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Indian Startup
A study on emerging trends in Ecosystem
Indian startup ecosystem: big
data, crowd funding,
shared economy 1
Sagar Lotan Chaudhari Received 24 September 2020
Revised 28 September 2020
Department of Business Analytics, Symbiosis Centre for Management and Human Accepted 28 September 2020
Resource Development, Symbiosis International University,
Pune, India, and
Manish Sinha
SIU SCMHRD, Pune, India

Abstract
Purpose – India ranks third in the global startup ecosystem in the world incubating more than 50,000
startups and witnessing 15% YoY growth per year. Being a center of innovation and skilled labor, Indian
startups have attracted investments from all over the world. This paper aims at exploring the trends that are
driving the growth in the Indian startup ecosystem.
Design/methodology/approach – Top 200 startups according to valuation are selected as a sample to
find out the major trends in the Indian startup ecosystem. This paper includes surveying the sample startups
about the implementation of trends such as big data, crowdfunding and shared economy in their startup and
its tangible, as well as intangible impacts on their business. The result of the survey is analyzed to get an
overview of the emerging trends in the Indian startup ecosystem.
Findings – Major ten emerging trends that drive growth in the Indian startup ecosystem are discovered and
the areas where these trends can be leveraged are identified.
Originality/value – This research has contributed toward structuring and documenting the growth
driving trends, and it will help the budding entrepreneurs to get familiar with the contemporary trends, pros
and cons associated with it and the ways to leverage these trends to build a successful startup.

Keywords Big data, Startup, Crowdfunding, Shared economy

Paper type Research paper

Introduction
This research is focused on the emerging trends in the Indian startup ecosystem, namely, Big
data, Crowdfunding and the Shared economy. The Indian startup ecosystem is most looked
upon startup ecosystems after the USA and China. It is growing at an astounding rate. Growth
in any startup ecosystem is fueled by the innovation and disruptions in that startup ecosystem.
The innovations and disruptions are based on certain underlying trends. In this research top,
10 such innovation driving trends are identified through an extensive survey of leading 200
startups that are based on digital technology. An extensive literature review was done on three
of these innovation driving trends, namely, Big data, Crowdfunding and the Shared economy. International Journal of Innovation
Science
The literature review focused on how these trends are shaping the startups and whole startup Vol. 13 No. 1, 2021
pp. 1-16
ecosystem, their way of operation, their evolution with time challenges faced to adopt those © Emerald Publishing Limited
1757-2223
trends and pros and cons associated with them. DOI 10.1108/IJIS-09-2020-0156
IJIS Literature review
13,1 Indian startup ecosystem
Different articles, which have explored the startup ecosystem in India are considered for the
literature review. According to the Indian official website for startups (startupindia.gov.in) it
established the definition to describe the startups:
The startup is an entity incorporated or registered in India not before than seven years, except for
2 Biotechnology startups 10 years, with annual turnover under INR 25 crore in any preceding
financial year and objective focused on innovation, development or improvement of product or
processes or services.
For the startup ecosystem, some of the popular hashtags are AI for India, AI, Big data,
Bitcoin, Digital India, Aadhar, Brexit, Budget and AbHarWishHogiPoori. Digital
technologies, socio-economic issues and promotional deals are few areas that have
witnessed the inclination of Indian startups #BeatPlasticPollution was another trending
hashtag and it shows the concern of startups regarding the environment. The 3 basic Ps
concept: people, planet and profit are located at the center of the startup ecosystem (Singh
et al., 2016).
Nasscom Startup Report, 2018 states that, the Indian start-up base is the third-largest in
the world preceded by the US and UK and is highly such as Israel and the UK’s startup
ecosystem. It is growing rapidly at 12–15% per year. Around 1,200 new startups listened in
2018. It also witnessed the growth of $2.2 billion in investments because of this more than
40,000 new employment vacancies were created. Newly added Unicorns included Oyo,
Swiggy, Paytmall and Byju. India now has left behind the UK, Germany and Israel in the
number of unicorn startups (Sodhi et al., 2019).
The 2010–2020 was declared as the Decade of Innovation. For any startup ecosystem
innovation is the prime driver and it also results in more industrialization. Ultimately, the
per capita income of a country rises. The unorganized and fragmented nature of the Indian
startup ecosystem is a major hindrance. It lacks unambiguous and transparent policies,
communications sources, knowledge and exposure to the masses. Any startup system
requires the right amalgamation of entrepreneur-friendly operational, regulatory and
taxation issues that affects the working of the business environment very much. The
government, big corporate, educational institutions can lead the process to build an
environment that is suitable for entrepreneurs. Overall, we can say that the Indian startup
ecosystem has lots of underlying potentials (P. Premkumar, 2019).
With the advent of internet technology in India, online startups have gained momentum.
Indian startups have a long way to go compared to their counterparts when it comes to
incubators. Sectors such as online payment gateway, cryptocurrency platforms, micro-
financing, service aggregation platforms have attracted the masses and involve immense
business potential. The business plan and its customer validation are the important points
for any startup. Big data acquired from the sources can allow the startups to formulate the
business plan and estimate the consumer demand with high accuracy (Kumar, 2015).

