Sachin Bansal's Billion brand merged with private labels of Flipkart

Flipkart has rolled Billion, a brand established by its former chief executive Sachin Bansal, into its private label business. The move comes mere weeks after the Flipkart co-founder left the Indian e-commerce company following strong disagreement with the board over terms of acquisition deal with Walmart Inc. in April.

Sachin Bansal formed Billion as a private label dealing in electronics, appliances and accessories after he was forced to give up the post of CEO in 2016. He meant it to be an affordable brand fashioned with Indian customers specifically in mind. Before his exit, Bansal was running Billion as a standalone brand separate from Flipkart's private businesses.

Now that the brand has been merged with Flipkart's private label business, it is part of a portfolio of eight brands which are being managed by Adarsh Menon, vice president of private labels in Flipkart. The 50-member team of Billion will work in conjunction with the private labels team of the e-tailer, while Sachin Bansal remains at its helm.

"The space that Billion has very successfully created and occupied for Indian consumers is the space of Make in India and Made in India. And that's an extremely rich asset that the brand has. That can enable it to travel across multiple categories, which speaks volumes about how strong the brand is. What Billion will continue to do is identifying very India-specific customer requirements, and then working with our ecosystem partners to deliver that to Indian consumers," Menon was quoted by Livemint, promising that the idea behind Billion as conceptualised by Sachin Bansal will be kept intact.

Major e-commerce players favour private labels as critical assets as they offer better margins than third-party brands. Billion and other private brands under Flipkart too were launched with the motive of achieving better sales via private brands.

Sachin Bansal, who co-founded Flipkart with Binny Bansal in a 2BHK flat in Bengaluru, bid adieu to the company in May earlier this year after the US-based retail behemoth acquired it. He had demanded stronger shareholder rights and better role in the operations of the resultant entity, which was opposed by Lee Fixel of Tiger Global Management, one of the major backers of Flipkart, and the company's board. Following this, Sachin had to sell his entire stake in Flipkart, sign a non-compete clause with the company and bow out of the company he founded.