E-COMMERCE SEMINAR

E-commerce platforms offer a greater market access to product sellers and small businesses that hitherto confined to small geographical area where they operate. Online market places also provide a big opportunity to the aspiring startups that can scale up their business, focusing all their energies on the products without any need to make investments on marketing, said representatives of some of the successful e-commerce companies, including Amazon and Bigbasket.

Taking part in a panel discussion on 'Opportunities and Challenges in e-commerce for SMEs', jointly organised by The Federation of Telangana Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FTCCI) and Business Standard, speakers told the entrepreneurs to use e-commerce platforms to build and scale up their dream businesses.

"It is perfectly possible for a small product seller to become a Unicorn one day using the online market place like Amazon”, said Pranav Bhasin, Director-Seller Experience for Amazon, while making a presentation on how a large base of small product sellers across India have been effectively using Amazon's online market place and growing their business. Any product seller can register his or her business on Amazon in a couple of simple steps and start selling the products, according to Bhasin.

During their opening remarks and later in the interactive session, the speakers shared their experiences and insights on how to become successful on an e-commerce platform and the things that a product seller has to keep in mind to withstand competition on an online market place.

Raj N Phani, Founder of Zaggle.in, T N Hari, Consultant Strategist for the online grocery business company Bigbasket.com, Vivek Durai, Founder of Paper.vc, Shah Amber, Associate Director, Cyber Security at global consulting firm PWC participated in the panel discussion.

Jayesh Ranjan, Principal Secretary, IT and Industries & Commerce, Government of Telangana, FTCCI President Arun Luharuka released the Federation's Handbook of e-commerce. Jayesh Ranjan said Telangana was the first state to come out with its own e-commerce policy and incentives and as a result many e-commerce companies have come forward to make huge investments in the state.