Big data
Big data has disruptively reshaped the field of business intelligence, which is the field that
helps to gain better consumer insights. We can identify the data sources, methods and
applications related to five important marketing perspectives. The 5 Ps of marketing, namely,
people, product, place, price and promotion, are the foundation for marketing intelligence. In
general, we can state that marketing is fueled by Big data analytics (Zhao, 2015).
 In the continuously evolving digital world, businesses ask for development and evolving Indian Startup
Big data analytics capabilities. It is extremely necessary for achieving a successful digital Ecosystem
business. The digital economy along with Big data analytics has challenged the status quo
of well-established business models. Indian startups need to build upon the resources that
are their strength, they are people, processes and technology (Berg, 2018).
After the innovation of big data, its benefits have opened doors to a new venture. It is
visible from the picture of an industry that organizations are participating in a data-driven
3
economy. They are combining the traditional way of doing analytics and Big data to gain
the leading edge. Organizations are transiting into a new era (Thomas and Davenport, 2013).
Business processes can be optimized using better predictive models. Such models offer
effective optimization tools. Retailers can optimally stock their inventory with the help of
predictive models build on data taken from weather forecasts, social media, google trends,
etc. Delivery route optimization and warehouse use optimization are the major applications
of big data analytics. High-end technologies such as GPS and Satellites are used to capture
the real-time position of the vehicles and process it along with traffic data to optimize their
routes (Kumar et al., 2016).
As per the analysis, product-based and service-based companies believed strategic
innovation has a major contribution to the success of the business. To gain a competitive
edge over competitors it has become extremely crucial to meet the evolving needs of tech-
savvy customers. Innovation in the current business world is fueled by new advents such as
Blockchain technology and Big data analytics (Kamala Kannan Dinesh, 2019).
In the year 2012, the big data market in India was around $200 million. The market is
growing at a (CAGR) of 83%. It is predicted that it can grow up to $2.3 billion by the end of
2018 (Singh, 2018).
In total, 63% of organizations have agreed that big data has been beneficial for their
companies. More than 70% of the data produced in the organization is used for making
decisions. Challenges posed by big data are probable misuse of data because data contains
information and power lies in information (Alam, 2014).
Many new startups have leveraged the Big data Analytics technology to build scalable
business models aim is to create a feasible business model to solve an issue. Abundant
opportunities can be seen in the agri-tech sector (Mr Anupam Anand, 2019). Big data
analytics has not only allowed them to streamline their operations but also created new
solutions. Fields such as pharma allied genomics, bioinformatics, pharma research and
clinical outcomes research are the applications of big data analytics. Electronic medical
record systems are one of the most data-focused systems in the world. Besides that, Big data
is a game-changer opportunity in sales and marketing, as it can give factual insight into
consumer behavior (Filippov, 2014).
With the increase of mobile subscribers, it has extensively penetrated into rural and
urban areas. It has now undeniably become imperative to offer services over cellphones to
ensure that the services are delivered to every citizen at their doorsteps. To survive the
cutthroat competition given by new entrants and already established players it has become
necessary for startups to offer something apart from class. Big data can be leveraged in such
a scenario to gain customer insights and serve them at best (Ranjan Kumar, 2020).
Urban transportation, retail areas are the areas that have seen a major effect due to big
data analytics. Dynamic demands and supplies can be addressed through the “Hyperscale”
Platforms. In the traditional taxi business, the supply side was always underused. Startups
such as Uber, Lyft, Didi Chuxing, changed the scenario using Big data (Nicolaus Henke,
2016).
IJIS Agriculture can be considered as the backbone of any major nation’s economy. Sources
13,1 such as institutions, data from websites, government data and agricultural colleges
contribute to the collection of agricultural data. The data obtained needs tremendous
preprocessing to remove the irregularities and make it usable for training the model. High-
performance databases like Cassandra are used for storing and maintaining the cleaned
data. This data is used by many startups to provide services such as crop analytics and
4 agricultural forecasting (Bose, 2017).
Huge, many variables, mixed, complicated, ill-formatted, incomplete, are the features of
Big data. Big data does not always lead to more useful and workable information. The
methods to extract usable and accurate forms of data should be reinforced for building a
strong data analytics system (Chun-Wei Tsai, 2015).

