Sameer Varma, Executive Director, ColdStar Logistics
India's cold chain industry is evolving beyond storage and transportation, with customers increasingly demanding dependable, technology-enabled supply chains that can deliver consistent quality across the country. Sameer Varma, Executive Director, ColdStar Logistics, discusses how the company is building a technology-led, standardised cold chain network focused on eliminating stockouts, improving visibility and helping customers redesign their supply chains. He also shares ColdStar's expansion plans, growing presence in Tier-II and Tier-III cities, and its increasing focus on specialised pharmaceutical logistics.
How has India's cold chain market evolved over the past decade, and what changes are driving demand today?
When we first started looking at the industry about 11 or 12 years ago, we were fascinated by how products actually reached consumers. Large parts of the supply chain were still unknown or lacked visibility. Since then, we've seen several fundamental shifts.
The first is production scale. As consumption has grown across India, manufacturers have significantly increased capacity. Second, consumers themselves have changed. They are looking for higher-quality products, greater choice, and much more convenience. The range of products available today is many times larger than it was a decade ago.
Convenience has also changed how supply chains are designed and managed. The value consumers place on convenience today is influencing investments across production, warehousing and logistics. Many of the changes we expected to happen in 2012 or 2013 have only become visible after 2020, and we are now seeing the impact across the industry.
The market is also diverse enough to support specialised solutions. Food, healthcare, pharmaceuticals, medical equipment and retail all require different cold chain models. While some consolidation will happen, there is still plenty of room for companies that solve specific customer problems.
What gap did ColdStar set out to solve, and what does your "zero stockout" philosophy mean?
When we started ColdStar, we wanted to solve the lack of standardisation in India's cold chain. Earlier, if a company manufactured products in one part of the country and wanted to serve customers elsewhere, there was very little consistency in the logistics solution. That made it difficult for brands to expand nationally.
Our objective is to connect manufacturers and consumers anywhere in India through a standardised logistics network. That means delivering the same quality of service regardless of geography, supported by technology that gives customers complete visibility into their supply chains.
Everything we do is built around one principle: zero stockouts. It is not just another service we offer. It defines how we design warehouses, train people, develop technology and execute operations. If a customer orders 100 units, our objective is to deliver all 100.
That starts with understanding customer requirements, maintaining complete control over inventory and product quality, and ensuring visibility throughout the supply chain. Our technology and training are designed to deliver accuracy every single time because preventing stockouts ultimately protects the customer's business and the end consumer's experience.
"I don't sell pallets. I don't sell trucking. I don't sell infrastructure. I sell a solution. Your product has to get from point A to point B. I can efficiently do it."
How does ColdStar design supply chains differently from a traditional cold chain provider?
We do much more than transport and storage. We work with customers to understand how their supply chain should be designed based on consumption patterns, inventory levels, costs and demand forecasts.
Our network today consists of around 45 distribution centres across India, serving approximately 200 cities and reaching about 8,500 unique pin codes. Depending on customer requirements, we help determine where inventory should be positioned and how products should move through the network to minimise costs while maintaining product availability.
Technology plays a central role. Initially these decisions were driven largely by experience, but over time we developed our own in-house platform, ColdStar X. Rather than simply providing dashboards, it combines operational data with business intelligence to help us and our customers make better supply chain decisions. It enables forecasting, inventory planning and continuous optimisation based on actual consumption patterns.
What is the scale of ColdStar's operations today?
We currently manage about 1.2 million sq ft of warehousing space and expect that to increase to between 1.8 and 2 million sq ft by the end of this financial year.
On transportation, around 700 to 750 trucks operate within our network on any given day, largely through long-term lease arrangements. We don't see ourselves as a trucking company or a warehousing company. We build infrastructure based on customer requirements. Some facilities are refurbished to suit specific industries, while others are developed for specialised operations such as healthcare, frozen products or high-throughput distribution.
Our measure of success isn't square footage or pallet positions. We focus on throughput, currently moving around 2 million units every day through our network.
Which industries do you serve, and what role does healthcare play within your business?
We focus primarily on three industries: food, retail and healthcare. Food and retail contribute almost equally to our business, while healthcare currently accounts for about 5 to 8%.
Healthcare may be smaller in size, but it is one of the most specialised parts of our business. We handle complex logistics solutions, including bulk consolidation, multimodal transportation and deliveries to research centres, hospitals and even patients' homes.
We also work with many of India's largest food manufacturers, food processors, restaurant chains and retailers. In healthcare, our market share is smaller, but the work itself is highly specialised and requires greater precision.
How does ColdStar differentiate itself from other cold chain companies?
We don't position ourselves around assets. I don't sell pallets. I don't sell trucking. I don't sell infrastructure. I sell a solution. Your product has to get from point A to point B, and I can efficiently do that.
Our approach starts with designing the customer's supply chain first. Once we understand what the customer needs, we build or lease the right infrastructure to support it. The infrastructure exists to deliver the solution, not the other way around. That is the fundamental difference in how we approach the market.
What opportunities do you see in pharmaceutical logistics?
Our current focus is on injectable medicines that require storage and transport between 2°C and 8°C. We are using our nationwide distribution network to provide passive packaging solutions for pharmaceutical customers across India.
Our customers include multinational logistics companies as well as end users. We identified a gap in the market for these specialised solutions and have built our capabilities around that.
International business currently forms only a small part of our operations. Where we do participate, it is mainly in processed food imports and fresh produce exports. Our strategy is customer-led rather than speculative. We expand into new services when customer demand justifies the investment.
What are customers asking for today, and how important is visibility in meeting those expectations?
Dependability is the single biggest requirement today. Historically, cold chains often broke down outside major cities because there wasn't enough consistency or standardisation. That is exactly what we are trying to solve.
Visibility is a key part of that. It is not just about tracking where a truck is. It is about knowing where every product is, what condition it is in, when it will arrive and how that information helps customers make better inventory decisions.
Too much inventory increases costs, while too little results in stockouts. Visibility enables both our customers and us to strike the right balance. Ultimately, what matters to us is not simply tracking a warehouse or a vehicle, but knowing where the last piece of ice cream is and ensuring it reaches the customer in perfect condition.
What are ColdStar's priorities for growth over the next year?
We've been growing at around 50 to 60% year on year over the past several years and have remained profitable. This year, our focus is on expanding our warehousing footprint from 1.2 million sq ft to between 1.8 and 2 million sq ft.
Geographically, we want to deepen our presence in Tier-II and Tier-III cities by extending the same level of service we currently provide in metro markets. At the same time, we will continue strengthening our capabilities in specialised pharmaceutical logistics, which we see as an important area of future growth.
This interview was originally published in the Indian Transport & Logistics News' July-J 2026 issue.