India's top E-commerce Startups plan to launch a Lobby Group

By Ridhima Malhotra

India’s leading e-commerce companies like Flipkart, Ola, MakeMyTrip and Quikr are coming together to launch an industry body – Indiatech.org. The lobby group is slated to be headed by Sachin Bansal, co-founder of Flipkart. At a time when international companies are successfully tapping into Indian markets, the lobby group seeks to present and advocate for the interests of local ventures.  The formation of the interest group clearly indicates the aggressive stance to fight against ‘deep pocketed’ global competitors for ‘fair market’ in country, reports The Economic Times.

Lobbying is an act of attempting to influence businesses and government leaders to create legislation or conduct an activity that will help a particular organisation. In India, like many countries, lobbying is viewed with skepticism. Though it is rampant, there is presently no law to regulate lobbying in the country. The 2G spectrum scam of 2010, unearthed the need to regulate lobbying and make it more transparent. Despite the ambiguity around lobbying, trade associations such as the FICCI, NASSCOM and CII have been able to carve out good deals for members in the business fraternity. But presently, there is no independent association that solely focuses on home-grown ventures.

The main work of Indiatech will be to push the government to make policies, which would help in the growth of the domestic startups and also boost the local internet business. Different Venture Capitalist and Hedge Fund firms like SoftBank, Tiger Global Management, Steadview Capital, Accel India and Matrix Partners India are invited to join the group. Besides lobbying, the group will also discuss issues related to job creation, skills training and providing resources to boost the internet business.

Data as reported from the Economic Times reveals that if the homegrown e-commerce companies fail, India would lose $10 billion of FDI and over $1 billion of the tax revenue per year. The nation would also lose a chance to create a million job opportunities. Many in the Indian start-up ecosystem feel that a composed gathering like Indiatech.org could be relied upon to provide a platform for the domestic players to voice out their interest. With an eye on domestic markets, it is however left to be seen if Indiatech will succeed in infusing a new sense of proactivity.