Crowdfunding
Crowdfunding is a unique way for founders to raise capital for their ambitious projects.
With its rapid growth, the dynamics of crowdfunding have not been explored to the fullest.
Such projects have a marginal probability of success or failure by huge. Geography also has
a correlation with the nature and success probabilities of projects. It can be used as a
platform to study newborn entrepreneurial ventures. Crowdfunding gives an empirical
setting where multiple new business ideas are compared easily. It serves as a fruitful way of
testing and extending existing theory (Mollick, 2014).
Content, context, linkages and stakeholders logic allows opening stakeholders, who are
inclined toward value generation. It discloses what they will obtain from any financial
instrument. The stakeholders are required to be brought together and change them into
users. The stakeholders include investors (funders) and startups (businesses). In the context
of crowdfunding financial institutions enjoy the features of competitors and contextual
stakeholders. It is particularly important to understand these shifts for successful value
creation. In Crowdfunding, value creation can be achieved after the complete satisfaction of
stakeholders (Loreta Valanþienơa, 2014).
Establishing a long-term relationship with the investors and funders is one of the
objectives of creators. The recognition that a creator gets from the larger online community
not only helps them to raise the fund but also gives the funders an idea about exploring new
projects. From the perspective of the funder. India is a country with a large population the
creators may find the huge potential for funding their projects (Elizabeth M. Gerber, 2012).
Market design, different sets of regulations for engagement, due diligence by crowd and
provision point system, are a few of the factors in which crowdfunding will have to compete
with traditional forms of fundraising. Due to its disruptive nature crowdfunding is bound to
undergo multiple successes and failures to emerge into refined form. Funders can lose
money to frauds, bad ideas or inefficient managers. There are high chances that ideas and
intellectual property will be stolen due to disclosing it to the public. Going ahead it can be
said that the benefits of crowdfunding will not be distributed uniformly (Ajay Agrawal,
2013).
Crowdfunding involves raising small amounts of capital from many individuals that
may or may not be directly benefitted from the product or idea. It is a major disruption in
entrepreneurial fundraising. In India crowdfunding is at a nascent stage. It is becoming a
major source of raising the finance externally for a few startups. According to an estimate,
there will be nearly 30 crowdfunding platforms (CFPs) in India till mid-2016 (Kshetri, 2016).
Crowdfunding is in the newborn stage in India, it has a long way to go before it is penetrated
and well-practiced into society. In India particularly it is not an innovative concept,
donations have been taken to build temples and religious festivals are celebrated through
contributions. However, financial contributions through a public platform based on the Indian Startup
internet are something new. Looking forward, crowdfunding will be a game-changer as a Ecosystem
recent disruption in the telecom industry has led to internet spread and e-commerce victory
in India (Hetal Jhaveri, 2014).
Investment asked by the crowd funder, the time period of the mentioned project and its
contribution frequency is a major three things that have an impact on underfunding or
overfunding. With the increase in project duration, the amount of money contributed will
increase, thereby increasing the chances of success of the given project (Cordovaa et al., 5
2015).
World Crowdfund Federation and European Crowdfunding Network are the global
crowdfunding organizations. It can be inferred from the regulations that; voluntary actions
are been taken to make it successful. Creation of well documented legal framework, which
includes how web entrepreneurs can use crowdfunding. It should also promote successful
cases from the USA, UK, Canada, Germany, France, Australia and Italy in the form of the
case study. The countries leading in crowdfunding such as China and the USA should
address the world about the right way to use this tool (Jegeleviciè and Valancienè, 2015).
Crowdfunding has many advantages compared to traditional fund-raising approaches
available for startups and Small Medium Enterprises. Capital raise under the Crowd
Funding Platform not being a public offer, and thus not triggering public offer related pre-
conditions, and the related costs and compliances therein, is a good starting point for this
platform available for such new generation companies. This will also enable the Eligible
Entities to reach out to a wider section of investors and investor groups for raising capital
(Prinsha, 2016). The concept of crowdfunding is certainly posing an idealistic potential if
implemented and accepted by the masses (Lakshita, 2019).

