Daybreak

Biyani’s retail empire flamed out. His daughters seek redemption in birthing new brands

Apr 22, 2025

The Bayani sisters are on a bold mission to rebuild their family's legacy with Think9 Consumer Technologies, a startup incubator for new brands. They face numerous challenges, particularly the struggles of the roll-up business model after their father's empire collapsed. The sisters tackle the daunting task of appealing to young consumers while dealing with a traditional workforce and navigating competitive pressures. Their journey is a blend of ambition, innovation, and the ongoing battle to overcome a tarnished family reputation.

09:19

Creator website

AI Summary

AI Chapters

Episode notes

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

The Bayani sisters' Think9 aims to incubate diverse brands using a roll-up model, yet faces challenges amid recent industry failures.

Navigating their family's mixed legacy complicates the Biyani sisters' efforts to establish competitive edge and effective market positioning.

Deep dives

Challenges of the Roll-Up Model

The Bayani sisters' startup studio, Think9 Consumer Technologies, employs a roll-up model to incubate brands across various consumer categories, aiming to scale these ventures into profitable businesses within five to seven years. However, this model has faced significant challenges as recent high-profile failures, such as Thrasio's bankruptcy, reveal its vulnerabilities. The sisters have observed similar struggles with other companies, like the Good Glam Group, which found that a uniform marketing strategy does not yield consistent results across different product lines. Despite their efforts, investor confidence is wavering, and the aforementioned slowdowns in the consumer goods sector complicate their ambition to establish a thriving brand portfolio.

Intro

2min

Navigating Legacy Challenges in New Brand Ventures

5min

Branding Challenges and Market Positioning in the FMCG Sector

2min

In 2021, Ashni and Avni Bayani, the scions of industrialist Kishore Biyani’s Future Group, launched their own venture – a startup studio called Think 9 Consumer Technologies.

The concept was simple – they would incubate new brands across categories like apparel, beauty, health and wellness and food; and then use common teams for marketing, technology and even product development.

Why? Well, according to an executive from the startup studio, the end goal is to be able to build them into sizable businesses in 5-7 years and then exit. It’s called the roll-up modelled and it was pioneered by a US-based consumer good company called Thrasio.

For the Bayani sisters, this isn’t just another venture. It’s a full blown comeback. You see around the time they launched Think9 Consumer Technologies, their father’s business empire – the Future Group – was falling apart. It eventually went bankrupt in 2022 and sold everything lock, stock and barrel to Reliance Industries.

So the sisters have a point to prove. But unfortunately not everything is working in their favour.

For starters the roll up model they based their business on has been stuttering for some time now. Remember Thrasio? Well it filed for bankruptcy just last year.

Tune in.

Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

Remember Everything You Learn from Podcasts

Save insights instantly, chat with episodes, and build lasting knowledge - all powered by AI.

Daybreak

Biyani’s retail empire flamed out. His daughters seek redemption in birthing new brands

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

Deep dives

Challenges of the Roll-Up Model

Legacy and Market Positioning Issues

Remember Everything You Learn from Podcasts