Zetwerk raised a total of $662.2 million in over 12 rounds of funding and in March 2023, you raised Rs 100 crore in debt funding. What are you doing differently that is working in the favour of your company?
We have been focusing on certain pillars to keep growing. These include building world-class processes and products, along with robust internal systems to meet the expectations of our customers, investors and external stakeholders, and a culture of empathy as an internal expression for the organisation at large.
What would you say makes you better than your peers?
We are very clear on the purpose of our business, which is to make an impact on people’s lives and we live by this every day. We currently employ more than 2,100 people full-time and generate employment for another 1,00,000 people indirectly through our business across India. We work with more than 10,000 supply partners to drive various manufacturing requirements. Some of our SME partners see more than a 100 per cent increase in revenues from partnering with us.
We have introduced more than 300 international customers to get their products manufactured from Indian suppliers, which counts towards 16 per cent of our revenue during FY22, all of which would have otherwise gone to neighbouring countries.
How has your sector changed over time and how has this impacted you?
Today, the manufacturing requirement is more diverse and deeper, so meeting specifics such as delivery time, minimum requirement, and certain customisation is essential. From a customer and supplier perspective, we encountered a broken supply chain system. Moreover, building the trust of suppliers to deliver outside a specific geographical area has also been a challenge.
What are your plans for 2023 and the areas of investment?
Zetwerk will bring significant demand for manufacturing to India and, in the process, make real additions to the country’s gross domestic product and growth. We will continue to invest in capacity-building, either ourselves or through partnerships, and exploit available opportunities in the industrial as well as consumer manufacturing segments.
We are also heavily investing in our in-house technical capabilities to improve efficiency in the manufacturing supply chain and meet the specific needs of our customers and suppliers to give them a more personalised experience.