Shared economy
Technological progress and economic instruments can bring revolutionary changes to the
startup ecosystem. Combined they can evolve the existing environment of mass
consumerism. Through its most acclaimed “start-up India” movement Indian government is
supporting the startup culture in India. Many startups are receiving mentorship from
several institutes and government bodies for the betterment of India in terms of future
prospects of startups (Kaushal, 2018).
To establish a startup on its firm foot, it needs to be given support and encouragement
during the first two stages of its lifecycle. Financers, Mentors and other stakeholders came
together on the platform of Startup India to share their ideas, best practices and build a long-
lasting partnership that will make India a leader in fields of business (Sarka, 2020).
In-country like India peer sharing economy has tremendous potential for non-centralized
innovation. A new regulatory framework is required to fully explore the potential sharing
economy. Enhancing the key efficiencies of sharing platforms and protecting consumer’s
rights must be the focus points of these regulatory norms (Kaushal, 2017).
Successfulness of any business model is embedded when a customer finds trust,
authenticity and transparency in that business model. Following are the four reasons to
adopt a sharing economy to save time (practical reasons), to meet new people (social
reasons), to save money (economic reasons) and to protect the environment (sustainable
reasons). People power the sharing economy, and that makes them unique (Toivola, 2018).
The sharing economy will continue to develop and evolve into an efficient ecosystem
itself, therefore, these platforms should be regulated. The better design would create an
ecosystem that will enable the right use of data to optimize their operations and better
utilization of public resources (Tatiana Sorokova, 2019).
IJIS In the sharing economy, the “possession” loses its value, on the other hand, sharing and
13,1 sharing unused resources gain value. The generation of higher profit margins, a drastic
reduction in cost and major improvements in business performance are just a few of the
wide benefits offered by the sharing economy (Grondys, 2019).
Classification of sharing economy is as follows: on-demand economy: it includes the
businesses such as Uber, Ola and blabla Car where resources are shared on customers
6 demand, second-hand economy: It consists of the businesses that sell second-hand products
such as Olx and eBay. Product service economy: It includes the platforms that rent the
products or services to customers e.g. Zoomcar, Drivezy, etc (Koen Frenken, 2017).
The sharing economy will be a huge breakthrough when it is amalgamated with new
technologies such as artificial intelligence and deep learning. Marketing in the sharing
economy has captured the nerve of customers and the majority of businesses that are based
on the sharing economy model such as UBER and Ola have gained customers by addressing
selling the experience of ownership (Giana M. Eckhardt, 2019).
Two ways can be used for enhancement of customers’ willingness to use shared services
or products. In a first way convey the utilitarian values (e.g. financial benefits, functional
benefits) of shared services or products to the customer and hedonic values (i.e. enjoyment
and pleasant interactions) that can be enjoyed by using shared services or products. Second,
capture the new innovations caused by sharing services or products and display them in
society (Hung-Tai Tsou, 2019).
The sustainability aspect is one of the major drivers for adopting the sharing economy.
We are facing social and environmental challenges such as climate crisis, depleting natural
resources and habitat destruction. Household consumption accounts for 60% of global
greenhouse gas emissions and 60–80% of total environmental impact. Sharing Economy
Business Model (SEBM) have a very tangible output toward the goal of sustainability
(Steven Curtis, 2020; Kurt Matzler, 2015).

Research methodology
The research is focused on the startups that are initiated and currently operating in India. In
the first stage leading 200 registered startups, which are based on digital technology were
surveyed. Decision-makers of these startups i.e. founders and CEOs were asked to answer a
series of questions. The questions emphasized the new trends that were adopted by their
organization and how these trends have benefitted them. Descriptive data analysis was done
on the results of the survey to get a wholesome picture of the trends in the Indian startup
ecosystem. The other part focuses on the willingness of Indian startups to adopt
crowdfunding as a way of raising capital and the problems faced by them.

Findings
After surveying multiple digital technology startups from the Indian startup ecosystem, the
following results were obtained (Figure 1).
Results showed that Big data (90.5%), Shared Economy (69%) and Hyper Localization
(67%) are the top three trends, detailed analysis of these trends is given in the latter part of
this research paper. Apart from top these, the Indian startup ecosystem also includes trends
like voice recognition (47%) which is implemented by multiple startups to ease the process
of searching the products in the mobile application e.g. Flipkart, Snapdeal, etc. Internet of
Things (48.5%) has taken the startup market by storm and is the fastest growing trend, it
has found its application in human less drone delivery system, smart warehouses, smart
gadgets to monitor health, etc. Due to an unprecedented crisis like COVID-19 social
distancing became a mandatory norm, and hence delivery by drone has become the most
 Indian Startup
Ecosystem

