Best Forbes India The Startup Fridays Podcasts (2024)

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep12: Vishal Gupta’s optimism for unicorns turning wealth creators for India 1:12:09

4d ago1:12:09

1:12:09

In this episode, Vishal Gupta, a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners, talks about his career as a VC investor in India, and gives us an overview of the opportunities he sees on the basis of what Bessemer calls roadmaps that the firm develops for various sectors. In this conversation, recorded on November 26, Gupta also talks about how, from among …

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep11: Zepic’s founders on their approach to marketing automation 53:55

18d ago53:55

53:55

In this episode, Naveen Venkat and Sreelesh Pillai talk about starting another company whose name starts with the letter z. Jokes apart, Venkat, a repeat software entrepreneur, and Pillai, a seasoned marketer, talk about why they think their new startup, Zepic, has something refreshing to offer enterprise customers in the crowded world of marketing…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep10: Ideaspring’s partners on backing the next-gen deep techs in India 1:03:36

2M ago1:03:36

1:03:36

In this episode, Naganand Doraswamy and Suryaprakash Konanuru, co-founders Ideaspring Capital, talk about their enthusiasm for India’s early-stage deep tech startups. The two talk about how, while these startups are part of a nascent ecosystem, they are developing products that are sometimes coming to the fore for the first time anywhere. Doraswamy…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep9: Clairco and Sensiable join forces on decarbonizing buildings 49:16

4M ago49:16

49:16

In this episode, the founders of Clairco and Sensiable, talk about their vision as one company, as their energy management tech and solutions complement each other – offering customers like Brigade Group a fuller suite of products and services. Aayush Jha, Udayan Banerjee, Ashish Singh and Akshay Davasam, talk about how they can help customers moni…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep8: Parithi Govindaraju on Okulo’s long-endurance drones for India 1:02:32

5M ago1:02:32

1:02:32

In this episode, Parithi Govindaraju, founder and CEO of Okulo Aerospace, gives us a quick update on the solar-electric hybrid long-endurance drones he and his team are developing, for what he describes as “persistent monitoring”. In this conversation, Parithi talks about the importance of such long-endurance UAVs for protecting India’s strategic a…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep7: Abhishek Poddar and Saurabh Arora’s experiment with tech and radical transparency 1:18:02

5M ago1:18:02

1:18:02

In this episode, Abhishek Poddar and Saurabh Arora, founders of Plum Benefits Insurance Brokers, talk about how they are using tech to reimagine employee health benefits and insurance. In this conversation, Abhishek and Saurabh, who started Plum five years ago, also talk about how the journey so far has been one of discovering “a culture of radical…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep6: AI for India – Jan Ki Baat, Sthaan and other use cases from People+ai 52:02

6M ago52:02

52:02

This episode is the second part of a conversation with Tanuj Bhojwani, head of People+ai, a non-profit effort that's working to find population-scale applications of artificial intelligence that are relevant to large problems in India. In this conversation, Tanuj about how both the development and applications of AI in India will be different from …

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep5: AI for India – how people+ai was born 39:31

7M ago39:31

39:31

In this episode, Tanuj Bhojwani, head of people+ai, a non-profit effort that’s working to find population-scale applications of artificial intelligence that are relevant to large problems in India, does a quick recounting of how the initiative was seeded. In this conversation, which I hope will be the first of many on AI for India, Bhojwani also gi…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep4: Axio's founders unpack lessons from BNPL success 44:28

9M ago44:28

44:28

In this episode, Sashank Rishyasringa, and Gaurav Hinduja, co-founders of Axio, a buy-now-pay-later specialist in Bengaluru, talk about how, while a strong regulatory environment is critical in fintech, it can also become an enabler of innovation. Lower cost of money for “new entrants and challengers” with innovative financial products can benefit …

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep3: Ashok Jhunjhunwala on why India must say ‘yes we can’ to deep tech 56:07

10M ago56:07

56:07

In this episode, Ashok Jhunjhunwala, institute professor at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras and president of IITM Research Park, Incubation Cell and RTBI, talks about why the next big push is needed now for India to become a nation of deep tech products over the next decade. He also asks that administrators and bureaucrats change their co…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep2: Vinod Shankar’s journey from software techie to lending books to deep tech investor 57:42

11M ago57:42

57:42

In this episode, Vinod Shankar, founding managing partner at Java Capital in Bangalore, talks about his passion for backing deep tech entrepreneurs. Vinod started out as a software engineer but found himself repeatedly drawn to new experiences. His insatiable thirst for knowledge has taken him from a software startup to leading marketing for a libr…

1
Startup Fridays S5 Ep1: Karan Mohla at B Capital on the convergence he sees coming in India’s startup ecosystem 1:06:36

12M ago1:06:36

1:06:36

Welcome to a new season of Startup Fridays. In this episode, Karan Mohla, partner at the VC firm B Capital talks about the convergence that he sees beginning to happen, which is bringing different aspects of India’s startup ecosystem to points of inflection. Karan, who’s based in Delhi, has been involved with investments in more than 20 companies i…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep24: Kavita Shenoy, Anand Gopal part 2 – from nearly running out of money to a done deal 51:02

