Pune: Digital-first multi-brand electric vehicle (EV) platform ‘BLive’ is solving the problem of awareness, access and affordability related to all EV products and post-sales services. Sandeep Mukherjee and Samarth Kholkar, the founder duo of the startup, interestingly had met in Pune a few years back and their friendship turned into an entrepreneurial partnership. What started as an EV experiential tour offering in Goa, ‘BLive’ now has over 20 brands listed on its platform and offers an omnichannel experience to its buyers – an e-commerce store and premium experience stores pan India.
The Pune connect…
Originally from Jamshedpur, Sandeep Mukherjee came to Pune for his graduate degree and MBA. In his corporate career spanning over 13 years in sales and marketing across global brands, Sandeep got exposure to electric vehicles and its positive impact on environment and mobility while he was working in Finland.
While Samarth, who is from Goa, had also been in Pune for his engineering education and later started working in a multinational technology company. In his last phase of corporate career, Samarth was into setting up cloud businesses for startups which essentially opened up his mind about entrepreneurship and doing something on his own. But before BLive, Samarth had a small stint with his friend’s startup in food and beverages industry.
“Although we had met in Pune as aspiring MBA students, our entrepreneurial journey started in early 2018. Then, EVs were not so popular, but Sandeep had seen what a mature ecosystem can be for EVs. We thought of building something which will help drive adoption of EVs. Pune and other cities are facing problem of vehicular pollution and electric vehicles are a solution to this problem. But one of the problems was people were unaware of EVs since the ecosystem was not mature,” recalled Samarth.
EV experiential tours
While brainstorming on the problem statement and its solutions, Sandeep and Samarth concluded that there are three issues that need to be addressed. According to them, these issues still persist. Says Sandeep, “People don’t know much about electric vehicles due to incomplete information (awareness), where to buy or take a demo ride (access) and financing options, insurance availability (affordability) were the three issues which we identified. So, we started with the first problem of awareness and thought about how to build a proposition to create awareness about EVs.”
Samarth said, “We created an interesting use case called ‘EV tourism’. We had observed that people don’t mind having new mobility experiences at tourist destinations. A person driving an SUV in home town, is happy with a scooter in Goa because it is a part of their experience. Similarly, nobody will travel in a bus in India but happily hop on hop off buses in London. So, we began with the EV tourism offering in Goa.”
“We thought it as a big platform to showcase our offering. Since I am from Goa, we knew the geography, etc. We used to conduct EV experiential tours on electric cycles across Goa. We did a 20-year exclusive partnership with Goa Tourism to be their EV tourism partner. People would try electric vehicles which were noiseless and smooth to ride. This increased awareness about EVs. Later, we did similar offerings in nine states and 15 locations in just two years. Till date, we have done more than 25,000 tours just on this side of the business which nobody had even thought of,” Samarth said.
“With the right process, people and everything in place, we made it scalable easily. Today you will find us as one of the top activities on trip advisors across the places. This helped us create our brand ‘BLive’ which is essentially short form of ‘Be Alive’. It basically means that you are renewing, refreshing and recharging yourself,” said Sandeep.
Learnings
In 2018, most Indians had never tried an electric vehicle. But the biggest revelation happened when they actually drove or sat on an electric vehicle. The use cases and benefits which came up were amazing. This helped BLive founders to have tremendous learnings on their product category.
Another learning, according to Sandeep, was that after the experiential tours at different tourist destinations, customers wanted to get the EVs delivered at their hometowns. “That made us think what is that one seamless platform that we can build, through which, any customer across India can be connected to an EV. Our dream of ‘an EV in every home’ began there. We thought of making a digital platform where you can see, learn and buy,” he said.
“People wanted to try out EVs but needed handholding while selecting the best suited product. Even today no genuine neutral platform is available for customers to help them choose the right product suited for their needs. Even during Covid lockdown, people were having online consultations with our EV experts. Demos were being organised and people were buying online and EVs delivered to their home directly,” said Sandeep.
Only premium
While starting the EV tours in Goa, Sandeep and Samarth ensured that the local rental taxi business and associations were not antagonised.
Says Samarth, “The unit economics is not so good, earning potential is very less in the rental business model. So, we packaged this entire thing as premium tours. For a 3-hour ride, it would cost around ₹2,000. Because of the premium tag, the crowds got filtered and operationally we could manage it way better. We haven’t lost a single bike nor has anybody damaged it. Because of the business preposition, it was not in conflict with the rental vehicle business. In fact, the rental vehicle operators bring clients to our tour start point. That is how we have managed the entire ecosystem. Besides high operational utilisation and a good clientele, we used technology to make this business model scalable.”
