E-commerce &

Operations
Casebook
What new feature will you add to MS Excel?

Solution:
Clarification: MS Excel Spreadsheet but not standalone software
Product: MS Excel latest version
Some prominent features: Database maintenance, Arithmetic, Logical Operations, Sharing etc.
Customers: Students, Corporate Workers
Needs:
Students: Research data maintenance and manipulation, maintain resources, Visualize Data,
Prepare reports, Analysis of Data etc.
Corporate Workers: Intensive research data, data from various sources, big data, live data,
continuous analytical insights, process flows etc.
Solution: (C: Cost, I: Implementation effort) (H: High, M: Medium, L: Low)
1. Prepare reports: Option to integrate doc to excel (C:M, I:H), Report Templates (C: L, I: L)
2. Data from various sources: Suggestion from google sources directly from excel (C:M, I:M),
Option to scrape & Integrate data (C:M, I:H)
3. Live Data: Update data as per updates of source data (C:M, I:M)
4. Continuous Analytical Insights: Dashboard Templates (C: L, I:M), Option to integrate high
end algorithms (ML) (C:M) I:H), Standard models’ availability (C:H, I:H)
Prioritization: 1a, 4a, 2a, 3a
Plan: Roll out in phases to selected consumers for specific period, collect feedback, analyze and
improve

Summarize
You are a new player in E-commerce market in a competitive market. A customer
is requesting for return after return expiration date. What would you do?

Solution:
Clarification: Return date expiration means it has passed the date till which the product can be
returned, plan of action has to short term impact and a long-term strategy for such cases
Company: Independent electronics retailer (TV, Fridge, Washing Machine, AC), Operates in
northern region, warehouses in Chandigarh, Delhi, Bihar, distribute directly from there, Own
logistics channel, decent margins, annual turnover of 10-12 cr, Return Policy: 30-day return / No
Question asked policy, Refund after due diligence on site

Market: Few big players, quite saturated market, Aggressive Marketing strategies, Return Policy:
30-day return / No Question asked policy, Refund after due diligence on site
Customer: Bought AC, Loyal customer, buy items of high range, from Delhi and ordered for Delhi
Reason: Nothing mentioned in request (as no Q&A), # of days past expiration date: 1 week, when
enquired about delay in request: The customer was out of city towards the end of the expiration
date
Decision: We will take return
In next visit (delivery of any other order) in the nearby area since it’s in Delhi and our warehouse is
in Delhi and hence quite minimal cost
Since he is a loyal customer and we can’t afford to lose such customer (saturated market)

Future Policy: Return policy to be displayed / communicated boldly, 1 check with the customer on
the status of the purchase b/w period of 30 days

Summarize
Flipkart is facing issues in delivery of bulky items to customers. How can it be
minimized?

Solution:
Clarification: Bulky items: FMCD: AC, Refrigerator, TV

Delivery steps: In fulfilment center--- packaged after the product is received if it has to-Check pin
code-----Sent to nearest warehouse----Assigned to delivery personnel--- Delivered

Delivery Issues: (Have to consider all)

1) Late delivery: Incorrect route taken, natural calamity
2) Early delivery: Received early
3) Incorrect items / wrong order: Mismatch while packaging, Incorrect routing of orders
4) Missing supplementary part: Packaging fault, misses during delivery
5) Issues with installation services: Service agent did not arrive, Incompetent service agent
6) Damaged item: Damaged item packaged, damaged during forwarding & carrying,
damaged during journey

Possible Plan of action:

1. Late delivery: Reassess our route optimization system if there is any & suggest to bring
one if there is not, develop a Business Continuity Plan to handle situations of natural
calamity
2. Early delivery: Hold back in warehouse setup till the date of delivery or enquire with the
customer for early delivery
3. Incorrect items / wrong order: Reassessing systems which assemble parts of the orders,
cross-checking system should be in place before packaging
4. Missing supplementary part: Define a standard check procedure for checking before
packaging, checklist to delivery person if there are separate parts in the order
5. Issues with installation services: Can be same issues as late delivery and thus same
solutions, schedule next available service agent, service agents should be trained in house
and equipped with latest tools
6. Damaged item: Standard checking procedure, cross-checking for any such damage before
delivery and then send back if required and intimate the same to customer and provide
option to reschedule

Summarize
 Make life easier for working women.

