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Open Talk @DSIM

An Interview with Rohit Fernandes, Founder of Shippr.in

Shippr.in is India’s first online platform supporting intra-city logistics. Shippr strive to organize the unorganized logistics sector making it accessible to all. Shippr is a disruptive approach to organize the Logistics sector that makes intra-city pickups and deliveries thoroughly efficient and reliable. In today’s fast moving economy, Shippr leads the innovation of local-market logistics to meet on-demand Transportation solutions that save time, money and hassle.

 

 
 
  
 
 
 
 

Q1. A warm greeting to you Mr. Rohit, it’s a pleasure to be doing this interview with you. We are very curious to know more about your business?

Ans. Shippr is an aggregation of a commercial vehicle. Some people call us “Uber of a commercial vehicle.” We provide a vehicle on demand to anybody that requires for logistics. If you are looking for something within Bangalore, Chennai and soon in Delhi, “Aap button dabao, Shippr bulao.” Now renting a Truck is as easy as booking a cab.

Our company’s first product, the MiniShippr, is a disruptive local logistics solution aimed at deliveries within Bangalore. It also helps single vehicle owners (vendors) reduce their idle time by 40 percent, thereby increasing profitability and quicker vehicle turnaround. We are using technology as its backbone; our intra-city aggregator organizes the logistics system, packages it and presents it to the consumer in its simplest form.

As far as its revenue model goes, the company gives the vehicle owner business and takes a percentage of the transaction value as its margin. It’s pricing to the customer is based on the distance and time taken for the vehicle to reach them.

Q2. Excellent model Rohit! How did the idea of Shippr come to your mind? How did you get started?

Ans. I come from a family of ‘logisticians’. I am an engineer with a Masters in Supply Chain Management and Logistics. I worked down in India and abroad as well in logistics & supply chain. I have seen the problems fleet owners, drivers and customers face on a daily basis and the general attitude is ‘Yeh nahi Badlega’.

Most of the drivers were not reliable as they were single vehicle owners and everybody was their own boss. This naturally led to price variation from driver to driver. These operators were fragmented and market dynamics also didn’t affect them, as they had no visibility of the demand outside of their areas.

I saw value in this segment. I soon realized that with the increase in ecommerce delivery density, rapid urbanization and improvement in standards of living, the intra-city logistics space would boom. But, for that the industry had to be organized. We see a lot of our demand coming from large ecommerce companies and enablers.

Q3. Rohit, can you share the process of developing Shippr and some of the challenges you faced along the way?

Ans. However, this sector is also burdened with multiple challenges. To name a few, illiteracy, lack of training and most importantly lack of work discipline are burdening it heavily. This apart, supply is spread across the geography of the city with less or no visibility to the demand around them.

The challenge that it is facing currently is short supply of containerized vehicles as they run mostly for institutions. Secondly, we are training our drivers to use our devices which need to be done periodically to ensure that they get used to it.

The most basic thing it would do is help you track the vehicle and more importantly, it will help match demand and supply.  It will help the user to track the driver, have complete transparency and accountability within the supply chain to having features like geo-fencing, route planning, load optimization, dynamic pricing, invoicing and analytics.

For Shippr, technology plays a very important role as it gives the driver visibility to the demand thus matching both demand and supply.

Q4. We are curious to know, how do you promote your company and how do you reach your customers? What digital marketing model works best for you?

Ans.The company caters to both B2B and B2C segment and has targeted marketing activities for this segment. In the case of the B2B side, its strategy is more feet-on-street and digital media marketing. We don’t just provide them with transportation services but give them a complete logistics platform that is integrated with their systems. As for consumers, it is mostly digital media and word of mouth. Social media is used for branding.The fact that the reach for Internet has widened and there has been a rapid urbanization has led to an increase in the density of deliveries with in a small radius. This means that a delivery for which bikes were used is now being replaced with commercial vehicles.

Shippr’s month-on-month growth is a staggering 250 percent which is made possible with the help of their digital marketing campaigns as well as having a strong sales team. 

 
Q5. Rohit, does the future look promising? Where do you see yourself and your business in the next 3 years?

Ans. We are soon expanding into the corporate segment and launching our next product which will support parcel and part load deliveries for SME’s across India. The company is currently operating in Bangalore & Chennai and will soon be expanding to New Delhi and Hyderabad. In the next three years, it aims to be an organization that touches every consumer with business in every Tier 1, 2 and 3 cities and to leverage technology to build a formidable supply network.

Q6. Finally, at the end of our interesting conversation, any advice for entrepreneurs willing to start an e- commerce business? 

Ans. If you are starting a business, firstly just see your target audience. Your idea will be a solution for billion people’s problem. Your idea makes you a very successful company.

“It was nice talking to you. Thank you so much for your time and providing us valuable information. Best wishes from DSIM.”
DSIM Team
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