Ankur Gupta’s career has been a deliberately non-linear journey across product, strategy, operations, partnerships, and growth. Beginning with a structured, first-principles grounding at Infosys Consulting, he went on to join Stripe as one of its first 10 employees in India and has built new verticals from scratch at Swiggy, Myntra, and Pine Labs, where he established online and omnichannel businesses. Drawing on a self-described curiosity and a ‘founder mindset’, Ankur treats roles and domains as interchangeable so long as the needle moves from point A to point B. Today, at one of the country’s largest fintech firms, he focuses on ensuring merchants achieve the best possible conversion, aligning partnerships, product, and pricing to make that outcome a reality.
What drew you to the digital commerce ecosystem?
Ankur reflects on how India’s consumer internet boom of the mid-2010s convinced him that building for consumers offered a uniquely meaningful kind of impact.
“When I came out of my MBA, the general direction many people were taking was banking or consulting, and I had a consulting background before my MBA. But I realised consulting had been around for a long time and would be around for a long time more. What would really be interesting is doing something unique, something different.
What I realised is that building for consumers in India is fascinating, because you can’t typecast consumers or create easy cohorts as you might in other geographies. Given the sheer size of the country, you end up solving a problem not for one or two cohorts but for thousands of cohorts and billions of people. The impact you create in the ecosystem is massive, and it’s also very satisfying.”
How did you handle moving across multiple roles and fields?
Ankur describes how a first-principles approach makes problems interchangeable, and how natural curiosity has driven his movement across roles and domains.
“Honestly, I’d love to say this was a master plan and I had the entire path figured out, but a lot of it is coincidence. Early on, I was with Infosys Consulting, which gave me a very structured way of thinking about what problem I’m approaching and how I’m trying to resolve it. Once you’ve built a first-principles approach to problem solving, that helps a lot, because you’ve defined a framework for how you tackle things — and the problems themselves become replaceable.
I’m also a very curious person by nature. If something new is happening, I have an inherent curiosity to understand exactly what it is. At the end of the day, the outcome is about moving the needle from point A to point B, and that’s what I’ve always focused on. As long as I’m able to move the needle and achieve the results, the role and the domain don’t matter.”
What do people outside the industry still misunderstand about how it works?
Ankur argues that consumers care about solutions, not metrics, and that India’s quick commerce networks have set a new global benchmark for convenience.
“People are largely unaware of how much consumers crave convenience across different ecosystems. On a shopping site, their goal is to find the item quickly, pay as easily as possible, and get it delivered as fast as possible. So the real question is how you make it as simple as possible, so they don’t have to spend mental bandwidth on what they want to do. One of the biggest trends in India over the last couple of years has been the rise of quick commerce. Today you can order almost everything — groceries, clothes, electronics, mobile phones — and have it delivered to your doorstep within ten minutes.
If you think about the next step, the way AI is seeping into our lives means that very soon it won’t be me going onto the apps to place an order — I’ll just tell my agent to do it for me. That’s why so many consumer internet and fintech companies are focusing on agentic commerce. And it won’t be a one-way street; it will be an agent-to-agent interaction on which a transaction takes place. Figuring out what powers and flexibility you give your agent to make those purchases and decisions on your behalf is going to be critical.”
How is convenience changing consumer behaviour?
Responding to the observation that convenience can breed laziness, Ankur explains the counter-trend: as commerce becomes frictionless, consumers increasingly seek out experiences.
“You’re right that it’s partly about getting lazier, but the reverse trend this triggers is that more experiential things are happening in the market. People are saying that commerce, shopping, and ordering should be as convenient as possible — but on the other side, they definitely want to experience things. Dining out is becoming more and more experiential, so restaurants now have to put far more effort into the ambience and the overall experience, not just the food. A lot of companies are creating different experiences for people, around dating, meeting friends, going out, and travelling.
That’s also why farmers’ markets still thrive, and people still go to them — but it’s not something they want to do every day. They don’t want it to become mundane; they want it to be a separate, once-in-a-while experience. So you’re right that people are becoming lazy, but they also want experiences.”
How is AI reshaping the way consumers discover, shop, and transact online?
He maps the sequence of disruption — from search to utility payments to consumer shopping — and explains how delegated, intelligent agents will change transactions.
“The way AI is taking over is going to really change how transactions happen. Search is one of the earliest entry points for digital users, and Google search is being disrupted enormously right now. People who used to spend a lot of time searching are now spending that time on a Claude, ChatGPT, or Perplexity, because they believe they’re getting better worth for their while on those platforms. After search, things like utility payments get disrupted next, because they’re a basic, recurring requirement. Consumer shopping comes next, where the idea is to make it even simpler with less involvement for your day-to-day needs.
What some people are trying now is giving their agents flexibility for price negotiation. As a seller, I might tell my agent that if I’m selling something at five dollars, it’s allowed to go as low as three and a half dollars if someone buys five units. You make it more intelligent by setting conditions — if this, then that. So agentic e-commerce will pick up in a very big way.”
What has become most important in your leadership philosophy over the years?
Ankur sets aside the textbook theories of his student days for three lived principles: caring for people, leading with empathy, and practising fairness.