Solution:
Clarification: Technical Solution, working women- corporate working women in a tier 1 city, Short
term as well as Long term solution

Customer:
New in to the corporate lady -- living independently in rented house
Middle aged in the corporate world from long-- Own house with family

Pain points:
• ‘New in to the corporate’ persona: Hectic Schedule, Work life balance, looks for activities
in weekends, looks for short notice home trip or trips in general, look for
academy/institutes where she can pursue hobby/interest, Rent, Grocery, Maid and other
maintenance stuff etc.
• ‘Middle aged’ in the corporate world from long: Hectic Schedule, Work life balance, looks
for activities in weekends with family, looks for short notice home trip or trips in general
with family, Rent, Grocery, Maid and other maintenance stuff, Children’s school schedule,
activity maintenance, Regular Cab issue if not a car owner

Solutions: (C: Cost, I: Implementation effort) (H: High, M: Medium, L: Low)

A one stop solution app for the major pain points highlighted.
• Looks for activities in weekends (customizing option): Info about movies from various
theatres and option to sort as per the location, Info about exciting offers in nearby sports
bar, activity (theatrics, outdoor sports center) etc. (C:M, I:M)
• Look for academy/institutes where she can pursue hobby/interest: Collaborate with few
specialists in the field of Arts, Music, Sports who have their centers of learning to come to
our platform to provide their offerings (C:H, I:H)
• Rent, Grocery, Maid: A feature to provide schedule and expense management of these
activities which can automatically notify about the possible actions (C: L, I:M)
• Children’s school schedule, activity:
Prioritization: 3 1 2

Plan:

• For the third feature we would require to develop standard module and follow standard
development process
• For the first we’ll have to begin by looking for the most feasible city and then begin our
search for such partners for collaboration then develop a module for onboarding and then
standard development for the feature.

Summarize
The rejects of the orders are increasing in your e-commerce website, find out
why.

Solution:

Basic information about the case:

• Firm: Amazon
• Operations: India
• Increase in the rejects of the order from FY-2017 onwards
• Returns are happening across all categories
• Website as well as mobile app order are getting rejected
• Orders are getting rejected from all over India
• No increase in the price/unit for the order in past 2 year
• No increase in the transaction cost as well as delivery charge
• Competition still remains the same for the industry
• Company specific issue (Not industry wide)

As orders are getting rejected, so it will happen after the order is getting placed.
Possible solution 1:
The time of the delivery of the product is changing. The firm is delivering order a bit late and
not on the promised date leading the customers to return the product.

Possible solution 2:
The time of the delivery of the product remains the same as it was mentioned. This means that
the rejects are not because of the UI or the product description.

The rejects were belonging to a particular type of payment method where the mode of
payment was Cash on Delivery and people were lacking cash due to demonetization.

Summarize
A lot of cabs are getting cancelled in Delhi. What could be the possible reason
for this?

Solution:
• Cab Aggregator: Uber
• Area of cancellations: Delhi
• New Competition: No
• Market Share: 30%
• No increase in price in recent time
• No of Cab in service remains the same for the firm
• Company Specific issue (Not industry wide)
• Cab booking application is same (No change in the UI)

Possible solution 1:
Time taken by the cab to reach the customer is increased leading the customer to cancel the
orders. The reason for the same is higher number of drivers shifting to shared cabs which leads
to lower number of cabs for personal cabs.

Possible solution 2:
The competitors have stopped using the surged pricing while our firm is still continuing the
surge pricing leading to a higher price for customer which leads to cancellation of the orders.

Summarize
What should Amazon do if a faulty order is being delivered to a customer?

Solution:
This question involves a lot of subjectivity based on the situation. Let’s assume:
• Client is calling for the first time after receiving the product
• Call is regarding the faulty appliance which is not working
• Order is received by the customer an hour back

Now, as the customer is facing the issue, the first priority should be the customer satisfaction
and try to fulfill what customer wants.
If the need is too urgent, you can show customer obsession by providing alternatives to get
the job and by taking care of the bills.

