A lot of promise on the Indian e-commerce front! Consumers shopping online is growing exponentially, mobile driven commerce is accelerating.  The Snapdeals and Flipkarts are becoming household names. But what is forgotten in this e-tailing revolution are the unsung heroes - the ecommerce enablers - most importantly logistics and supply chain/inventory management.


Lets runs through the process - Assume a consumer clicks the buy button on an ecommerce site and chooses Cash on Delivery which continues to be a predominant payment method in India  and chooses one day delivery.


How does the ecommerce vendor manage its orders? How does the vendor manage the warehouse? How does a vendor manage suppliers and get inventory in a timely fashion to be shipped to the consumer? If a customer pays cash, how fast and securely does the cash reach the ecommerce vendor?  This is where the ecommerce logistics companies like Delhivery and inventory/order management software companies like Unicommerce come into play.  The less talked about heroes that help enable the trade to happen or in other words they are the "commerce" in e-commerce!


India will see a huge revolution in the e-commerce infrastructure space over the next decade just like the tower companies and other mobile telephony equipment companies powered the infrastructure revolution in the wireless telecom space.  Unlike in other developed economies where some of the basic infrastructure around logistics and retail technology was already in existence and e-commerce players focused solely on building out the front end by plugging into this infrastructure effortlessly, India is seeing the ecommerce players and the infrastructure players growing up simultaneously and adapting to each others needs as they grow and form a robust ecosystem.

I have been amazed at the buzz that has been generated around these Health tracking devices. I see a lot of people wearing bands of different colors. And now there seem to be companies that are offering coaches alongside the devices.


Really?  What was lacking in our lives was a measurement device that measured how much we walked, how we slept and once we had that data, we would  be able to fix our lives? Is that the real problem that we had no data available real time? Or that we didn't have anyone pinging us and telling us that we did not meet our fitness objectives for the day?


I don't think so. I think the real problem lies in the innate human motivation for anything we do.  A device can remind you but it is a temporary fix.  After a few months, if there is no motivation to continue with an exercise regimen, no device in the world can help. And if there is motivation to continue on a health track, a device stuck to your body all day is really of little value.


Lack of sleep at night is often tied to stress levels and other ailments which a device cannot help with. And the symptoms resulting from a lack of sleep is often visible the next day be it fatigue, irritability, etc. And even if the symptoms are not visible and there is data to show unhealthy sleep, the problem lies in the drivers of the sleep which are not easily fixable and are often deep routed which can take serious behavior and mindset change to make a positive difference over a long period of time.


So just like our New Year's Resolution to Lose Weight and subsequently signing up for a Gym Membership,  I believe the purchase of these health tracking devices is impulsive and not fully thought through.   While this  fitness oriented wearable devices do get sales just like a lot of Gyms get memberships post New Years, there are other social motivations/influencers of a physical Gym that allow for sustaining a membership at a Gym even though the activity levels at the Gym have dropped.  These don't exist for a fitness tracking device. So I don't see users continuously upgrading or renewing their fitness devices like they do Gym memberships or their Ipods/Iphones.  I believe that there is a segment of wearable devices that is very valuable such as those that help with monitoring statistics for chronic diseases, etc which enable timely care.  I don't believe devices that try and influence human motivation are scalable or sustainable.  But devices that help with critical information that can be acted upon without deep mindset shifts can work.


I think these fitness device companies will continue to attract sales as there a lot of headroom for first time users that may buy the device in the hope that it will change their fitness behavior. In the interim, if these companies figure out a way to keep these users by introducing hooks that are beyond basic fitness, this industry could thrive. Otherwise, I forsee challenges.  Not to take away from the super talent and all the hard work put in by the management and employees at all these firms.  And the investor money gone in to help create these companies.


What next, shall we have devices for kids to remind them to do their homework on time?