How this business visionary nearly lost everything, except rose again to construct his subsequent unicorn

Life has been a rollercoaster ride for Sandeep Aggarwal, the pioneer behind two unicorns (secretly held new businesses with a valuation of over USD 1 Billion) - ShopClues, an e-commercial center, and Droom, a web-based stage for trading new and used vehicles. Droom arrived at a GMV (gross product esteem) of Rs 20,000 crore and produced an income of Rs 700 CR in the last monetary year. Subsequent to laboring for a long time in the US, for the most part as a Wall Street examiner with a portion of the top organizations, Sandeep involved his immense organization of contacts in the US to raise $1.95 Million and sent off Shopclues in 2011 from Gurgaon (later renamed as Gurugram).

Life has been a rollercoaster ride for Sandeep Aggarwal, founder of two unicorns (privately held startups with a valuation of over USD 1 Billion) - ShopClues, an e-marketplace, and Droom, an online platform for buying and selling new and pre-owned automobiles. Droom reached a GMV (gross merchandise value) of Rs 20,000 crore and generated revenue of Rs 700 CR in the last financial year. After working for 12 years in the US, mostly as a Wall Street analyst with some of the top companies, Sandeep used his vast network of contacts in the US to raise $1.95 Million and launched Shop clues in 2011 from Gurgaon (later renamed Gurugram). Sandeep was arrested by the FBI in July 2013 in the US, where he had gone for a vacation with his family.

The next few months would turn into a horrible nightmare for Sandeep, who would stay back in the US to fight the legal battle and also face the ignominy of exiting the company he founded. Sandeep shares with The Weekend Leader, his inspiring story of how he fought back, picking up the threads of life, founding another startup, and building it into a unicorn His second startup Droom was launched on 21 November 2014 from the same office where he had started Shop Clues on 21 November 2011, and it became a unicorn - the 55th unicorn in India - in April 2021. “I am the only tech entrepreneur who founded two unicorns in India,” says Sandeep proudly.

As the proud CEO of the company says, “We sell everything from a Rs 4k Firefox Bicycle to a Rs 4.5 crore Lamborghini or Rolls-Royce to a plane. “We have sold 4.3 lakh vehicles and are present in 1161 cities around the world.” Today, the company has 350 employees with offices in India and Singapore. He vividly remembers the incident that took place on 28 July 2013 when FBI agents surrounded the car that he was in San Jose, California, and produced an arrest warrant. The police took me to Contra Costa Detention Center on the outskirts of San Francisco,” says Sandeep.

Sandeep sent back Radhika to India with his two young sons, Ahaan and Arjit in order to manage Shop Clues. For the next 15 months, Sandeep used to visit the FBI office during the day in New York and monitor ShopClues-related work at night from his home. “I stepped down and made one of my friends the CEO of Shop Clues,” says the 49-year-old entrepreneur.

“I started working as a full-time consultant in the company that was my baby. Our investors didn’t want me in the company because of the FBI case. However, the judgment kept getting postponed until the next six years, and Sandeep was allowed to go back to India in August 2014. My troubles had taken a toll on them,” says Sandeep.

Born into a middle-class family as the youngest of four children, Sandeep spent his early childhood at Guhla, a village in Haryana about 105 km from Chandigarh, and later at Kalka, a small town near Chandigarh. Sandeep raised several rounds of funds - $1 Million in June 2014, $4 Million in Oct 2014, and $11 Million in May 2015 - to launch his comeback venture Droom with the support of investors who continued to repose their faith in him.

Their sons Ahaan, 19, and Arjit, 13, spend time with both their parents. Sandeep likes to spend good quality time with the boys. And I am definitely in a good place in life now,” he says.

written by: