While Nitin was seen as a ruthless leader greedy for power, his boldness and decisiveness won over Binny and Sachin as well as the board members. Few others had shown the willingness to take up the unpopular but essential assignment of shedding jobs. But after it was done, Flipkart was able to shrink its wage bill and conserve cash. Binny rewarded Nitin by expanding his role, trusting strategy, analytics and other divisions in his care.
The second task Lee had assigned Nitin was more perilous: convince Binny to bring back Kalyan Krishnamurthy. Although the Bansals had resisted Lee’s proposal to reinstate Kalyan in January 2016, he had later brought it up several times with Binny. Lee had also enlisted the services of a few Flipkart executives to persuade Binny, among whom Nitin was the most influential. It wasn’t just Lee who was agitating for Kalyan’s return. Some juniors of Nitin from IIT Delhi who were senior managers at Flipkart also spoke highly of Kalyan, urging Nitin to bring him back. An introductory meeting was arranged between Kalyan and Nitin. They had a few things in common. Both were strong-willed, high-octane, all-action men, burning with ambition. Both were in their mid-forties and had no doubt that the best part of their careers was yet to come. The meeting went well and they stayed in touch regularly thereafter.
Until early June, Binny kept vetoing Kalyan’s return. Whenever Nitin or Lee or anyone else raised the topic, he would insist that they didn’t need Kalyan. Binny had many misgivings about him. Kalyan might be able to improve sales but the company’s culture would suffer, he said. ‘It’s always my way or the highway for Kalyan.’2 Binny also did not approve of Kalyan’s reliance on discounts to raise sales in many categories. ‘It’s too short-term,’ he pointed out. What would they do when money ran out?
Eventually, Binny’s resistance proved futile. One of the reasons was that Binny’s relationship with the Flipkart investors had altered. Until the end of 2015, Lee had had tremendous faith in Sachin and Binny. But the failure of Sachin’s attempted transformation of Flipkart had shaken him up. He mainly held Sachin responsible for the disaster. But it was true that Binny, too, had been an integral part of that project. Though not as weakened as Sachin’s, Binny’s standing with Lee had diminished as well.
Finally, in early June, Lee prevailed over him. Flipkart’s sales were still stagnant. There was a strong likelihood that Amazon could overtake the company at any moment. Binny reluctantly agreed to bring back Kalyan on one condition: Kalyan would be kept on a leash, his role limited and temporary. Around mid-June, Flipkart reappointed Kalyan in a strangely titled role, Head – Category Design Management.
In truth, Kalyan’s title was a subterfuge. It was inevitable that he would have complete control of Flipkart’s sales and marketing functions. His immediate mandate was unambiguous: revive sales growth and prevent Amazon from dislodging Flipkart.
It was a tough ask. Amazon had built up serious momentum and was within touching distance of Flipkart. The gap between the two companies was less than $100 million in monthly gross sales. With each passing month, Amazon was closing in. This was a staggering achievement given that it had started out in India just three years ago. Of course, unlike Flipkart, Amazon wasn’t constrained by the task of having to raise capital. Still, its ascent had been remarkably swift. In April 2016, Jeff Bezos had promoted Amit Agarwal, the Amazon India head, to his ‘S-Team’. This team comprised the seniormost leaders at Amazon globally under Bezos. Amit, who had a love of mountaineering, savoured the moment – at the age of forty-one, he had risen to Amazon’s summit. In an email to employees, Bezos said, ‘Amit and our India team are doing remarkable things. Amit and his experience in India will be a key resource for all of us on S-team as we work to figure out what it is to be a true global company.’3 By promoting Amit, Bezos had displayed his great satisfaction with the performance of the India business.
A few weeks later, he went for the kill.
In early June, around the same time that Kalyan was preparing to return to Flipkart, Bezos announced that Amazon would invest an additional $3 billion in India, having nearly exhausted its earlier investment pledge of $2 billion. He made the announcement in Washington, D.C. at the US India Business Council’s global leadership awards ceremony, where he was feted by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He spent nearly half an hour in conversation with Modi. Bezos gushed about the ‘huge potential’ of the Indian economy and mentioned that the Amazon India team was ‘surpassing even our most ambitious milestones’.4
One year later, Bezos again met Modi at an industry event in the US state capital. At this conference, he found another well-known CEO courting the Indian PM: Doug McMillon, head of Walmart, the world’s largest retailer.
IN HIS FIRST stint at Flipkart, Kalyan, as Lee Fixel’s man on the ground, had initially been feared. Very soon, however, his straight talk and deep knowledge of e-commerce had won over colleagues. Unusually for a Tamil Brahmin, Kalyan preferred to speak in Hindi, in which he was fluent. He was blunt, unrelenting, like a robot, with little time for anything apart from work.
This time round, Kalyan was in no mood for niceties.
As he was walking into the office on his first day back at Flipkart, Kalyan was greeted by a division manager who was sipping
