Back

Since the India vs China startups issue is getting huge, let me try to clear this up. Here is a comparison between Indian and Chinese startups based on valuations. Sector: Food India: Zomato ($24B) China: Meituan ($120B) Sector: E-commerce India: Flipkart ($37.6B) China: Alibaba ($278B) Sector: Fashion India: Nykaa ($6B), Myntra ($2B*) China: Shein (~$63B) *Note: Myntra was acquired for $230M in 2014. $2B is an estimated valuation based on their FY24 ₹5122 Cr revenue. Sector: Betting India: Dream11 (~$8B) China: None (high regulation) Sector: Fintech India: Paytm ($6B) China: Ant Group ($150B) Sector: Semiconductors India: Saankhya Labs (~$30M), (no unicorn yet) China: Biren Technology ($2.2B) Sector: Space Tech India: Skyroot Aerospace ($500M) China: Landspace ($1B) Sector: AI India: Krutrim ($1B), Sarvam AI ($111M) China: SenseTime ($12B) Sector: Electric Vehicles (EV) India: Ola Electric ($3B), Ather Energy ($1B) China: NIO ($40B), BYD ($100B) Sector: Drones India: IdeaForge ($115M) China: DJI (>$15B) Sector: Social Media India: ShareChat (~$1.5B) China: ByteDance (total $315B) With this comparison, you can clearly see India not only has food or fashion startups, but also space tech, AI, and deep tech startups too. The issue is that they are currently much smaller compared to Chinese ones and will take time to grow. Also, if you wonder why I compared valuations. Ahh, that's because it's easier to find. Also revenue figures are often unavailable, and converting financial data like revenue from local currencies to USD takes a lot of time. Thus I stuck to valuation. Further, many companies like Alibaba have expanded into multiple sectors, so their valuation is cumulative across all of them. Thus, it's not ideal to compare Indian startups directly with huge Chinese ones, but we have no other option. Actually, this is exactly what even Aadit Palicha said. Consumer startups like ecom are the ones that later diversify into multiple sectors like AI and tech. Chinese companies like Alibaba and American ones like Amazon did that. Now, it's time for Indian startups like Zomato or Zepto to do the same. And that will happen once their core business becomes a cash cow. I hope this made sense. What do you think?