Amazon for B2B plastic raw material procurement.

Our platform streamlines procurement of all kinds of plastic raw materials for the end users. Currently, they (the owner themselves in most cases) procure raw material 2-6 times a month by spending hours contacting multiple suppliers to negotiate, & discover material and pricing, which is time-consuming and inefficient.
We provide market insights, technical consultation, and full operations management. By tapping into a vast network of suppliers and optimizing logistics, we make it effortless for businesses to access the best possible deals. – it's like Amazon for B2B plastic raw material needs

Current residence: City: Bhiwadi State: Rajasthan Country: India Bhiwadi is an esteemed industrial area on the outskirts of the capital city of India - Delhi. I plan to relocate to Delhi because it provides me with strategic advantages in terms of business trade and access to a talented workforce.

I have built an MVP (mobile app) and plan to launch it in early May 2023. I do have some transacting customers at the moment but we follow a manual process over calls. As I am waiting for a company incorporation, I am temporarily using my old proprietorship firm to route the transactions.

I have put in about 2.5 months of full time effort up until this point but I have been fully immersed in the plastic industry since the age of 19 and have gained about 3.5 years of experience. Until recently, I followed traditional methods in my work. However, I began to focus on streamlining and organizing the business in January 2023, which led to the development of Polymer Market.
In 2021, I attempted to create a similar platform, but my approach was vastly different. Upon reflection, I realized that I lacked a clear understanding of the market and the product itself, which hindered my progress.

Currently, we have zero activity on the platform since we plan to launch it in early May 2023.
However, within the last 15 days, we were able to conduct a single transaction with a customer for $50,000 at a net margin of ~1.5%.

Potential revenue streams that I am still exploring are - SaaS, & auxiliary services (hiring, machinery, education) . I know that each of these has potential in an Industry worth more than half a trillion dollars but my focus to start with is solely on plastic raw material trade.

No

No

It has been around 3.5 years since I started working in the industry but my procurement experience till date remains very inefficient, & outdated due to low use of tech. I am building something that I’d be proud to use.
Moreover, the industry is at an inflection point due to the entrance of foreign players, industry growth, digitization efforts, and COVID-19. Since people are adapting to new ways of doing business, everything up until this point has made it ripe for us to enter and digitise it entirely.

Supply & demand already exists in the market and we are only optimising a process, & standardizing raw materials. The need us because:

1. End-users in India don’t hire procurement managers even at a fairly large scale due to high AOV. Polymer Market is their ideal digial procurement manager.
2. There are some companies that I have tried to digitise the process, and while they have received good response from the market(validating us), the overall problem stays unsolved.

We have realized that even the manufacturers want to learn and grow. They are not using YT just for entertainment but for education as well. They will even pay you if you are truly adding value to them.
At present, Indian per capita plastic consumption is ⅓ of world average & 1/10 of the US. Educating & pushing the industry forward will be very crucial since the gap in consumption will be filled by tier-2 & tier-3, who have very different growth challenges than those in metro cities.

We will be buying plastic raw material at x & then selling it with a markup x + something. I expect to be able to generate profits in early days as below:

Category: Virgin raw material domestic trade
Size in India: 18.5 MT(million tons)/ annum or ~$25 Bn (at $1.34/kg estimate)
Addressable: 5.5 MT/annum or 30% is traded via open market and the rest is directly shipped from refinery to end-users.
Realistic estimate: I know multiple traders (5+) ( trading upwards of 0.14 MT/ annum, (100 mn+ revenue) i.e ~0.75% of overall market & ~2.25% of the addressable market at ~2% PAT margins. Do note that trade between traders is also involved in this.
Margins that we expect to make: 0.5-1.5%

Category: Reprocess raw material
Size in India: ~6 MT (Million Tons) / annum or ~$3.8 Bn.
Margins that we expect to make: 10-15%

As we grow, and enter into import-export, a network effect will come into play that will help us bank on arbitrage, increase our margins, and addressable market size.

Mridul Anand - 100% (proprietorship). Also to be the CEO of Pvt Ltd (incorporation in process)

Mridul Anand - 100% (proprietorship)

Pvt Ltd (main company; awaiting incorporation):

Mridul Anand (founder, CEO) - 70%
Employes, mentors, investors pool - 29%
Rajesh Gupta (mentor) - 1%
Mr. Rajesh Gupta of one of India’s oldest and largest polymer distributor houses. He has been my mentor in this business from day zero and is like a fatherly figure for me.

I have a proprietorship company (100% ownership) - Shree Balaji Trading Co. registered in a separate state than where I reside. I am using this entity temporarily to route transactions till the time a pvt ltd company is incorporated.

No

I have built the platform for IOS & Android myself using a low code tool - FlutterFlow with firebase backend. While I am not a developer, I have been coding since the age of 13, and built a couple of consumer facing products in the past. I plan to keep using FlutterFlow and hire around it to stay frugal.

No

I have wanted to build a space launch vehicle for tourists but don’t think that it suits me very well at the moment. Apart from that,

Making healthcare more affordable for the developed countries -
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I was amused to find that even fairly large suppliers in the polymer industry would spy on their competitor’s warehouses & track shipments to discover more customers.
or
A Linkedin hack: I posted a free job, and saw followers on my company page increase by 30-35 counts/ a day. Around 25% of people that applied, took the time to research a bit about the company on Linkedin.
Or
Before I entered into business, I had no clue what a panic attack is, but since then not only have I experienced multiple of these, I also started taking therapy to develop my EQ.

It was a no brainer because of three primary reasons:
1. Paul Graham gives the most consistent and relevant startups hacks, and advice. They are a delight.
2. YC has an unparalleled alumni.
3. It would be fun, and insightful to meet so many like minded folks from around the world, and network with them.

Paul Graham’s twitter & my Linkedin feed.