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Are Indian Unicorns Taking the Media for a Ride?

Mint has listed (on its front page) various fancy "GMV" goals totted out by CEOs of Indian E-Commerce Unicorns - at various points to various media outlets - but have been "missed by big margins". Extract:
Payments start-up Paytm launched its e-commerce business only in 2014, years after Flipkart and Snapdeal. But that didn’t stop the company from spelling out growth targets that would put its rivals to shame.
Alibaba-backed Paytm said in an April 2015 interview with Mint that it will generate annualized GMV of more than $4 billion by December 2015. In an interview this February with the Hindu BusinessLine newspaper, Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma said the company was clocking GMV of $3 billion, which means it missed its sales target. No sweat. Paytm has set an even more ambitious target of hitting $10 billion in GMV by this December. 
..."If these goals are anything to go by, it would seem as if accountability isn’t high on the list of priorities at many e-commerce firms. Or perhaps the statements chronicled..simply comprise a low-risk, free-of-cost public relations strategy. If that’s the case, rose-coloured projections from start-ups are unlikely to stop any time soon.," 
Ouch, Ouch and Ouch!!

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