Case 1: Let’s assume that he wants the product to replace with new one. In this situation, first
assure the customer about the things he wants and do the needful to get it done ASAP.
Next should be investigate why this happened, if there is any trend in past, issue occurring for
first time or has happened in past.
Take this back if the issue is occurring on a regular basis to find the possible brand or seller at
fault if possible and rectify the issue.

Case2: If customer is interested in getting the money returned, try to convince him but if not
possible, assure him about fulfillment of his request.

Summarize
Swiggy has decided to enter the table reservation category in restaurants.
How will it go about it?

Clarification: Who are the stakeholders?

The restaurant and customers booking on the app.
Are they similar to Zomato? Yes.
Objective: Create mobile app/website

Customer Persona:
Family (of say 4, husband + wife + 2 kids), couples and corporate meetings
Issues faced by customers (in the order of the journey):
1. Customers do not know which restaurant offers a good dining experience for a
particular cuisine/budget.
2. Restaurants may not have parking space or valet parking at the location.
3. Customers are not aware of the average waiting time at restaurants, and do not
prefer waiting.
4. When the restaurant is overcrowded, customers don’t like the dining experience.
5. Customers may want a particular table at the restaurant.
6. Customers who are choosy will not know the availability of a particular dish in the
restaurant.
7. For people with strict timelines (working professionals and client meetings), they
may not be able to have a dish of their choice prepared given the time constraint.
Issues faced by restaurants (in the order of the journey):
1. Restaurants have vacant tables if customers are not aware of the restaurant.
2. If the restaurant is overcrowded and they are not able to accommodate customers,
they lose their customers – those who have been waiting too long and those who did
not get a good dining experience.
3. When a restaurant is overcrowded and customers are told to wait or come later, the
restaurant cannot predict the occupancy time since ordering food is a spur of the
moment activity.
4. If the restaurant reserves a table for a regular customer, then that table has to be
kept vacant. The restaurant loses a prospective customer who cannot utilize the
table though it is unoccupied.

Possible plan of action:

1. Supply details - Swiggy has to get the table availability and parking vacancy details in
restaurants. Restaurants will have to digitize the process (follow up question – Who
will bear the cost of digitizing restaurant table occupancy?)
 2. Since predicting the estimated occupancy time is difficult for customers ordering on
impulse, the restaurant should try to increase pre-booking dishes as far as possible.
They can do this by incentivizing customers who pre-book orders.
3. Pre-booking orders can also help the restaurant personalize orders for
choosy customers – less oil, sugar, etc.
4. If orders are pre-booked, customers who have a strict timeline will be able to
finish dining within the timeline since food is already prepared.
5. Follow-up question: What happens to the dish if it is already prepared and
the customer is late?
6. Creating a matching algorithm for demand and supply. Also suggest features to
filter restaurant matches for customers such as location, cuisine, budget, parking
space, etc.
7. Matching algorithm will also take into account estimated travel time of
customer and waiting time of tables.
8. Follow-up question: How will Swiggy integrate maps into the app to keep track of
the customer’s location?
9. Also suggest alternative restaurants for the customer – if he is on his way and
a similar restaurant has a vacant table, he can choose that restaurant instead.
10. Follow-up question: If the customer has booked a table for a particular time, and
is late, what happens? Should it continue to be blocked at the cost of losing
another customer? If so, how is the lost revenue compensated? If not, what
happens to the customer who arrives late (say, due to traffic) but has no table to
sit?

Also come up with a wireframe design of the application (web/mobile app) and a
revenue model.

Summarize
Uber has decided to launch its cab aggregating service in a Tier 2 city.
Come up with a launch strategy for the same.

Clarification:
Objective: Profit Maximization or market capture
Other competitors in the city
Other means of transport
Population, average income, willingness to spend
Industrial/residential landscape
Is there a specific category preference – cabs (Go,
premium, share), bikes, auto?

Customer Persona:
Lower class – 25%
Middle class – 50% (Car Owners – 40%, don’t own cars – 60%)
Upper class – 25% (self-driven and chauffer driven)

Issues faced by middle-class customers:

Car-owners
1. Excessive traffic
2. Parking issues
3. People who drink
4. Car maintenance, fuel cost
Do not own cars
1. They do not own cars to commute as per their convenience
2. Public transport is:
a. Crowded
b. Slow, infrequent and therefore inefficient
3. Safety issues
4. Families travelling on a trip, need privacy

Launch Strategy
If the city is an industrial hub or tourist hotspot, Share is a good alternative
If traffic congestion is a major hurdle, then Bike or Auto service can be launched.
Depending on income level and willingness to pay %, Uber Premium can be launched.
For all other cases, Uber Go is the best option.
 Estimation of Market Size
The population of our target age group is 16 to 60 years, assume the population to be 25
lakhs in a Tier 2 city. So, with an equal age distribution, the population of our target group
is 20 lakhs.

