Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal focusing energy on nurturing startups

The lessons Binny Bansal imbibed early on as co-founder of Flipkart, which went on to become India's biggest homegrown online retail giant, are now guiding him in the second innings as an entrepreneur.

Bansal, who left Flipkart under a cloud following a #MeToo row soon after Walmart bought it for a record $16 billion deal, wants to put everything behind him and move on, media reports say.

Bansal, 37, who continued as Flipkart's group CEO under new owner Walmart and left after he was investigated for alleged personal misconduct though he still reportedly holds 4 per cent stake in the e-commerce company and a seat on the board, is focusing his energies on xto10x Technologies. He co-founded the management consultancy with former colleague Saikiran Krishnamurthy for helping entrepreneurs survive the difficult initial years.

"I'm looking forward to the next chapter of my life," the Business Standard website quoted him as saying in one of his first interviews since his Flipkart exit. "Person to person, I can help 10 startups but the ambition is to help 10,000 early and mid-stage entrepreneurs, not 10," he told the website.

Bansal says his new company will build technology tools to help startups grow and provide consulting ranging from legal and finance to communications and management mentoring.

"Today, software is built for large enterprises and not small startups," he says. "Think of it as solving for startups what Amazon Web Services has done for computing, helping enterprises go from zero to a thousand servers overnight with no hassle."

Bansal, who co-founded Flipkart with two other colleagues after a stint in Amazon, says xto10x will help entrepreneurs avoid the mistakes Flipkart made in the initial days.

An Economic Times report of December 14 said xto10x Technologies would offer technology tools, mentorship and consulting services on a self-serve model to series B and C startups looking to scale up. The Bengaluru-based venture offers a product suite that takes care of strategy and data science to execution, a learning platform with curated courseware, events and reference cases and consulting and mentoring.

"Instead of making a thousand mistakes, if we can help other startups make a hundred or even few hundred, that would be worth it," he told the website.

Bansal is an anchor investor in 021 Capital, a venture capital fund, and has financial and management interest in about 30 startups. His most recent investment has been in Crio, a software development learning platform.