Axis My India MD: 'Exit polls loss-making venture, will go for stock market listing after...'

Axis My India's Pradeep Gupta has said that the exit polls business is a loss-making venture and that his company will go for listing on the stock market once other businesses are successful. "Exit polls are a loss-making venture because no media house will pay as much money as that invested on the ground...the only profit that we make in exit polls is that we get visibility which we do not get while doing market research for corporate clients," he said in an interview with PTI.

Gupta, whose prediction for the Lok Sabha went wrong in some key states, said, "Besides the other investments we make on the ground...every surveyor gets Rs 500 for hitting the bull's eye (for accurate prediction) and we covered 3,605 assembly constituencies (in Lok Sabah election). There are other incentives too depending upon the accuracy of prediction."

"So, if all would have gone right, this money would have gone but its (company's) brand equity would have been high...though it seems as a loss monetarily but its profit in terms of visibility," he said, adding that his company will go for a stock market listing once its other businesses, which are currently in the pipeline, turn profitable.

Born in Waraseoni village of the Balaghat district in Madhya Pradesh, Gupta after working with the Thomson Press in Delhi moved to Mumbai in 1993 to work with an advertising agency. "I was the first to use utility bills for advertising and the idea proved to be very profitable back then," he said.

Gupta later went to the Harvard Business School and after returning to India, he began his career as a pollster in 2013. Out of 65 elections, Gupta said, he accurately predicted 60. Gupta came under fire after the opposition alleged that he deliberately predicted a clean sweep for the BJP to manipulate the stock market, which hit a record high after the exit polls were announced and crashed on the day of counting, June 4.

Axis My India, a consumer data intelligence company, is in the business of market research and surveys. According to information available on its site, the firm has a physical presence in 700-plus districts and can mobilise engagement with 250 million Indian households immediately.

Gupta founded Axis My India as a printing and publishing company in 1998. The company expanded and entered consumer research and election forecasting in 2013. As per the site, Axis My India offers services related to election forecasting, consumer research, and social impact consulting.

The Mumbai-headquartered firm has worked for some of the leading brands like Unilever, Mahindra & Mahindra, P&G, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Piramal Finance, Disney Star, and Tata Motors. It has also launched its services in the US market under the brand name Axis My America.