Accessibility
After addressing the first issue, Sandeep and Samarth went ahead to tackle the next one. It was about access to actually buy an electric vehicle and get a demo.
Samarth said, “People enjoying the experiential tours would come back to us and say the experience was good, the guide was good and the electric vehicle is also good. But where can we buy it? Essentially, we had created a target customer group willing to buy e-vehicles.”
“We created the first online marketplace for electric vehicles. This was a multi-brand platform built in 2020. It not only gave multiple choice to customers, but also offered advisory service regarding usage purpose and best suited product for each customer. Within the platform, we created a community of EV experts who would advise customers on online calls, give face-to-face demos and tell which product is best suited for them,” he said.
Experience store model
With the tourism and marketplace model for EVs, BLive had started generating a lot of attention across multiple cities in India. However, while doing so, Sandeep and Samarth had been careful about having very less ‘burn’.
Elaborating on this strategy, Sandeep said, “We always started with the proof of concept and identified the gaps. In the first year itself, we sold to customers in over 50 cities only through our online channel. It was a great recognition of the effort that we had put in and also the fact that there is an audience which is looking for something in this space. Then we started looking at it more deeply. We realised that since it was a new category, people needed experience and demo before taking any decision. That is where we conceptualised this experience store concept.”
“People got information about EVs online, they could compare different products, but for a demo they could come to the BLive experience store. Unlike dealership stores of any manufacturer, BLive experience stores offered a multi-brand, good experience coupled with interaction of EV experts, easy financing options like zero per cent EMI, Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL), exchange offers, etc all together.”
Multi-brand tie-up
Samarth said, “Our experience and connects helped us to open up a lot of doors. We went to all top brands. One of the brands agreed to display their products on our platform. We also work extensively on the B2B enterprise side with them where we sell to the fleet operators and they give us the product in the backend. One prominent EV player had not done any tie-ups with any other platforms earlier, but we did a unique use case for them. We did their test rides and pre-bookings before their store launch in Goa. We played the role of EV experts for them and that took our relationship to the next level.”
Sandeep said, “Our focus is on south and west India market. These markets are slightly better in terms of response and awareness, education, propensity to buy and adoption of EVs. We are opening stores in metro cities like Hyderabad first and then expanding in nearby small towns like Karimnagar, Varangal, Nellore, etc. Similarly, after Pune, we are expanding in Nashik, Aurangabad, Nagpur, Ratnagiri, etc.”
“We fundamentally have a marketplace model. Apart from multiple brands and service providers, we also have a tie-up with a company called SpareIt who provide post-sales services, accessories, spares, etc. They have pan-India presence and customers can buy their services on our platform. BLive has also tie-up with charging companies to locate the nearest charger, check its availability, cost of charging, etc,” he said.
Offerings
BLive primarily acts as a platform which offers all electric vehicles and EV-related services to its franchise partners and to the end customer eventually. Explaining the arrangement between manufacturers, BLive and franchise partners, Sandeep said, “We have an agreement with supplier partners to provide electric vehicles, good pricing, post-sales service and support mechanism to our franchise partner via us. The OEMs take up accountability for quality of product, timely delivery, partner training, post-sales services. Also, the franchise partners don’t have run around for any marketing, awareness or service needs.”
Future plans
“Going ahead, all last mile logistics, third party logistics, ecommerce delivery segment will contribute to almost 50 per cent of our businesses while rest 50 per cent will come from personal usage vehicles. In the experience stores too, most queries are from small businesses, restaurants, hotels chains as they are also looking at stores to buy bulk for businesses. Going forward electric 3W and 4W will also be available at BLive stores,” Sandeep and Samarth said.
“We are coming up with certain financial services also. Soon, the BLive app will be launched which will be a one-stop shop solution for EVs. Charging station deployment will also be accessible through our stores,” they said.
‘EV Tours Franchise’ coming soon
BLive is soon launching the EV Tour Franchise model. Sandeep said, “We are looking for EV enthusiasts with local city knowledge. BLive will be providing 10 electric cycles and will cover marketing, customer acquisition and booking. The franchise partner will execute it, accompany customers for the tour, maintain electric vehicles and help BLive build local experiences. The electric cycles will be on outright purchase model or on lease. Revenues will be shared with the franchise partner. The EV experiential tours will be theme-based on local culture, flavour, food, history, homes, etc. It will be an immersive experience.”
