for IPOs. There are silos, so, for example you have two IB component of 60%. In the
book-built IPO you have a retail component of 30% and a high net worth individual component of 10% and therefore,
within these silos there are levels of subscription, under subscription, over subscription, and therefore allocation. The
third big difference in IPOs in India versus the US is that there is no discretionary allotment of stock among
institutions.
So, the banker and the company cannot decide whom to give how much allocation to. It is all pro rata, all
proportioned allotment depending on how much you applied for, you will get a certain percentage of that in case the
issue is over subscribed youll just scale back. These are three differences that Id like to highlight, but otherwise road
shows, investment bankers, process, DRHP, RHP are very similar.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
What was the initial offer that you had?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, we raised about $37 million of capital. Although, the IPO was open for 4 days, we had gone in with the price
band of 290 to 320.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
Rs 293
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Rs 290 to Rs 320 and that Rs 320 for delivering about 19.5% of the company, we would have raised $37.5 million,
which is what we did.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
What is the trading at today?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, today, I dont know, but it fluctuates between somewhere in the 500s.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
So, it doubled.
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, it slightly less than doubled, yes.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
What are you going to do with the money that youve raised?

Sanjeev Bikhchandani Info Edge (India) Ltd.

This is more or less well stick to what weve committed in the prospectus. This is basically growth capital, so were
looking at new businesses and new markets, potential acquisitions. Were looking at consolidating our Noida
operations into one premises, therefore, possibly a campus. These are some of the uses of this profit money.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
Youre not a young company. You founded your company 10 years ago, so, it took you 10 long years before you went
IPO. What does it take to run a company in India?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, I think if I go back to the early days, clearly the struggle was we didnt have enough capital. Thats different now,
I mean, there is a lot more venture funding available now. There was only one or two venture capitalists maybe in
India, when we started out in 97 and the second is the because you dont have capital you dont have access to
good infrastructure, office infrastructure, connectivity and so on. So therefore, almost every business in India would
start on a bootstrap mode, self-funded mode or your family is already in business and therefore, is able to fund you.
So, youve either access to capital, which is personal capital. Clearly, for ventures like ours debt was not an option,
so, while India did have debt available from banks, but, the banks would basically do asset based lending, which is
that youre buying land, building. Okay, and then they will lend you money, but they would look at your cash flows.
Can you sustain the repayments? So, for startups, it is very hard to get money.
So, clearly, access to capital was one thing. I think thats changing. I think entrepreneurship as a career choice for
educated white-collar youths who are not from a family business background, whose family is not in business, it was
a brave and bold decision in the 90s. I think that is changing because there are enough success stories now. I think
the presence of an entrepreneurial network like TiE, mentoring, meeting other people, I think that is a big help. We
had nobody. So, it took a lot of bootstrapping when actually while we started Naukri in 1997 I have been an
entrepreneur since 1990, and the first 10 years we struggled. Then, finally, we got venture capital from ICICI venture
in early 2000.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
What was the first venture you started?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
The company was still the same, it was Info Edge and it was in various avatars. First there was a partnership, then
there was proprietorship and finally, there was a private limited company in which we launch Naukri. We were doing
salary surveys, databases; we were basically selling information ideas, whatever came over, we were struggling,
we were running out of servant quarter after paying 800 rupees rent. We had one employee, then two employees,
finally we had nine employees when we launched Naukri. So, there was 10 years of sort of struggle out servant
quarters.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
So, the inspiration for Naukri, which is a jobs portal, I am assuming came out of the online job portals in the US?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well actually, no. I didnt visit any online job portal on the Internet till about two years after we launched Naukri. This
was an idea, which came to me when in 1990 I was working in a company, early in 1990 late 1989, which is now
called GlaxoSmithKline. I would observe my colleagues we were sitting in a hall and Id observe my colleagues
would always look at appointment ads in business magazines before reading the rest of the magazine and then they
would discuss.