Population (16-60 years)

20 lakhs

Lower class Middle class Upper class

10 lakhs

Own cars Don’t own cars

4 lakhs 6 lakhs

Will use Won’t use Seldom riders

Frequent riders
80,0000 2.4 lakhs

Therefore, total market size = 2.4 lakhs + 80,000 = 3.2 lakhs

Now, assuming 10% of market size use the cab per day, total rides per day = 32,000

Estimation of daily rides per cab

Assume that Peak Hours is from 7am to 10am and 6pm to 9pm daily (6 hours totally), each
ride for an average duration of 20 minutes. So, we have 18 potential ride slots per day, and
assume an occupancy rate of 50% per slot.
During regular hours, we can assume an average ride duration of 30 minutes with say, an
occupancy rate of 1/6th per slot.

Entire day

Peak hours Regular hours

9 rides 6 rides

Therefore, total daily rides per cab = 15

Therefore, number of cabs or drivers required = 32000/15 = 2133 cabs
Assuming a buffer of cabs, the total approx. number of cabs or drivers required = 2200
Pricing and Revenue Estimation
Let us assume that average distance per ride is 8km, with average duration being 30
minutes. So, the average perp price would be Rs. 150 going by other tier 2 cities.
Also note that surge pricing may be required during peak hours depending on the city
Assuming that 20% of the rides are premium at Rs. 200, 10% of the rides are surge priced at
Rs. 200, and the rest 70% at Rs. 150
Therefore, daily revenue = (0.2 * 2200 * 15 * 200) + (0.1 * 2200 * 15 * 200) + (0.7 * 2200 * 15
* 150) = Rs. 54,45,000
Now in India, Uber keeps 20% of the fare.

There Uber earns Rs. 10,89,000 per day.

Also come up with a strategy to launch Bike sharing or Auto booking service if asked by
interviewer.

Summarize
 Unsolved Cases

1. The rejects of the orders are increasing in your e-commerce website, find out why.
2. One customer is regularly returning the products in your portal. How to deal with it?
3. How would you improve Microsoft Windows?
4. What should Amazon do if a faulty order is being delivered to a customer?
5. Which category would you like to introduce on Amazon/Flipkart? How would you go about it?
6. You are a new player in a e commerce in a competitive market. A customer has raised a request for
return for a product which has crossed its return expiration date, what would you do?
7. You are a mobile manufacturer and lately return request for one of the models have increased by 40%
from the retailers. How would you react to it?
8. How would you improve Facebook video feature?
9. You have been assigned as the manager to design an incentive structure to the drivers of a cab
aggregator? How would design it?
10. An ecommerce firm is thinking of removing the cash on delivery feature. Should they do it or not?
11. LinkedIn wants to add new feature in its website. What should it be and how would you go about it?
12. A lot of cabs are getting cancelled in Delhi. What could be the possible reason for this? Identify and
solve.
13. What should Facebook do to increase the usage of messenger?
14. What new feature can be introduced in Amazon Echo?
15. Should amazon go for offline stores in India?
16. The earphone category at Flipkart is seeing a lot of returns and making this category non-profitable.
What will you do as a category manager?
17. How would you solve the pain points of a working woman?
18. A customer returned a product with certain reason. When the same product is delivered back to
seller, the seller complaint of product not being the same that he delivered. What will you do?
19. The delivery boys at an ecommerce firm are swiping false status that customer was not available.
There are many complaints by the customers for the same. How will you rectify this problem?
20. What new feature would you put in Excel Spreadsheet?
21. How would you monetize YouTube apart from ads?
22. Design an interface where patients are allowed to store money
23. How will you improve Paytm wallet?
24. What new feature will you add to Google Maps?
25. Design an experience for a sports fan
26. How will you increase the customer engagement for YouTube “Skip ads” feature?
27. Suggest methods to increase revenue for YouTube advertise department
28. Should Flipkart introduce a Roadies like show in its upcoming video streaming service?
29. Improve the User Experience of Notes sharing app for college students
30. Given the data usage of all students in FMS and analytics details, what app would you build and why?
31. How would you design a loyalty program for Udaan?
32. Designing a health app with social network and what will be your business model?
33. You are the Product and growth manager for PhonePe, devise a growth strategy for the product
proposed above.
34. Design a Smart chair for old people.
35. How will you design a table booking feature for Swiggy?
36. What will be your response and strategy as a warehouse manager to an expected but sudden
increase in demand by the Forecasting team?
37. You want to establish a warehouse for an ecommerce player in India, how would you go about it?
38. Flipkart is facing issues in delivery of bulky items to customer. How can it be minimized?
39. A medical equipment manufacturer wants to scale its business in BRIC nations. Explore the metrics to
be looked at for gauging feasibility of the same.

