New Delhi, Sept 22 (KNN) In an era of e-commerce, people book almost everything online ranging from a movie ticket to an airplane seat, then why isn’t it possible to book a truck online? KNN gets in conversation with Ishu Bansal, the co-founder of Trucksuvidha- a leading portal for the transport industry which connects transporters, truck drivers and other related entities with one another.
 
“The logistics industry is vast with all the required resources but still the demand is not being met,” Bansal said adding, “We plan to act as the bridge between the customer and the transporter as we faced a lot of trouble while booking a truck online for our business. This was the driving force behind this venture”.
 
The idea came to the founders mind from their personal experience when had to transport some material inter-state.
 
“We realized how unorganized this sector was, which required a bit of technology & innovation to turn things around,” he pointed.
 
The problems being faced while booking a truck are - hassles a customer goes through; difficulty in coordinating with the truck driver; and potential business losses faced by transporters - all of which had a solution.
 
“We are here to provide that solution,” added Bansal.          
 
Making the people aware of how technology will make their lives better; getting the truck drivers educated about their rights; and making people accept change in an industry which has not seen use of technology since its inception were some of the prime obstacles faced by the venture.
 
“Our plan is to organize and modernize a technology crippled industry. The existing dogma needs to vanish and people need to be more aware of the things going around in the current world scenario,” the entrepreneur argued.

Trucksuvidha currently operates in 632 different locations with 2400 registered users. The start-up provides with different types of heavy commercial vehicles.
 
Talking about the existence of popular e-commerce sites in global market, the co-founder shared his opinion saying, “Amazon and Flipkart provide users with a huge range of products whereas TruckSuvidha caters to only the logistics industry by providing unique services which were not available before. We have a huge platform for e-commerce sites providing products and solutions. Logistics was the only industry lacking this advantage as the business was being done manually like old times. TruckSuvidha offers a unique platform for all the entities to connect and boost their business with a single click of a mouse.”
 
“Our plan is to overhaul the transportation industry with the influx of technology and modern practices,” he added.
 
The services of trucksuvidha were developed through a brain storming process and a year of research work. The key vulnerabilities of the sector were targeted. The exhaustive database of the enterprise provides with real time information on not only the forward journey but the return journey as well. The unique subscription model at affordable prices makes the job easier for both the transporters and customers as only relevant information are shared with the apt party to make the operation easy and swift. The main features include Load Board, Truck Board and Distance Calculator which feed into the database the requirements from a transporters and customers perspective.
 
“We classify the information and share the same to get the transaction on-going. So basically we help the key players come together to perform their business in a simple yet effective manner,”Bandal pointed.
 
 Trucksuvidha has some big clients on its troll like - Ambuja Cement, Jindal steel, Agarwal Packers and Movers, Darcl are the foremost of them.
 
As for the issue of online marketing trends rupturing the traditional offline markets, the entrepreneur holds the view that customer has endless options to choose and buy products or services.
 
Quoting the example of market scenario of Delhi, Bansal said, “The current population size in Delhi itself is 1.5 crores and vendors be it offline or online cannot cater to such a big population size.”
 
“At the end it is all about pleasing the customer. Businesses would have to come up with new innovative solutions to stay in the market whether it is online or offline,” Bansal said.
 
Coming forward to discuss the growth of SMEs in India, Bansal has the perception that current scenario provides huge opportunities for businesses to grow.  According to the entrepreneur a healthy competition is necessary to remove market dominance by a particular brand and self-growth. 
 
“In this new era technology provides never before imagined solutions at competitive process which not only reduces operational costs but provides the customer with a variety of choices. In future India will be the hub for SMEs, so why not seize the opportunity to learn and grow,” the Trucksuvidha co-founder said.
 
The start-up, currently, functions as team of 20 members with an annual turnover of 5-6 lakh rupees.
 
Trucksuvidha plans to target the entire transportation industry all over India in near future.
 
“Our plan is to increase our operations base and move to different locations all across India. We require an influx of funds as our business plans predicts an exponential growth and lots of opportunities in future” expressed Bansal during the interview.
 
As per the current scenario, with new sites emerging almost every day which provide unique solutions to customers, the co-founder is of the view that government has played a very positive role in bringing this change. The security measures have gained the customers trust of making a transaction online with sites offering 128 bit encryption and banks providing a 2 step account access process.
 
“The mind-set has changed over the last few years which in my experience is one of the biggest challenges. All this would not have been possible if the government would not have been supportive” concluded Bansal. (KNN/ J)