Figure 1.
Top 10 emerging
trends in Indian
startup ecosystem

ambitious project and Food-tech companies such as Zomato and Swiggy are eyeing it.
Aggregate services (31.5%) is the most recent trend and has gained its popularity in no time,
It includes startups that provide multiple services under one umbrella such as bill payments,
movie ticket booking, traveling ticket booking and shows or concert ticket booking.
Freecharge, Phonepay are the startups that operate in this trend. E-Wallet (22.5%) gained its
popularity after demonetization in 2016 startups such as Ola cabs, Paytm and Phonepay, are
the most used E-wallets. The game platform (17.5%) includes the startups such as Flipkart
(it included games in its mobile application to increase customer engagement), Dream11 and
Mobile Premier League. With the increasing awareness about electric vehicles, there are
many startups, which are working on developing digital technology that is needed for
electric vehicles. Crowdfunding is a trend, which is in its infancy and only (0.5%) of the
surveyed startups had done crowdfunding.
IJIS Table 1 shows the top 10 startups of the Indian ecosystem and the total funding they
13,1 have received to date. It can be concluded Big data, Shared Economy, Hyper Localization are
the trends that are followed by the majority of the startups, thus incrementally changing the
digital technology landscape of the Indian startup ecosystem. Big data was generated for
many years, as the advent of new tools and techniques startups have used this data for
developing multiple facets of existing business forms.
8
Big data in the Indian startup ecosystem
Out of all startups that were surveyed, 90.5% of startups implemented Big data analytics in
their business processes. These firms adopted Big Data analytics in various ways with an
objective to improve business processes, enhance the consumer experience, efficient
resource utilization, etc. Following are the major areas where Big Data analytics was
majorly leveraged.
Recommendation engines. E-commerce startups such as Snapdeal, Big Basket, Grofers
and Paytm used Big Data of consumers’ search history and analyzed it to build a robust
recommendation model for product recommendations. It was also used for finding out
products that are frequently bought together. They performed market basket analysis on
this data and send the notifications to the respective customer. The product
recommendation engine helped these startups to increase product visibility and created a
product impression in the subconscious mind of the consumer.
Trends identification. The food-tech market in India is projected to grow at a robust pace,
at a CAGR of over 12% during 2016–2021 (source: analyticsindiamag.com) therefore,
startups such as Zomato, Freshmenu and Swiggy are using advanced technologies to offer
more personalized services and gain market share. They used Big Data analytics for finding
the patterns in sales. The specific application of Big Data analytics was finding order traffic
at different restaurants and optimizing the logistics to minimize the waiting time of the
customer. Some food items showed a high correlation of being bought together, such items
were identified and suggested to the customer.

Sr. Total funding

No. Startup name Sector Business driving trends (US$)

1 One97 Communications Payment service, e- E-wallet, big data 4.4bn

(Paytm) commerce
2 Ola Transportation Big data, e-wallet, shared economy 3.8bn
3 Oyo Rooms Accommodation, travel Big data, shared economy 3.2bn
and tourism
4 Udaan B2B business platform Big data, hyper localization 2.8bn
5 Snapdeal E-commerce Big data, e-wallet, voice 1.8bn
recognition
6 Swiggy Food and beverages Big data, hyper localization of hotel 1.6bn
services
7 BYJU’s Education Big data 1.4bn
8 Big Basket Grocery and vegetables Hyper localization of grocery 1.1bn
Table 1. services
9 Delhivery Logistics Big data, IoT, shared economy 0.935bn
Business driving 10 Zomato Food and beverages Big data, hyper localization of hotel 0.915bn
trends in top 10 services
valued Indian
startups Source: Survey
Customer churn prediction. Snapdeal, Lenskart, Coolwinks, Grofers, Firstcry are the Indian Startup
startups that deal with consumer goods. They used Big data analytics for RFM (Recency, Ecosystem
Frequency and Monetary) analysis for segmenting customers into various classes as an
active customer, lost customer, sleeping customer, etc., and designed a strategy to maximize
the number of active customers. The customer churn model was prepared on Big Data to
predict the customer churn and launch campaigns to reduce customer attrition.
Consumer behavior analysis. Startups such as Ola cabs and Oyo rooms have used Big
Data analytics for gaining insights about customer behavior. Ola cabs have analyzed the 9
Big data for building a statistical model that gives out the price surge in rides fares during
peak hours and unpleasant climate (e.g. Heavy rain, Scorching heat, etc). Oyo rooms have
used Big Data analytics to identify the locations that have frequent visitors and amenities
that customers prefer while booking the room. his helped them to focus on that particular
geographical area.
Health-care analytics. Big data analytics has given birth to a completely new field known
as Health-care Analytics. Currently, there are 197 health-care analytics startups in India.
Lybrate, Qure.ai, Oncostem, Artelus are major startups in health-care analytics. They have
used Big data analytics for cancer detection, predictive health-care, X-Ray analysis using
image processing, etc.
Resource optimization. Startups that are based on logistics and delivery services such as
Delhivery, Ekart, Rivigo and Blackbuck have leveraged Big Data analytics for optimal
utilization of delivery vehicles. Shelf stock level optimization is another way of resource
optimization by startups that operate in consumer goods such as Grofers, Big Basket and
Lenskart.

