Walmart-Flipkart deal a ‘perfect’ answer to those dismissive of Indian startups: Paytm’s Vijay Shekhar Sharma

Walmart Flipkart deal: After the world’s largest retailer Walmart picked up a 77% stake in homegrown giant Flipkart, online czar Vijay Shekhar Sharma of Paytm called it a perfect answer to those who were dismissive of Indian start-ups. Commenting on the humoungous valuation garnered by Flipkart in the deal, Vijay Shekhar Sharma tweeted, “This is 1 Lakh crore+, all cash deal ! vI call it, perfect answer to those who were dismissive of Indian startups in an open-for-all market. What an incredible outcome for every believer of Flipkart.” In another tweet, he also lauded the efforts of co-founders Sachin and Binny Bansal and congratulated them for their audacious achievements.

Notably, the landmark deal which saw world’s largest retailer Walmart buying out the firm for $16 billion, or about Rs 1,07,000 crore, is way above the valuations of any Indian major retailer, including D-Mart. D-Mart currently commands a market capitalisation of Rs 91,500 crore. Notably, his own venture Paytm has grown by leaps and bounds in the last few years and commands a valuation of about $10 billion.

Apart from Vijay Shekhar Sharma, reknowned venture capitalist Vani Kola termed the deal as a landmark moment. “Every business conversation today to the books of decades later, Walmart`s acquisition of Flipkart for $20B will find a special mention.

It puts India’s Flipkart right next to tech behemoth WhatsApp, which was acquired by Facebook for $22 billion in 2014,” Kalaari’s Vani Kola wrote in a Linkedin post. “Flipkart truly upheld audacity and customer centricity and I got to work with the best people. We took on some of the biggest challenges and solved many complex problems for india,” Sachin Bansal, who will exit hi 5.5% stake in the company said in a Facebook post yesterday.

After completing a decade long stint in the organisation, Sachin Bansal said that it’s time to move on. “Sadly my work here is done and after 10 years, it’s time to hand over the baton and move on from Flipkart. But I’ll be watching and cheering from the outside — Flipsters, you better continue to do a good job!” he said.

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