cemX: While every budding entrepreneur was dreaming of creating another e-commerce giant like Flipkart and Amazon; Ashutosh and Sourav had already decided to become game-changer in the Indian cement industry by creating an online platform for it.
Opportunity in a time of crisis
It all started in 2019 when Ashutosh returned to India after completing a program of Entrepreneurship in Boston, US. Upon his return, he was briefed by his father about the issues which were going in Building-material industry then. Ashutosh immediately recognized the opportunity in a time of crisis. He knew the industry needed something which could work as a catalyst in its growth.
cemX, is a B2B and B2C online procurement marketplace for cement. It is an aggregator platform that facilitates a direct supply channel between the large dealerships of cement and the end consumers. Its B2B customers are real estate companies, builders and small retailers whereas individual consumers fall into its B2C customer category.
Ashutosh meets Sourav (Co-founder of cemX)
While the beta-prototype testing of the idea was going on, Ashutosh met Sourav, his senior from grad school in Kolkata with whom he shared his idea. At that time Sourav was already an alumnus of Boston University, United States of America, and was doing Masters in Business Management from Imperial College London. Sourav didn’t take time to realize the immense potential in this promising business idea of bringing the sale of cement online in the India’s digital transformation era and hence began brainstorming various business strategies to accelerate its performance and growth. Sourav’s aptitude and learning perfectly resonated with Ashutosh’s vision, and hence they collaborated and became Co-founders of cemX by registering cemX in Bihar in May 2019.
cemX: Break with tradition
Through cemX, Ashutosh and Sourav envisioned to transform the entire orthodox cement industry into a digital domain to democratize the price arbitrage for cement purchases below the regional dealerships. cemX breaks the barriers of geographic segregation and demographics by disrupting the human-middlemen supply chain.
“The present offline supply chain for various materials is unorganized, fragmented and orthodox. Hence, by taking acquisition process of cement online into the Digital domain, we aim to achieve uniformity and transparency in cement pricing thereby removing any arbitrage for offering economies of scale on cement pricing. Purchasing cement online at the right price is helping companies, individuals, and retailers to avoid cost over-runs to a very large extent. Unlike major Investor backed e-commerce companies who are offering an entire building-materials supply gamut, we are consciously and intentionally product-specific and geographically focused company as we understand cement is the most widely used material in building the modern infrastructure anywhere in the world.” said co-founders, cemX.
With almost zero investment, offline extension stores are geographically established to allow for cross-retailing and cross-marketing with other existing brick-and-mortar building material stores. It ensures both hassle and bargain free cement deals with reliable and faster delivery at the best rates. They carefully position themselves as “Digital intermediaries” in the age-old human supply chain for the procurement of cement through an e-commerce model that eradicates any physical and geographical jurisdictions for the supply.
(Edited by Team Startup Anecdotes)