Crowdfunding trend in the Indian startup ecosystem

In India crowdfunding is at an infancy stage. Only 0.9% of the total surveyed startups were
actually funded by crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is a new alternate for conventional ways
of funding. Penetration of crowdfunding has been extremely limited in the Indian startup
ecosystem, therefore, very few examples of successful startups are available. Few of the
reasons for the success of these startups
Social cause appeal. As an alternate to disposable cutlery and bamboo chopsticks, edible
cutlery was introduced by BAKEYS’ in 2010 in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh.
Environmental safety was the prime motive behind the inception of this idea, as a result, it
received a funding of Rs. 24,92,380. The major reason for their success was a social cause
appeal. Increasing awareness about the environment drove the audience to fund for the
cause and make it work.
Response to crowdfunding seeker. The second startup that became successful in raising
capital through crowdfunding is Mixer Foods and Beverages LLP, it is ready to drink
nonalcoholic beverage startup from Mumbai. The crowdfunding campaign started by it was
instantly popular and it raised Rs. 2,57,700. The idea was successful in collecting funds
because the founders were based out in Mumbai and they appealed to their neighborhood
for an entrepreneurial venture. They gained a huge response to this idea because of their
appeal.
The uniqueness of the idea. Leaf Wearables is an electronics goods manufacturing
company based in India. As a part of their project of women’s safety, they raised Rs. 5,16,670
through crowdfunding for the product called “safer.” The response received to this idea
immense due to its uniqueness and approach to solving the contemporary issue of society.
Crowdfunding might be a new concept in the startup ecosystem, but it was practiced in
India on large scale by NGOs. some well-known crowdfunding campaigns run by NGO’s in
IJIS India are CRY, Teach for India, Nanhi kali Ketto, Kickstarter, FuelADream, Indiegogo are
13,1 major crowdfunding platforms in India.

Sharing economy trend in the Indian startup ecosystem

Sharing instead of owning is the psychology in the millennial generation and this was
accurately tapped by many Indian startups to establish their firm. In total, 69% of the total
10 surveyed startups practiced shared economy in their business. The sharing economy was
not only part of their business model but also part of their business operations. following
were the major areas where the sharing economy was practiced.
Shared transportation/vehicles. In metro cities parking has become one of the major
problems, “sharing a car instead of buying a car for transportation” has become the point of
view of customers. Therefore, the ride-hailing concept has become immensely popular in
metro cities. The concept of ride-hailing has not been limited to intracity but also extended
to intercity transportation. Ola cabs, Taxi4sure, Zoomcar, Drivezy are the startups that
operate under this segment. Within a span of 10 years, Ola cabs have become the second
most valued startup in India (3.8 Bn USD). It has operations in 250þ cities in 4 countries due
to ease and affordability shared transportation/vehicles has become the fastest-growing
sector.
Space sharing. Space sharing startups can be broadly classified into three categories:
(1) Office space sharing: Awfis and Friyay are the Indian startups that rent office
space to corporates who are not willing to invest in infrastructure. This concept
has been immensely popular in budding entrepreneurs and freelancers, very few
startups have been operating in these areas.
(2) Living space sharing: Zolo stays, Stanza living, Clive, Oyo life are the few startups
that have tapped the need for millennials staying in metro cities. They have offered
living spaces to the people that need living space ranging from few months to
years.
(3) Vacation space sharing: Oyo Rooms, 99 rooms, Wandertrails are the startups that
currently offer a living space for the tourists that visit to spend a vacation. These
spaces are generally a part of the house that the owner is willing to rent out.

Asset sharing. Yulu, Vogo, Rapido, Bounce are the startups that operate on sharing
motorbikes and cycles. Home appliances and furniture sharing startups such as Furlenco,
Rentickle and Rentmojo are gaining popularity. All the aforementioned startups operate on
benefits such as optimum utilization of resources and decreasing environmental effects. The
counterpart who is sharing his resources also benefits monetarily, thus creating a win-win
situation. The end-users of shared services can enjoy the same perks of owning a much
affordable budget.
Peer to peer capital sharing. As the sharing economy is a new venture it has endless
business opportunities for everybody who has an asset to share. The trend of sharing
economy in startups is not only limited to the sharing of assets but also grown to the share
of capital. Few startups with an innovative idea of peer to peer (P2P) lending have
established into the Indian startup ecosystem. Lendbox, Finzy, Lendingkart, LenDen Club
are a few startups that have eased the process of peer to peer lending.

Willingness to adopt the trend

The second part of the research focuses on startups’ willingness to adopt these trends into
their business. Figure 2 clearly shows that Big data is something that has explosive
 Number of startups willing to adopt the Indian Startup
Trends Ecosystem
120% 100%
90%
100%
80%
11
60% 39%
40%
20%
0% Figure 2.
Big Data Shared Crowd Funding Percent of startups
Economy willing to adopt the
trends
Source: Survey

potential, therefore every single startup is willing to adopt it into their business. The sharing
economy has also proved its benefits to all its stakeholders, and therefore ready to be
included by the startups where it is feasible. It is not possible for all the startups to adopt a
shared economy into their business. Startups that are based on technological services,
personalized goods such as Lenksart, Coolwinks and Gaming platform creators such as
Dream11 and Mobile Premier League cannot adopt a sharing economy due to the nature of
their business. The response to crowdfunding shows that its suitable only in certain forms
of businesses such as individual projects that do not involve patents and copyright issues
and projects that have appeal for a social cause or environmental cause.

