Sachin and Binny Bansal standing outside their first office in Bengaluru
Photo Credit: Twitter/ Sachin Bansal
Following the announcement of Walmart's acquisition of a major stake in Indian e-commerce major, Flipkart, the latter's co-founder Sachin Bansal announced the end of his ten-year-long tenure with the company.
In a Facebook post, Bansal announced that he would be taking a step back from the company to "focus on pending personal projects", and also wished Flipkart and its employees the best for its upcoming journey.
"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. 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 wrote.
On Wednesday, the American retail major Walmart announced acquiring 77 percent stake in Flipkart against an initial payment of $16 billion (over 1 lakh crores).
Reports suggested that Sachin, who owned 5.5 percent stake in Flipkart, would be selling the same at a price of approximately $1 billion upon his exit from the company.
An ex-IITian, Sachin, along with Binny Bansal, founded Flipkart in 2006, with a starting investment of around Rs. 4,00,000. The entrepreneurial duo had started off by delivering books across Bengaluru on their scooters, and later, personally delivered products to select customers in order to garner feedback on online retail, before emerging as the Indian e-commerce giants who revolutionised the online purchase medium.
However, Sachin was ousted as the company's chief executive officer in 2016.
On a related note, a new management board of the company is scheduled to be announced shortly, and will comprise independent members and those from Walmart, Flipkart and the e-commerce major's existing investors, Tencent Holdings and Tiger Global.
Meanwhile, Krish Iyer, the president and chief executive officer of Walmart India will continue to lead that part of operations.
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