For years, India’s online-first brands relied heavily on marketplaces to simplify logistics, payments, and even basic brand discovery. But the convenience came at a cost: high commissions, limited customer visibility and almost no access to first-party data. As founders realised they needed a deeper understanding and more control over margins, the direct-to-customer (D2C) model began to surge—without completely abandoning marketplaces.
Today, retailers run their own storefronts, manage shipping, handle payments, and oversee marketing and customer support. But the next battle for D2C growth is no longer simply about selling online, it’s about insight. Brands need usable customer data, AI-driven intelligence and tools that don’t force founders to become AI experts overnight.
Himanshu Adlakha, founder of Winston Electronics, sums up the challenge simply: “If I have to sit down and understand AI, should I understand AI or should I run the business?”
Notably, the answer lies with aggregators like Shiprocket, which are building AI-led platforms that preserve a brand’s independence while giving them enterprise-grade technology.
The D2C Surge: Why Data is Now The Differentiator
According to Shiprocket and KPMG’s report, the D2C market reached $80 billion in 2024 and will hit $100 billion by 2025. Shiprocket’s CEO, Saahil Goel, had stated that D2C now accounts for 15% of India’s e-commerce, up from just 2-3% five years ago—a dramatic shift driven by consumer behaviour and the rise of omnichannel commerce.
A major catalyst in that has been the way Indians now shop: 77% use both online and offline channels interchangeably, and brands offering integrated experiences see 89% retention, compared to 33% for those operating in silos.
This highlights D2C’s need to own the full customer journey—from the first click to the last post-purchase service—and is a necessity for retention and growth. Adlakha puts it straight: “Startups want good data sets before going out anywhere.” Platforms that enable this, without interfering with customer relationships, are gaining traction rapidly.
Shiprocket’s Modular, AI-First Stack
Behind Shiprocket’s pitch to founders is its modular architecture. Praful Poddar, chief product officer, in an exclusive discussion with AIM, described Shiprocket’s system as “rails built on top of Lego blocks.”
Shiprocket provides the foundational rails, but brands choose only the modules they need—from logistics and payments to customer retention and omnichannel tools. The platform is deliberately configurable, built for MSMEs that require flexibility without engineering resources.
Aditya Poddar, CEO and founder of Fitfeast.in, which generates 70% of its revenue through its own website, says Shiprocket’s data tools have been crucial. The startup relies heavily on Engage, a WhatsApp-centric customer communication and service tool, and Shiprocket’s early cash-on-delivery remittance feature. With a Gen Z and millennial-heavy audience, Fitfeast uses Engage for rapid, frictionless conversations and order verification.
Adlakha also cites how Winston Electronics repurposed Engage for address verification and order confirmations—an example of the system’s adaptable nature.
He also explains why Shiprocket opts for its checkout option over online shopping platform Shopify’s native option. Customers, who were once required to write their names and email ID, now only need to enter their mobile number. It has an OTP-based login, allowing returning customers to see pre-filled addresses. Moreover, brands can tweak coupon rules, pin codes and page behaviour. The result is a faster, familiar mobile-first flow—deeply suited to the Indian consumer.
Shiprocket’s chief technology officer, Sunil Kumar, believes the only difference between MSMEs and large enterprises is access. One example is Shiprocket Radar, a tool that tracks supply stress across geographies. Large enterprises have traditionally used similar intelligence internally for optimisation. Kumar compared this to Uber’s H3 geospatial indexing system—once a proprietary optimisation tool that was later open-sourced.
Inside Shiprocket’s AI-First Infrastructure
Shiprocket’s evolution into a D2C infrastructure company is driven by its AI-first backbone. Beyond tools, it’s building automated systems for logistics, cataloguing, payments, fraud detection and customer experience.
At the centre is Shunya.ai, a multimodal (handling voice, text and image) platform trained on Indian commerce data. It supports over nine Indian languages, and enables multilingual catalogue creation, creative generation and customer communication. This saves up to 30-40% of content creation time—critical for MSMEs operating in small teams.
Praful envisions voice AI at three different levels. The company, he revealed, is trying to figure out ultra-low-cost voice solutions for MSMEs; India-first voice AI that’s tuned for accents and dialects; and end-to-end voice-led workflows to train warehouse staff, assist customers, and power empathetic service interactions.