“When I was younger and studying organisational behaviour and leadership, I read all these theories and thought about the kind of leader I wanted to become. But once you start managing teams and making decisions that impact people at a large level, you realise it boils down to some very basic things. One of the things I hold close to my heart is that I take care of the people around me, because most of the business is driven by people. If people are happy and motivated, and they know the common goal, it makes a sea of difference to how they work and the effort they put in.
While your outcomes, goals, and numbers are extremely important, equally important is empathy. One of our company’s mottos is ‘care with tough love’. You can’t blindly tell everyone it’s okay not to work — you want them to deliver and to prosper — but having a little empathy and care alongside that makes a lot of difference. The last thing I’ve realised is the importance of fairness — not just towards others, but towards yourself. It’s important to be fully aware of what you’re capable of and to be fair about how you work, in your personal and professional space.”
What skills will matter most for young professionals entering digital commerce?
He points to logical reasoning, human connection, and technological awareness as the durable advantages in an AI-driven world.
“A few things will make a real difference. Number one is logic. AI will be able to do tasks that have a very defined outcome and a very defined logic, but somebody has to sit and define that logic. The more logical people are, and the better they understand systems and logical reasoning, the more difference it makes.
Number two, more than technical understanding, will be people’s understanding. That power of human-to-human connection — interacting with someone, closing a deal, convincing them a partnership is worth having — those soft skills become very important, because they’re not easily replaceable.
Finally, it’s important to have a good understanding of technology. At a certain level, you need to know what’s happening. If AI is coming for you, it’s better to understand it than to be an ostrich and put your head down. Learn more about it, read more about it, and understand the technical developments. The better you understand it, the more prepared and smarter you’ll be around it.”
How do you balance speed and experimentation with long-term strategic thinking?
Ankur credits discipline, openness to feedback from every level, and deliberate time to recharge as the way to avoid drowning in the day-to-day.
“It’s not easy. A lot of it comes from discipline — and I don’t mean army training. Very simply, make sure that every day you spend half an hour in the morning defining the most critical part of your day and what you want to achieve from it. You don’t even need to put it on paper; just spending time thinking about it, or writing yourself a note, makes a huge difference to what you’re supposed to do.
You also have to be very open to feedback, and feedback doesn’t only come from your managers or seniors — it can come from your peers or people in your chain of command. If you believe someone’s doing good work, interact with them and understand what’s working in your interactions and what isn’t. Sometimes that’s an eye-opener: such a small change can lead to a much larger impact.
It’s also very important to spend time just relaxing. You don’t have to be serious or working one hundred percent of the time. Even within the office, find time to sit back, have a drink, and get to know other people — because at the end of the day, it’s not all walls, chairs, and tables; it’s also the people.”
What is the one question business and technology leaders should be asking themselves?
He closes on the value of staying connected to the ground and maintaining what a former mentor called a ‘healthy paranoia’.
“For me, the question would be: what exactly am I doing to keep myself aware of what is happening today, and what will I do over the next couple of years? I’m a strong believer in knowing what’s working and what’s not, having a feedback loop, and understanding and taking feedback.
A lot of the time, leaders lose touch with the ground because of the sheer amount they do and the pressure they’re under. You need to have an ear to the ground and understand what’s working at the lowest level, because that’s usually where the grain of truth is.
One of the good leaders I worked with always told me you should never worry, but you should always have a healthy paranoia — where you’re a little concerned about what will and won’t happen, but you’re not fretting over it. A little healthy paranoia and a little ear to the ground go a long way.”
Join the Conversation: The Ortus Club’s Executive Network
As Ankur’s perspective shows, the shifts reshaping digital commerce — from quick commerce to agentic transactions — are rarely navigated in isolation. Leaders building consumer-first products at scale increasingly rely on candid, peer-level dialogue to test assumptions, compare market signals, and refine how they balance speed with long-term direction.
At The Ortus Club, we host curated executive roundtables that bring together senior leaders facing these exact challenges. Step beyond the hype around AI and convenience, and engage in the kind of open, high-value conversations that connect global strategy with localised, on-the-ground execution.
FAQs Section
Q: What is agentic commerce?
A: It is a model in which AI agents transact on a consumer’s behalf, increasingly through agent-to-agent interactions where the buyer’s agent and the seller’s agent negotiate and complete a purchase based on conditions set in advance.
Q: Why has quick commerce grown so quickly in India?
A: Players such as Blinkit, Zepto, Swiggy, and Zomato have built strong supply chain networks and strategically located dark stores, enabling ten-minute doorstep delivery of groceries, electronics, and more — setting a global benchmark for convenience.
Q: Does greater convenience reduce consumer engagement overall?
A: Not entirely. As routine shopping becomes frictionless, consumers redirect their energy towards experiential pursuits such as dining, travel, and unique, non-commoditised purchases, which become more deliberate and occasional.
Q: Which skills will matter most for younger professionals in digital commerce?
A: Logical reasoning and systems understanding to define the logic AI executes, strong human-to-human relationship skills that are not easily replaceable, and a solid working awareness of technology and how it evolves.
Q: What does ‘care with tough love’ mean as a leadership principle?
A: It is the practice of genuinely caring for and motivating people while still holding them to high standards and delivery, ensuring a healthy feedback loop so individuals understand both what is working and what is not.
