Flipkart ropes in former Swiggy executive Anuj Rathi as Cleartrip CEO

Anuj Rathi, incoming Cleartrip CEO

Flipkart, the homegrown ecommerce giant, has roped in Anuj Rathi as the new chief executive of Cleartrip, the company’s travel platform, people in the know told Moneycontrol. This will be Rathi’s second innings at the Walmart-owned company, he worked at Flipkart for two years between 2010 and 2012 as Product Manager.

He went on to work at companies like Snapdeal and Swiggy after that. After over seven years at Swiggy, he joined Jupiter in September 2023 but his stint was a short one. Rathi, an IIT Kanpur alumnus, has more than 18 years of experience in the industry and has worked at large corporations like Walmart, apart from new-age ecommerce companies.

Rathi is joining Cleartrip to replace Ayyappan R, the current CEO of Cleartrip, who is on his way out after spending over 11 years at the Bengaluru-based company, as reported by Moneycontrol earlier.

Cleartrip did not immediately respond to Moneycontrol’s queries. News website The Arc was first to report about Rathi moving to Cleartrip.

The movements are part of a wider restructuring at Flipkart, which has seen several top executives depart. Moneycontrol reported on May 20 that two more senior – Prabh Simran Singh and Sankalp Mehrotra – executives are leaving the company, following five other recent departures.

In February, Moneycontrol had first reported that Sandeep Kohli, SVP and head of data centres was leaving Flipkart after nine years with the company. Along with Kohli, Amitesh Jha (head of marketplace and categories), Bharath Ram (SVP of Growth and Retention) Ayyappan R (Cleartrip head) and Dheeraj Aneja (head of fintech and payments) all quit Flipkart around the same time.

These developments come at a time when Walmart, Flipkart’s parent company, said it is assessing the right time for Flipkart’s IPO, as reported by Moneycontrol earlier.

“We’re looking and exploring when would be the right time to IPO that (Flipkart) business. There’s strong growth in Flipkart and in PhonePe and we’re excited about the India market,” a Walmart executive told analysts after announcing the company’s results on May 16.