While high-quality voice remains expensive, Shiprocket’s ambition is to democratise it at scale.
AI influences real-time decisions across fulfilment: CORE (courier recommendation engine) chooses the best delivery partner using predictive models, and warehouses become intelligent fulfilment hubs. India’s warehouse automation market is projected to reach $2 billion annually by 2026, putting it among the top six globally. Modern fulfilment centres are hitting 99.9% order accuracy.
AI for Risk, Payments and Fraud Control
With UPI controlling 84% of digital volumes, Shiprocket’s AI layers perform address checks, fraud detection, COD risk scoring and real-time payment monitoring. Reducing “bad orders” is crucial for MSMEs operating on thin margins.
Even customer support is being reshaped through AI agents. Over 80% of Indian consumers already use AI chatbots for service. Organisations expect a 17% boost in customer satisfaction through AI-led support. Kumar says the thin line between chatbot and agent is dissolving: “This is the real manifestation of any agent working out—whether you call it a chatbot or a voicebot.”
Shiprocket integrates directly with Google and Meta—Google Ads/Analytics and Meta Pixel/Conversion API. Automated date transfer for purchase events and cart data gives brands precise return on ad spend (ROAS) measurement and campaign optimisation—a capability earlier restricted to tech-savvy enterprises.
How Will D2C Evolve?
There are now multiple layers vying to capture the D2C enablement layer and founders must balance tech adoption with business fundamentals. Adlakha emphasises that founders cannot and should not try to become AI experts. The future lies in AI embedded into software, not implemented manually on every D2C site.
Praful outlines three principles for building enduring D2C brands: stay close to the customer and build for first principles, avoid tech hype and focus on practical tools that solve real problems and double down on unit economics. He describes Shiprocket’s role as enablers, not partners trying to own the customer. “We rely on MSMEs to do business. We try to play a small part as they grow. It means respect for what they’ve built and the hustle they bring.”
Race to IPO and Competitive Landscape
Founded in 2012 as a shipping aggregator, Shiprocket has steadily expanded through acquisitions including Pikkr, Wizgo, Oumni, Glaucus and Rocketbox. According to The Economic Times, the company received Security and Exchange Board of India’s (SEBI) approval on November 3 for a ₹2,400 crore IPO. Shiprocket opted for a confidential route to file its Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP).
In FY25, Shiprocket reported a 24% year-on-year (YoY) increase in revenue to ₹1,632 crore for the fiscal year ending in March, and reduced its net loss to ₹74 crore. This came after the company’s net loss widened significantly by 74.4% in FY24, reaching ₹595 crore. During the same period, its operating revenue increased by 20.8% to ₹1,316 crore.
Meanwhile, The Arc noted that 80% of Shiprocket’s revenue still came from third-party logistics aggregation and newer business lines are scaling. An ET report from October 30 stated that in FY25, revenue from Shiprocket’s core business rose over 20% YoY to ₹1,306 crore, and its emerging business segment grew 41% YoY, driven by growth in cross-border, martech and omnichannel offerings.
Competition is revving up as well. Rival Unicommerce posted an operating revenue of ₹135 crore in FY25. In March 2025, it acquired e-commerce platform Shipway to add solutions for courier aggregation, shipping automation and returns, making it an integrated logistics provider rather than a pure-play SaaS company.
But Shiprocket dwarfs Unicommerce in scale: GMV of $3 billion (~₹25,000 crore) in FY24; over four lakh merchants, including 1.8 lakh active ones; and 200 million shipments annually. Unicommerce processed 20 million quick-commerce items in FY25 via Uniware, but total GMV remains undisclosed.
Shiprocket’s broader stack, scale and AI-first strategy position it strongly for an IPO year.
The Bigger Picture: AI Key to India’s D2C Future
India’s D2C ecosystem is maturing quickly, driven by consumer expectations, omnichannel behaviour and the need for brands to own their data. Yet, most founders lack the time or expertise to build proprietary AI capabilities.
This is where Shiprocket is placing its bets—on AI-enabled, modular rails that give MSMEs enterprise-grade power without heavy engineering.
If India’s next D2C brands emerge in the next few years, they will likely be built not on the marketplace alone, but on platforms that combine logistics, intelligence, customer experience and automation.
Shiprocket wants to be that operating system.
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