SoftBank's next big crisis could be brewing in India

SoftBank's next big crisis could be brewing in India

Masayoshi Son. Photographer: Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg

In 2014, Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, the founders of Delhi-based e-commerce company Snapdeal, boarded a plane to Tokyo. Their company had just struggled through a transition from a Groupon-like discount voucher seller to a full online retail marketplace, and had nearly failed — but Bahl and Bansal had managed to turn it around. They brought in $850 million from major investors, including sovereign wealth fund Temasek Holdings, Ratan Tata, the head of Tata Group, and U.S. chipmaker Intel. EBay even approached Snapdeal with a proposal to acquire the business.

Bring stories like this into your inbox every day.

Sign up for our newsletter - The Daily Brief
Subscribe to Newsletter