Walking away from Wall Street proves worthy

Who would leave the privelege of hanging out with Internet icons Mark Zuckerberg and Larry Page at the Wall Street and analysing markets? Well, that’s what Sandeep Aggarwal did when he had the idea of setting up his own company.

Having worked as an IT analyst at investment bank Caris and Company (acquired by B Riley & Co in 2012), Mr Aggarwal found it difficult to move away from the buzz of the markets despite being able to make nearly $1 million every year.

“At Wall Street, I used to hang around with luminaries from Larry Page to Mark Zuckerberg. I was one of the top analysts there. For me walking away from that was not easy,” recalls Aggarwal.

Given the fear of failure, “it took me seven months to take a decision that I wouldn’t regret setting up Shopclues, a protal that connect small and medium enterprises,” says Mr Aggarwal. The idea of setting up Shopclues struck him while he was researching about makemytrip.com.

“That was when I realised Indian e-commerce space was ready for the prime time,” reveals Mr Aggarwal who set up his company in November 2011 with seed money of $2,50,000. Following this, the company got another round of investment worth $2 million from Silicon Valley angels.

The company has also completed its third round of funding close to $10 million from Helion Venture Partners and Nexus Venture Partners recently.

In the meantime, the company has seen tremendous growth from just 200 orders in the first month of operations in December 2011 to 2.5 lakh orders per month currently.

The company has 10,000 merchants across India.

The website offers a range of products from a product as trivial as a key chain to the expensive LCD TVs.

The company, claims, that it has the second largest catalogue that any e-commerce website has in India.

“Some 60 per cent of our business comes from fashion,” says Mr Aggarwal.

Explaining the company’s roadmap for future, Mr Aggarwal s ay s Shopclues plans to sell one billion products via its merchants.

At Wall Street, I used to hang out with luminaries like Larry Page and Zuckerberg. I was one of the top analysts there. For me walking away from that wasn’t easy