Fixxo was founded in 2016. Not with a profound vision, but with a lot of exuberance. By two engineers who loved gadgetry and were disillusioned with the banality of IT jobs in Bangalore.
Saurabh was a UX designer by day, moonlighting as the “Jugaad Guy” and “fixer of everything” in his friends circle. Manish was a software engineer by education, working in an Investment Bank, itching to startup on his own. They were friends before they were partners. Having toyed with a couple more business ideas before hitting upon Fixxo, they knew there was something worth holding on to here!
The idea back then was to just have fun, do what we loved, while earning a living. Lofty solemn goals emerged along the way. One unexpected challenge we faced was that customers seemed strangely suspicious of not just our abilities, but also our integrity. Being from professional backgrounds, and entirely new to the industry we found this a bit annoying and insulting. Later it dawned on us - the market was rife with small-time tricksters waiting to rip you off. Owing to this dubious reputation, anyone would naturally feel skeptical handing over an expensive piece of gadget to us. We made a conscious decision to separate ourselves from the market, to put customer trust at the centre of our business. And for this, we realized repairing devices wasn’t enough, we had to first find ways to salve the trust deficit in customers’ minds. This led to new processes and systems - Elaborate Pre & Post repair QC forms, Visual proof of each device and issue, transparent communication at each stage of the service, pre-approval of quotation before any service, strong post-service support. Notably, these ideas, though intuitive, were pretty alien in the industry when we started out.
Apple products are expensive (duh!). There’s a significant demand for Pre-owned refurbished devices esp. MacBooks & iPhones. And it makes complete sense - you can acquire the same performance & quality at almost half the price. Any downsides? You miss out on the novelty of “unboxing”, and some shallow bragging rights. Good deal, at any rate.
We, at Fixxo, started the pre-owned sales segment in early 2018. Having sold over a 1000 devices in the first year itself, we realized that here too the primary concern for customers was trust - what if the MacBook turns out to be a bad lemon? Rest easy, all pre-owned devices sold at Fixxo undergo a rigorous QC process and come with a minimum 3 months’ warranty.
Quite organically, we grew footprints from the retail sector into the B2B sector. Loyal customers saw the value we could add to their organizations. And started connecting us to their IT Admins / Asset managers / Procurement managers. Starting roughly in late 2018, we have on-boarded over a 100 companies now - startups and large businesses. Models of engagement vary from on-demand repair service to AMCs. We’ve grown our basket of offerings from services to sales and now rentals too.
This was more like a post-facto realization. Without making a conscious decision, Fixxo, right from the outset, has been following environmentally responsible practices. Obviously we gather a lot of e-waste in this line of work. Over the years we have tied up with and utilized services of various waste management & recycling startups in order to ensure safe disposal of the toxic e-waste. Till the end of 2019, we had safely disposed over 5000 kgs of e-waste. Shout-out to our current vendors Saahas & Ensyde.
You, as customers, too can laud yourself - each time you decide to repair a glitchy product instead of buying a new one, you’re making a difference. You’re making a difference each time you buy a pre-owned refurbished device. It is an important issue, and we definitely take pride in the impact, however small, we’re making.