Discussion
Big data
Need for big data in the Indian startup ecosystem. The needs of a consumer are always
evolving or changing. These evolving or changing needs get recorded in the form of
transactions in the business and over the period of time, this leads to Big data. A data is
called Big data when it is generated at large volumes, large velocity and in a large variety.
Startups being based on innovation and disruptions generally find it interesting to work
with Big data. It can not only provide them with insights but also give direction to potential
business. India is a country with diverse geography and diverse culture. This diversity in
geography and culture has a significant influence on consumer behavior, therefore it is
necessary to record this consumer behavior in the form of Big Data and analyze it. This will
help the startups to tweak their products and services according to consumer behavior in a
particular location. This potential of Big Data was acknowledged by many entrepreneurs in
early-stage and as a result, the Indian startup ecosystem has been growing with an
astounding rate of 12–15% (source: www.starupindia.gov.in).
Upcoming innovative applications of big data. The awareness about the potential of Big
data has led to an increase in learning skills such as machine learning and deep learning which
are applications of Big data. Big data analytics is currently being used in the banking and finance
sector for loan default prediction. Machine learning algorithms like logistic regression, random
forests along boosting techniques are used for processing the big data and predicting the loan
defaulter. Big data analytics forms the basis of Artificial Intelligence (AI). AI has been considered
IJIS to replicate human behavior. It has tremendous applications in the sectors where humans face
13,1 fatigue due to repetitive and mundane tasks. Chatbots is a new technology where big data
analytics is combined with Natural Language Processing to create a human-like chatting
experience for customers. Contus, Botsnext, Hidden Brain Infotech are the few leading startups in
the chatbot field. These chatbots have already started replacing the backend humans required for
customer support. With the increasing use of Big data, it becomes necessary to have the
12 necessary infrastructure. India being a rapidly developing country has one of the top digital
infrastructures among the developing nations. The Indian government has planned to make
Delhi NCR one of the top 5 global hubs with a valuation of 150bn USD by 2025 housing 30þ
unicorns (source: Delhi-NCR startup report 2019, TiE).
Benefits of using big data. Big data has innumerable benefits. With the invention of new
algorithms, new ways are being developed to gain new insights from the data. It helps the
marketers to under the customer needs with precision. It quantifies consumer behavior
which makes it easier to analyze. It helps the startups to predict the behavior of the customer
in advance and take decisions accordingly. Startups have used Big Data for identifying
patterns and trends in the sales, this has greatly helped them to tweak their products or
services to maximize the margins. Big Data has helped to optimize the use of resources,
which, in turn, has a good effect on the bottom line of startups.

Crowdfunding
The need for crowdfunding in the Indian startup ecosystem. As mentioned earlier India is a
country with high diversity. Therefore, few startups that address the local needs have limited
scalability. Investors tend to avoid such ideas that lack scalability. Due to increasingly intense
competition in the startup ecosystem, many ideas fail to grab investor’s attention. Sometimes
due to lack of proper communication or lack of infrastructure the funding seekers cannot
approach the investor. Crowdfunding has proved to be a feasible solution to the aforementioned
issues. A startup that is focused on local needs can raise funds from local people. Similarly, the
ideas that carry potential but fail to impress investors can certainly impress society and gain
their funds.
Current scenario of crowdfunding in the Indian startup ecosystem. Crowdfunding has
three variants:
(1) Donation Model: Financial contributions made without expectations of benefits.
(2) Lending Model: Financial contributions made with expectations of repayment.
(3) Equity Model: Financial contributions made with investors acquiring the stake.

