Report: A Billion of India's People Are Unmonetizable

India is home to 1.4 billion—but not to 1.4 billion consumers. The BBC reports on findings from the VC firm Blume Ventures, which has pegged the country's consuming class—meaning those people with the ability to spend any discretionary money on goods or services—at just 130 million to 140 million people. That's akin to Mexico's consuming class, per the BBC. Another 300 million are "aspirant" consumers who are reluctant payers and less of a target for businesses or startups. That means roughly a billion people are "unmonetizable" and "beyond the pale, of as now, for startups," per the report.

And the consuming class isn't expanding so much as it is "deepening": The count of those with wealth isn't ticking up, but those who have it are getting more of it. Indeed, in 1990 the top 10% of Indians held 34% of the country's income; the figure now stands at 57.7%. That's shaping brands' growth strategies, per the report: Premiumization is becoming more the norm, where growth is coming from expanded upscale and luxury offerings rather than those meant to appeal to the masses. As report author Sajith Pai puts it to the BBC, "Those who are too focused at the mass end or have a product mix that doesn't have exposure to the premium end have lost market share." (More India stories.)