BS People: Sumant Kasliwal

E-commerce banker dives into the fray

Sumant Kasliwal, a banker and board member to some of India’s best known companies in e-commerce, undoubtedly got a little bored watching all the recent action in the industry from the wings. So much so that Kasliwal, a private equity veteran with more than ten years of experience, quit his job at ICICI Venture to start his own e-commerce firm.

Sumant, a Chartered Accountant, began his professional career with Arthur Andersen. After his stint at Arthur Andersen (1995-2000), he joined ICICI Venture as Assistant VP and worked till 2004, with a focus on media investments. He then held multiple leadership and operating roles at STAR India across digital services, television distribution & marketing for three years before a short stint of nine months at Microsoft as head of business planning & strategy, online service group. Sumant returned to ICICI Venture in 2008 and focused on investments in the consumer and media & entertainment space.

Sumant will benefit from his vast experience as board member of Miditech, Contest2win, Hungama and Traveljini. During his first tenure with ICICI Venture, he provided operating and strategic guidance to the companies and assisted on the exit strategies for the fund investments.

“Prolonged real estate problems (high-cost and non-availability) coupled with unplanned and mis-managed retail environment is opening up exciting opportunities in alternate retailing business models. Given the favourable demographics, poor and non-profitable existing models and encouraging adaptation trends, I strongly feel that digital commerce/ e-commerce would be the greatest disruption to the existing retail models,” he says.

The Indian e-commerce industry, excluding the online travel market, is estimated at Rs 6,340 crore and is expected to grow to Rs 8,630 crore this year.