So, I came to the conclusion that jobs are a high interest category of information and the next thing I noticed was that
every week five or six headhunters would call and try and hit at one or the other of my colleagues. These jobs were
never advertised and they were different headhunters each time with a different job. I figured theres a whole
fragmented database of jobs out there, which is not advertised and jobs are a high interest category of information.
So, if somebody would compile a database of jobs, keep it live and current and a national kind of archive, which is
current, it would be a very powerful product. The only thing I didnt know was how to implement it because there was
no Internet that time. So, when the Internet came in 95 in India and I saw it the first time in 96 is when I revived this
idea and I said look we can do this. So, the initial sort of Website we launched in March 97, was something which
was pure job listings. There was no resume database, so, we didnt have the benefit of looking at other job sites
around the world otherwise, wed have launched with a much wider range of products, initially.
So, thats how the idea came out. Of course, we evolved as we looked at competition, we looked at customers, wed
began to speak to people, we saw whats happening. So, now its a very different product, but initially, it was an idea
we just got by observing job seekers.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
What is the status of the job market today? What percentage of the classifieds does Naukri have?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
You know, market share figures are there is no sort of industry documentation. Market share figures are therefore
are hard to come by, but if you look at online classifieds and you look at data like comScore or Alexa, on traffic share
if you define the market as consisting of Naukri, Monster Plus Jobs and TimesJobs. You define traffic as total page
use. According to comScore, were somewhere in the 50%-ish range, 54%-55% and according to Alexa, were in the
60s. So, this is the kind of percentage we have. So, were definitely clear leaders with higher than 50% market share.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
Youre also running AdSense on your Websites?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Were running AdSense on our Websites.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
So, thats also a big revenue.
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, I wont say its big revenue, but it is good revenue. Its passive revenue, it doesnt require sales force and
therefore its very good margin revenue.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
How has your company changed the online jobs market, the matchmaking and the real estate market, because all
three are in many ways fragmented, they share a lot of characteristics in common?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, see on the online jobs, obviously, were clear pioneers and leaders in India, on matrimonials, we are the
Number 3 player, also we started early in 98, but this is a company we acquired in 2004, so, Jeevansathi started in
98. We had a minority shareholding from 2000 to 2004 and then in 2004 we bought it from the other partners and
began to run it ourselves. Were Number 3 there. So, clearly, you know, but were catching up and itll be hopefully in
the next well have some good news to report in the next 12 to 18 months on Jeevansathi. As far as real estate is

concerned, see nobody did anything significant on real estate, right from the midst down. There were no prior players
prior to the met down who succeeded.
So, this is a huge empty space and when we looked at the amount of money being spent in print media, on television,
on radio, on outdoor in promoting real estate project, we figured there was a better way of doing this and if we did
something on the Internet wed be able to get some share of that ads spend (ph) and thats what the target is. Having
said that, its a bit early, its very new. Right now what weve is proof of concept, weve got a few clients, weve got
traffic, weve got people getting getting enquiries and leads. So, thats happened and thats good news, but its still a
long way away from being called a large category on the Internet.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
Final question is, what advise would you give to young entrepreneurs today who have stars in their eyes and are
looking for because there are many VCs who are out here? Theres a lot of money chasing very few ideas thats
something that I keep repeating.
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, a few things. First is, get some experience first. While there have been a lot of success stories of people who
succeeded in businesses without working anywhere else, my recommendation is get some experience. Its a good
idea to have good reality check before you start a venture of your own because its kind of harder to lead large team,
in the organization scales unless youve had some experience from being at the bottom of the organization. Second
is, start businesses in those areas where youve domain expertise. The third is, dont just copy an idea either from the
US or from anybody else in India; be different.
Ultimately, its the differentiated ideas that will succeed and become big. Being different also enables you to sort of
learn early and to make mistakes when its cheap to make mistakes before competition comes in and thats what
helped us also, because we launched in 97 and there was no competition. First competitor came in 2000, by that
time wed learned the business. Competition took a lot longer to learn.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
But today, though you may not have that luxury of learning the business because things are evolving so fast, so, what
do you do?
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Well, thats not true, actually, if youre focused on the customer and you know your customers really well and you
know what his real needs are. Youve got to base your business proposition, your value proposition, on some deep
customer insight. Youve got to solve the problem that is currently not being solved or in a method that its not being
solved and it will take, possibly years for competition to get that insight. So, build your business around focused
customer insights.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
Thank you so much for your time.
Sanjeev Bikhchandani - Info Edge (India) Ltd.
Thank you.
Kamla Bhatt - IndiaTech
You were listening to Sanjeev Bikhchandani Co-Founder and CEO of Info Edge. This interview was recorded at the
TiE conference in Mumbai, on December 18th, 2006. This is Kamla Bhatt for PodTech and as always, thank you for
tuning in.