40. Our client is a U.S. and Europe based premium shoelaces manufacturer. They want to know whether
they should enter the Indian market.
41. Our Client Autoco is a leading MNC Auto Manufacturer, with revenues of over $100 billion (2011).
Autoco assembles a variety of consumer vehicles and has numerous suppliers around the world. It has a
global supply base but limited flexibility with supply of certain parts due to infrastructure and geographical
constraints.
42. Recently Tier 1 Co, a supplier of critical components for some of Autoco’s leading cars and trucks
threatened to cease production due to significant financial losses. If Tier 1 Co stops supplying, Autoco has
to stop numerous production lines leading to negative financials, loss of service and brand name among
customers. Tier1 Co has a revenue of $40 million and operates via 3 manufacturing plants. All these plants
were underutilized. It sells 90% of its parts to Autoco. We have been asked by our client Autoco to support
the assurance of continued product supply, drive operational improvements and develop long term
sourcing strategy
43. As a B2B firm we manufacture test equipment for electronics firms. The revenue per product ranges
from $500 to $100,000 as this is a high complexity business. On an average we hold 200 days of inventory
which we would like to bring down to 100. What do you think we should do?
44. Our client General Motors Company (NYSE: GM), commonly referred to as General Motors (GM), is an
American multinational corporation headquartered in Detroit that designs, manufactures, markets, and
distributes automobiles and auto parts. With global headquarters in Detroit’s Renaissance Center, GM
manufactures cars and trucks in 35 countries. General Motors, together with Ford and Fiat Chrysler (FCA
US), are often referred to as the “Big Three” automobile manufacturers in the U.S. Current GM auto brands
include Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Pontiac and Hummer. For this case, General Motors desperately wants
to increase their profits. The CEO of GM has approached our consulting team to help them increase profits.
How would you go about it?
a) Your client Nordstrom is a mid-size department store similar to Macy’s. Founded in 1901 by Swedish
American John W. Nordstrom and Carl F. Wallin, Nordstrom has only one store and is located in the suburb
of Seattle, Washington. Nordstrom store has mainly two categories of products - apparel and home décor;
Apparel – Mens, Womens and Children apparel Home décor – all kinds of home furnishing products.
b) The Nordstrom department store recently has seen declining profitability and has hired your consulting
firm to investigate the possible causes of its declining profitability. Also, Nordstrom would like to
understand what are its strategic next steps. What would you recommend they do?
45. Twitch.tv is a live streaming video platform owned by Twitch Interactive Inc. Introduced in June 2011,
the site primarily focuses on video game live streaming, including broadcasts of eSports competitions, in
addition to creative content, “real life” streams, and more recently, music broadcasts. Content on the site
can either be viewed live or via video on demand. For this case, you’re not analyzing a client situation.
Imagine that you’re just a third-party observer and don’t have access to any of the information that would
not be publicly available. Let’s go back to the end of year 2014. Recently, Amazon.com bought Twitch.tv
for $970 million. Was this a good purchase for Amazon to make? How would the deal change the dynamics
in online video industry?
46. Your client’s, a startup’s company’s business plan is very simple: they want to sell all kinds of hardware
tools and home improvement items online on their e-commerce website www.iHardware.com. Explore
and establish the value chain for the business.
47. Similar to other online food ordering companies like GrubHub, Seamless, Delivery Hero, Just-Eat,
FoodPanda, etc, the client’s startup works like this: They will buy an ice cream store first, then build a
website which would list different kinds of ice cream they sell, as well as menus from local ice cream shops.
The users would then use the website to place orders online. The client would then be responsible for
arranging the ice cream delivery, either from the client’s own store or from local ice cream shops. The
