Meet Sahil Goel who is revolutionizing India’s e-commerce industry: Founder of aIndia’s 106th Unicorn Start-Up Having Valuation worth 10000 Crores

Saahil Goel: When Saahil Goel founded Shiprocket, an automated shipping solution provider, in 2017, he had no idea that his company would be valued at over $1 billion just a few years later. Yet, in 2022, Shiprocket entered the coveted list of India’s unicorns, joining the ranks of other highly valued startups like Flipkart, Zomato, etc. So, how did Goel do it? What was the journey like that took Shiprocket from a mere idea to a billion-dollar company? The answer is simple: persistence, adaptability, and a willingness to learn from failure.

The automated shipping solution provider’s journey to a $1 billion value has been full of adapting to changes. Saahil Goel founded BigFoot Retail Solution Pvt Ltd in 2012, which is the parent company of Shiprocket. According to Saahil Goel, co-founder, and CEO of Shiprocket, there were many occasions along this journey when they had to halt what they were doing and start over while attempting to bring all stakeholders, including investors, along. Saahil had to revamp their business strategy many times to earn profit for their stakeholders.

Early Life and Career of Saahil Goel

Saahil Goel was born and brought up in Delhi. He was born into a middle-class business family. He completed his schooling at St. Columba’s School, in New Delhi. After finishing school, he attended Drexel University College of Engineering, where he studied Computer Science. Sahil also has an MBA and MS from the University of Pittsburgh (USA). He began his work with Max Life Insurance as a Business Analyst. Following that, he began working as a Technology and Process Consultant at SDLC Partners (a subsidiary of Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield). He was also on the founding member team of Kasper Consulting.

Entrepreneurial Journey of Saahil Goel

Saahil always had an entrepreneurial spirit. While working for SDLC partners, he realized that entrepreneurship was his forte. So he experimented with his entrepreneurial skills by becoming one of the founding team members of Kasper Consulting. After that in 2012, he founded BigFoot Retail Solutions Private Limited with his friend Gautam Kapoor. Saahils’s prioritized his focus on the Small and Medium Business segment of the Indian Economy and wanted to solve their business issues. Saahil quickly realized that logistics was a major pain point for small and medium-sized businesses in India, so he founded Shiprocket in 2017 to offer automated shipping solutions to small sellers. Shiprocket was incepted in 2017 by Saahil Goel, Gautam Kapoor and Vishesh Khurana. In 2020, the startup elevated Akshay Ghulati from chief business officer (CBO) to another co-founder.

Change in Business Strategies

Saahil Goel changed his business strategy multiple times before adopting the business model of Shiprocket. Initially, inspired by Shopify’s strategy, Saahil, and his friends decided to provide small businesses with the tools they need to sell directly to customers via e-commerce. For that purpose, they built a shopping cart called Kartrocket. However, after a few years, they noticed it wasn’t working. In India, subscription charging for SMBs (small and medium businesses) was unsustainable. It was also difficult to implement distribution, onboarding, and do-it-yourself (DIY) systems for SMBs.

Then Goel and his colleagues decided to port Kartrocket to mobile. This resulted in the establishment of the mobile marketplace Kraftly. When the entity began expanding the website development experience for SMEs to mobile, they rebranded Kartrocket to Shiprocket. As the app evolved, the team quickly understood that consumers don’t actually need a fancy shopping cart-building website.  What the SMEs needed was a way to ship; goods needed to be moved, and cash on delivery was required. And that was where things started to fall apart because the infrastructure was not designed for them. It took Saahil and his friends six years to figure out what was wrong.

Saahil realized that logistics was a major pain point for small and medium-sized businesses in India, and many SMBs struggled to find reliable, affordable shipping solutions that would allow them to scale their operations. Goel saw an opportunity to address this need and launched Shiprocket, an automated logistics platform that would connect businesses with shipping partners and streamline the shipping process.

Success Story of Shiprocket

Shiprocket now delivers to around 24000 serviceable pin codes in India & 220 countries, with lower return costs as compared to forward charges and maximum insurance coverage for lost shipments. By 2021, Shiprocket had grown exponentially, with over 100,000 businesses using the platform to ship their products to customers across India and beyond. Investors took notice, and in 2022, Shiprocket became a unicorn, with a valuation of over $1 billion. The startup is currently valued at around 1.3 Billion dollars (more than 10000 crores). The company now employs around 300 – 400 employees.

Goel’s