Ola and Flipkart Beware! Jugnoo is the next big thing Jugnoo is showing significant traction with 10,000 daily transactions already in less than a year.

Post acquiring Mumbai-based taxi aggregator BookMyCab in July this year in a cash plus stock deal, Chandigarh-based on-demand hyperlocal marketplace Jugnoo announces successful acquisition of two more start-ups – Bistro Offers, Chandigarh-based restaurant discovery app, which was launched in October 2014. The other one is yelo, a Bengaluru-based mobile only services marketplace.

With an established presence in 10 cities of India, Jugnoo further strengthens its position in the hyperlocal space by these acquisitions. Both, in a way, focus on hyperlocal content discovery and this brings to light Jugnoo's strategy of getting into this space, where they are already leading the logistics side.

"We are pleased to complete these acquisitions as content discovery is an emerging concept and enables us to engage our customers better. Between Jugnoo, Bistro and yelo, we offer complementary products and there is potential for significant synergies," says Samar Singla, CEO & Founder Jugnoo.

What does this mean for Bistro and yelo, "Both continue to be independent products and their team will continue to build and grow the product. Our plan is to launch them in all our markets very quickly and then work on monetizing the traffic via Jugnoo offerings," adds Singla.

Growth Potential

In the current scenario, where restaurants have multiple offers running, they constantly struggle to broadcast these to the consumers and hence, end up with a huge overhead. Bistro provides a DIY platform for broadcasting offers and managing loyalty for any restaurant or a chain of restaurants. The unique functionalities within the app interface allow restaurant managers to build, execute and monitor customer engagement and brand loyalty campaigns.

Jugnoo is showing significant traction with 10,000 daily transactions already in less than a year under the suite of its three applications – Jugnoo Autos, Jugnoo Meals and Jugnoo Fatafat. This is expected to grow exponentially with upcoming launches. The content play from Bistro and yelo, will be paving a path for Jugnoo to be a comprehensive services aggregator for its consumers.

Saral Maghan, CEO, Bistro, shares his thoughts behind this move, "Jugnoo has seen explosive growth and has scaled very fast. With our product already gaining momentum, Jugnoo's traction would propel our reach to a much bigger audience quickly."

Speaking about yelo, a peer-to-peer platform that puts the user in touch with the right people for his/her needs, Singla adds, "It is no secret anymore that everyone is struggling to find the right talent for the kind of work they need to get done. yelo brings with it the right expertise we needed to break into this market of providing talent on-demand by leveraging content discovery platform."

Prasun Jain, Founder, yelo, who like Singla, is an alumnus of Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, further states, "The potential of hyperlocal and content discovery is endless and with each of us having tested this in our own capacity, I believe this acquisition is a pragmatic move for all of us resulting in an increased reach, a more comprehensive solution for the masses."

More Acquisitions in Offing

Jugnoo is the first incubate and first success story from Chandigarh-based global technology solution incubation firm Click Labs. The team at Jugnoo is very candid in expressing the potential they see in exploring collaborations and are constantly on a lookout for players, who provide an evident avenue for them to warrant their evolving vision of being a one stop shop for convenience to the common man. Their business enables them to create a link between the brand and the consumer and provide a value proposition to both parties and thus making their business model a sustainable one.

With the start-up ecosystem witnessing a consolidation phase, more acquisitions are expected to become characteristic to this space. Big venture funded start-ups eye players in Pre Series A stage to get their IP and products faster and to use their reach to service a bigger audience. The size of both the deals is identified at $1 million, including cash and stock components.

Take on Competition

Today, people need everything on their fingertips. Jugnoo aspires to become the assistant providers for whatever people need. Hence, Jugnoo is first building the whole integrated supply chain, and then build the front end data, which unitises everything.

Jugnoo has 8 verticals in ad demand space and plans to continue launching new products every three months. Post launching Juggernaut and Taxi Hawk, Click Labs launched its third SaaS product Tookan last month. Tookan is an off the shelf solution, designed around generic workflows enabling multiple use cases for businesses managing field personnel, deliveries and services.

"In India, people like to transact, but they are very price conscious. The brand that gives the best experience at lowest cost is going to be the winner. Hyperlocal is all about scale. Once you have a product market fit, you just have to run fast. If you look at Flipkart, they launched pan India. Though we launched city-by-city, but now we want to move fast. Curated marketplaces like Autorikshaws and Food are the two biggest sectors today. Hence, we are focusing on these sectors," points Singla.

Further speaking about the competition, Singla adds, "This is a new industry being created, and when you operate in a new industry, competition is very skewed and tough to define. So Flipkart will be a competitor as they are trying to get into this space. Also Ola is a competitor."

"In my view, Ola is a great company, but their DNA is not diversified. On the other hand, our focus is intact from the very first day and I think we can do it better than Ola, Flipkart because beyond a point, money means nothing; it's the DNA of the company that matters. And I feel we can handle diversity very easily," Singla opines further.

Long-term Vision

Singla believes to have an aligning vision, and in this vision, he feels to have an equal or greater chance of succeeding than his competitors. He says, "If you are a thought leader in a space, you automatically become a leader. Technology runs from thought leadership and not from money."

"Being successful is all about vision. Our vision is being the assistant for every person in India. Our vision from day one defines our purpose and strategy. I follow my gut because my vision is guiding me. I don't look at anybody else making product decision," Singla elaborates further.