What has changed for Indian unicorns from Flipkart-era to OYO-era and what’s next

The rise in the number of unicorn startups in India has roots in its nascent yet fast evolving startup ecosystem. For the emerging and developing Indian economy, having the third largest startup ecosystem (after the US and the UK) in terms of number of startups at around 7,700 (as per Nasscom last year), which has so far seen as much as 30 internet businesses hitting the hallowed $1-billion valuation mark, shows the resiliency and tenacity of Indian entrepreneurs to build large digital ventures amid regulatory and bureaucratic inefficiencies that has eased only in last few years.

The environment in other ecosystems including the US, the UK, Israel, and also China has been far more enabling than in India given their respective Ease of Doing Business rankings at 8, 9, 49, and 46 last year even as India jumped 23 ranks to 77 in the ranking. So, what has clearly changed for India to take on more developed ecosystems from the 2011-12 era when InMobi and Flipkart turned unicorn to the likes to Byju’s, OYO, Bigbasket, and Delhivery in around last two years is the government’s willingness to recognise startups as among key pillars towards job creation and innovation.