Unicorns meet with Piyush Goyal, plan to set up 'Startups Club of India'

In a first-of-its-kind meeting, 54 out of the 111 Unicorns of India met with Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Wednesday.

The discussion focused on the growth trajectory of the Indian startup ecosystem, the role of domestic capital in nurturing and scaling startups and India's position in the international startup landscape.

Unicorns planned to set up Startup Club of India which can jointly raise issues with the government and on other platforms to improve the startup ecosystem in the country.

Vijay Sekhar Sharma, Founder of Paytm, said, "An idea was floated by the Minister to make a club of unicorns or association of startups, which was a good idea and we will try to make a club of unicorns or association of startups. 

With the association of startups, we can also come up with many solutions, like connecting with bankers and investors to get access to capital.

"Rikant Pitti, co-founder of EaseMyTrip; Sandeep Aggarwal, founder of Droom; Vijay Sekhar Sharma, founder of Paytm; Deepinder Goyal, founder of Zomato; Aman Gupta, co-founder of BoAt; and representatives from other unicorns like Flipkart, Phonepe, Swiggy, OYO, and Zerodha were in the meeting, which lasted more than 4 hours.

After the marathon meeting, Rikant Pitti said that such meetings happen once in a while and said "We discussed domestic capital versus international capital and how to deepen the startup ecosystem in the country. 

We discussed the challenges we are facing. All the founders of Unicorns have made suggestions to the minister. 

I belong to the travel industry and recently we started a campaign 'nation first, business later', we discussed that as well.

"Sandeep Aggarwal said that the discussion was for our entrepreneurial community. "We request that the Minister smooth out the company law matters related to startups. 

The second issue was capital access; how can we increase capital access in tier 3 cities? and some tax issues were discussed broadly. The minister was very receptive to our suggestions," said Aggarwal.

These startups are not only developing innovative solutions and technologies but are also generating large-scale employment and contributing to the growth of the nation.

The unicorns are gaining significance in India's growth narrative as they are taking the Indian startup story global and attracting investors from across the globe to invest in Indian startups.

Smita Deorah, co-founder of Lead School, said, "It was very enriching that the government was open to taking our ideas or inputs. 

It also gives us a lot of hope as we build our businesses for India to build and grow.

"Sanjiv, Joint Secretary, DPIIT, said, "The purpose of this meeting was to improve the startup ecosystem of the country. Unicorn founders are great mentors."

"We got suggestions from them. With their mentorship, we want to build the number-one startup ecosystem in the world."