client would generate revenues by charging a small commission fee to ice cream shops for every customer
order from their website. Is this a good idea? Why or why not?
48. You're the elevator in-charge of a building with 25 floors. The building has a mix of commercial and
residential floors. You're getting frequent complaints regarding the long waiting time of elevator. What
would you do?
49. One of the brands in grocery category is not selling and has stock left which is soon to expire. Specify
all the possible reasons for it and also suggest solutions for each of the reasons.
50. What are the factors you would consider while forecasting demand and maintaining stock during
different times of the year? (Pick any product of your choice)
51. Come up with a strategy to launch Swiggy Go in Kamla Nagar, Delhi
52. You are the marketing manager for Tinder. The user base in a particular city is not increasing at an
expected rate. There has been a decline. Devise a growth strategy for Tinder
53. Employees are complaining about time wastage while waiting for the elevator. How to solve this?
54. Being a hotel, travel and experience company, what data point will you leverage, how will you use and
what business objective do you want to achieve through data?
55. Enumerate problems faced by a truck driver and design a data collection mechanism for it.
56. How would you calculate the optimum location for the pitstops in a relay-based transportation model?
57. Your goal is to increase the Revenues and Profits for a logistics company that ship’s cargo. How will you
go about it? Also suggest KPIs to measure these improvements.
58. PhonePe is giving Rs.70 cashback on first transaction and Rs.35 from second onwards at petrol pumps
for a minimum ticket size of Rs.100. You working at Paytm have a budget of Rs.200 per customer to be
spent over 3-4 months to ensure customer retention. How do you go about it?
59. We need to launch furniture segment, elaborate your approach on that
60. We are facing losses in coke cans delivery, find the reason
61. Avg. Time spent on a particular category (Let’s say comedy) on YouTube is going down. Brainstorm
on that and focus on metrics.
62. How will you price let’s say a subscription model for big basket that includes services like instant
delivery (something like Amazon prime does)?
63. Design a virtual footwear store to enhance customer experience.
64. How would you make profits on low cost items (smaller SKUs) like dish washing liquids?
65. Design a platform for individual travelers to connect
66. Design an experience(app/product) for Sports Fan
67. No. of Orders in Zomato has fallen, identify what metrics you will look at and find the problem.
Sketch a Dashboard for Zomato East Zone Head with Metrics and how it will look.
68. Design a Restaurant Recommender Engine for Swiggy: What all attributes you will look into?
Customer Side Attributes, Business Side Attributes
69. Launch Dance as a service on Urban Clap. How would you decide the pricing of the service?
70. Increase customer engagement for YouTube Skip Ads and increase revenue for YouTube’s
advertisement department.
71. One of the brands in grocery category is not selling and has stock left which is soon to expire. Specify
all the possible reasons for it and also suggest solutions for each of the reasons

72. Driver onboarding have 5 steps:

1. Registration - 1 minute
2. Verification - 2 minutes
3. Training - 60 minutes
4. Vehicle Inspection - 2 minutes
5. Approval - 1 minute
There are 200 drivers to be onboarded and you are leading a team of 4 (including you), working from 9
am to 6 pm. Find the minimum time required to carry out the process. Be as creative as possible but
logical too.
73. Customer support cost consist of 3 components:
1. FAQ - No running costs, one-time fixed cost
2. Raising a ticket - Cost 90 paisa per ticket
3. Call to Customer Care - Cost Rs. 1.5 per customer

This model works in Uber Cabs but in Auto and Moto it is costing too much to the company. Suggest
ways to reduce these costs.

74. Find cost of Uber Rental from Delhi to Aligarh. 2. If according to you it costs Uber 4500 for a round
trip to Aligarh, why does it show me only 2500 for a trip to Aligarh. (Assume Uber is earning profit on the
trip) 3. If the probability of finding a return trip on rentals is 50%, what should be our price for the trip to
avoid losses