The startup Bakey’s edible cutlery and Mixer food and beverage raised capital through a
donation model. Recently, a movie in south India was crowdfunded by the people after the
director requested the people on Facebook. Milaap and Ketto are crowdfunding platforms
that work on the donation model. The lending model is struggling to take off because it
lacks the trust factor. A strict legal framework can build the backbone of trust for the
lending model. Rang de.org is a platform that operates on a lending model. Equity-based
crowdfunding involves the transfer of securities, hence, it falls under the jurisdiction of
SEBI. Crowdfunding can rejuvenate the startup idea that has been failed to grab funding
from angel investors and venture capitalists, but it has its own disadvantages. There is a
huge communication gap between the crowdfunding platforms and the funding seekers.
Due to the advent of Jio, there has been an internet revolution in India and the platforms
have become more accessible to funding seekers. Even though the platforms are more
accessible people are reluctant to share their products with society at the nascent stage.
Counterfeiting of the product is the main reason behind the reluctance of the people. The Indian Startup
startup ideas that are associated with social factors such as environment, women safety and Ecosystem
hygiene generally are successful in raising crowdfunding because donation givers see it as
their responsibility toward society. Along with huge potential, it also possesses a danger, a
huge money laundering scheme or a Ponzi scheme can be executed by frauds. As there lack
a clear guideline and its knowledge in society it is quite difficult to build a startup using
crowdfunding. 13
Benefits of crowdfunding. The process of crowdfunding is more efficient than
conventional ways of funding due to its simple nature. It is an exceptionally good way to
gauge the trust of consumers in your idea, the ideas that receive funding from crowdfunding
pass the test of consumers’ acceptance. It serves a dual purpose, crowdfunding acts as a
fundraising activity and marketing activity due to its penetration among the masses. It
gives encouragement to the ideas that have appeal for a social or environmental cause,
which fail to get funding from investors. Risks associated with these ideas or projects are
hedged among all the contributors, this is a very important benefit because in
unprecedented events the fund seeker does not bear all the losses.

Shared economy
Need for the sharing economy in the Indian startup ecosystem. India is a developing country,
therefore, a large number of working populations is concentrated in the metro cities such as
Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru and Delhi. Increased population density gives rise to numerous space-
related issues such as unaffordable real estate rates and lack of parking space. Startups at the
nascent stage find it quite difficult to invest in office infrastructure they need space with a
professional office setup that can be shared with multiple people so that infrastructure expense is
minimized. similarly owning assets at temporary residence is a tough task for individuals while
shifting from place to place. The sharing economy has addressed all these issues and facilitated
access to them. The sharing of assets and services in a sharing economy has not only answered
all the problems but also created new sources of income.
Current scenario of shared economy in the Indian startup ecosystem. Due to the COVID-
19 pandemic, the dynamics of the sharing economy are bound to change. Social distancing
has become a necessity, therefore, vehicle sharing startups such as Ola cabs, Taxi4sure, Zoomcar
and Drivezy had to shut down their operations completely. A similar effect will be seen on
working space sharing startups such as Awfis, WeWork, Friyay and living space sharing
startups such as ZoloStay, Airbnb and Oyo. On the other hand, capital sharing startups will not
be affected by pandemic on that scale. However, the idea of shared services or shared products is
going to inevitable need of Indian market due to its advantage of high lifestyle with a low
associated cost. Therefore, once the pandemic is suppressed by vaccines and medicines, the
sharing economy will resurge again.
Benefits of a shared economy. Shared Economy has been a boon to the Indian startup
ecosystem. It has built a mutually beneficial collaboration between those who possess assets
and those who need assets. The class that is willing to share assets have enjoyed benefits in
the form of income from passive assets. The other class that is at the recipient end of shared
economy benefits because they can enjoy the perks and amenities of luxury at affordable
cost without actually owning them. Optimum utilization of available resources is the most
important benefit to the startups that operate on the principle of a sharing economy. Apart
from this shared economy also has intangible benefits like it helps companies to reduce their
carbon footprints. Efficient use of assets etc.
IJIS Conclusions and recommendations
13,1 Big data is one of the major growth drivers in the Indian startup ecosystem, the initiatives
by the Indian government are providing a boost for new ventures. Till today Indian startups
have extensively used Big data in businesses but there is still a lot of potentials to be
explored. India has a huge repository of data, which needs to be digitized and used for
enhancing customer experience. The focus should be given on developing infrastructure
14 that is compatible to use Big data. Leverage the use of technology and Big data to establish
new fields that has applications of Big data analytics, for example, Health-care Analytics.
Fraud Detection, etc. Shared Economy is undoubtedly a long-lasting trend with immense
business opportunities, but due to unprecedented pandemic events the space sharing sector
is undergoing distress. However, it will resurge once the pandemic is over. The movable
assets sharing sector of the sharing economy like e.g. Household goods sharing, furniture
sharing will not be in distress for a longer time. Along with its unmatchable benefits
crowdfunding carries many misconceptions and danger along with it. Awareness should be
created among budding entrepreneurs. Strict guidelines and regulations should be placed to
avoid misuse of crowdfunding.

Limitations
The study can have multiple limitations, some of the limitations that should be noted are,
due to the nature of the research question and limited availability of the data the research
was highly based on qualitative research methods. Indian startup ecosystem consists of
more than 50,000 startups with 1,500–2,000 startups getting added yearly and the official
data of these startups are not publicly available, therefore, the research was limited to the
sample size of top 200 startups. The startups were reluctant to share the financial impact of
these trends on their business, therefore, the study could not capture the monetary benefits
gained as an effect of the adoption of these trends.

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Corresponding author
Sagar Lotan Chaudhari can be contacted at: [email protected]

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