IndiaMART.com records 128% rise in profits over last year

8 May, 2001: IndiaMART.com- one of the first Indian portals launched during the early phases of evolution of internet in India in 1996 has recorded a 128% rise in profits and 112% growth in revenues (up from Rs 135.5 lakh to Rs 287 lakh) over the last year. The EBDIT of the of the company has gone up by 150% from Rs 13.9 lakh (audited) for the year 1999-2000 to Rs 34.7 lakh (provisional) for 2000-2001. In today’s scenario, when the dotcom bubble is supposed to have burst, the organisation not only has broken-even but also has shown profits during all five years of its operations since 1996.

Incidentally, at the same time, the Business World-Netsense dotcom profitability survey (Business World – May 14, 2001) found IndiaMART as the only profitable Indian dotcom from a cluster of 300 short-listed dotcom companies surveyed. IndiaMART was found to be the only dotcom reporting positive cash flows along with consistant profit figures amongst the 21 surviving dotcoms listed in the survey results.

“Our strategy of network expansion to reach larger SME markets and offering multiple business services and solutions thereby generating multiple revenue streams has done the trick for us. We made it a point to run our business just like any other conventional business and not to get carried away by the media hype about dotcoms or the easy availability of VCs in the market. We only held the ground strongly and kept a close eye on our costs and revenues”, informs Mr Dinesh Agarwal, CEO – IndiaMART Intermesh Limited.

The company generates its revenues through multiple sources including development of online business catalogs, B2B auctions, web-based advertising, cobranded promotion and marketing campaigns and development of e-business and e-commerce solutions for clients. Engaging 160 professionals, the company operates from its head office in Delhi and a nation-wide network of three branches (Mumbai, Chennai and Lucknow) and 24 marketing franchisees at strategic locations.

IndiaMART online B2B marketplace attracts international buyers looking for exporters, suppliers and manufacturers from India for their business needs. The marketplace generates more than one lakh B2B trade queries every month through which its member SME businesses are estimated to have conducted a business worth Rs 600 crores in the last financial year alone. Already fetching close to 6 million pageviews, representing one of the highest figures in the world in the B2B segment, IndiaMART.com offers its visitors online B2B directory with over 60,000 businesses listed under more than 450 product/service categories. Visitors to IndiaMART.com can browse through over 1200 business catalogues and can interact online with member businesses. The marketplace also offers a lot of useful business information on key Indian industries, interactive community tools and business support services to facilitate B2B trade between its visitors and member businesses.

The company recently launched its B2B auction platform auction.IndiaMART.com where member businesses can list their inventory for global buyers to bid upon. IndiaMART has also tied up with YourImporter.com – a conglomerate of large US based importers to host their import requirements on a co-branded platform quoteforum.IndiaMART.com inviting supply quotes from Indian exporters listed with IndiaMART. The marketplace plans to avail other business support services including logistics, insurance services online to participating members through tie-ups with leading companies.

IndiaMART is confident of achieving at least 2,500 online catalogues of member businesses on the portal by the end of the year, making IndiaMART.com the largest Indian B2B portal, not far behind those largest in the world. The company further plans to introduce ETO (Electronic Trade Offers) and RFQ/RFP (Request for quote/Request for proposal) services to further facilitate online B2B trade for its members.

1. Unaudited Financial Results for the year ending 31 March 2001:

2. Summary of financial results for last three years (1998-2001):
(Rs. lacs)

3. Revenue Break-up for the year 2000-2001