12M ago51:02

51:02

This is part two of a conversation with Kavita Shenoy and Anand Gopal, on their 10-year entrepreneurial roller coaster, building Voiro, an ad-tech SaaS company in Bengaluru. In today’s episode, they talk about how the $750 billion ad landscape is changing, their hopes for Voiro’s future, how building their own company has been life-changing, and wh…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep23: Kavita Shenoy, Anand Gopal Part 1: 30k from Nandan Nilekani to multinational customers at Voiro 45:57

1y ago45:57

45:57

Part one of a conversation with Kavita Shenoy and Anand Gopal, on their 10-year entrepreneurial adventure, building Voiro, an ad-tech SaaS company in Bengaluru. Kavita and Anand are natural conversationalists and story tellers, and produce their own podcast as well. In today’s episode, they talk about how they started Voiro, and then went from cons…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep22: Viral Shah on the mission at Julia Hub to help scientists and engineers innovate faster 1:01:58

1y ago1:01:58

1:01:58

Viral Shah, co-inventor of Julia programming language and co-founder of Julia Hub, an enterprise software startup, talks about this opensource language’s journey that will touch 15 years in the new year. Julia Hub, founded in 2015, today has customers including some of the world’s biggest companies in pharmaceuticals, aerospace, semiconductors, and…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep21: Amit Gupta on sticking to his by-the-pincode approach to scaling Yulu 50:02

1y ago50:02

50:02

In this episode, Amit Gupta, co-founder and CEO of Yulu Bikes, gives us an update on how the electric moped venture will continue its pincode-by-pincode approach to growth. Earlier this year, Yulu added a battery-as-a-service business, called Yuma. Yulu has also entered the OEM business, with Bajaj Auto making the Yulu Wynn, a more stylish version …

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep20: Kiran Mysore on his journey from Bhadravati to UTEC’s deep tech evangelist 54:29

1y ago54:29

54:29

In this episode, we chat with Kiran Mysore, a principal at the University of Tokyo Edge Capital, one of Asia’s biggest deep tech VC funds, on the ninth anniversary of his move to Japan, where he found his calling as a deep tech VC investor, leading global investments including India and southeast Asian ventures. We spoke mostly about his experience…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep19: Kunal Khattar on how the best is yet to come in India’s EV sector 1:00:16

1+ y ago1:00:16

1:00:16

Kunal Khattar, founding partner at AdvantEdge, an early-stage VC firm in Delhi, focused on India’s mobility sector, talks about the future of this industry in India and the role that companies ranging from Ather to Tesla could play in it. He also talks about business innovations that could soon make electric vehicles more affordable to the Indian b…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep18: Arun Raghavan on journey from accidental investor to $40 mln fund at Arali 1:01:41

1+ y ago1:01:41

1:01:41

Arun Raghavan, founding partner at Arali Ventures in Bengaluru, talks about how he and his friend Rajiv Raghunandan became VC investors with an operator’s flavour, and the experience that’s helped them invest very early in entrepreneurs across sectors, from fintech and SaaS to deep tech startups. Arun also talks about how India is ready for the nex…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep 17: TN Hari’s counterintuitive ideas on purpose and other notes on Indian startups 1:04:50

1+ y ago1:04:50

1:04:50

In this episode, TN Hari, co-founder of Artha School of Entrepreneurship, who’s also a prolific author on building for India, and an angel investor, talks about his learnings from across his career – from being a corporate executive at Tata Steel to diving into startups like TaxiForSure and BigBasket. He talks about problems in India that aren’t ne…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep16: How Shivnath Babu wears two hats lightly, an entrepreneur and a scientist 55:52

1+ y ago55:52

55:52

In this episode, Shivnath Babu, co-founder and CTO of Unravel Data, talks about the growing importance of data observability and the contributions being made by his venture. Shivnath started his career as a computer science engineer from IIT Madras and then earned his PhD in the area of data platforms at Stanford University. He spent 12 years as an…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep15: Will Poole on investing in resilient founders in the global south 1:00:51

1+ y ago1:00:51

1:00:51

In this episode, Will Poole, co-founder and managing partner of Capria Ventures, talks about the opportunities and challenges in investing in the global south. Will started his career with a computer science degree 40 years ago and worked at some of the biggest names in tech, including Sun Microsystems and Microsoft, before turning to VC investing.…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep14: The lightness of being Dev Khare and other notes on India’s startup scene 1:03:32

1+ y ago1:03:32

1:03:32

In this episode, Dev Khare, a partner at Lightspeed, one of the most prominent global early-stage VC firms operating in India, talks about how and why he became a venture capital investor, and what keeps him going today. Dev also talks about how India’s startups are changing, how Lightspeed is different, in his view, and some lessons from his own c…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep13: Sayandeb Banerjee on life as a ‘practitioner’ CEO at TheMathCompany 1:09:20

1+ y ago1:09:20

1:09:20

In this episode, Sayandeb Banerjee, co-founder and CEO at TheMathCompany, talks about how his six-year-old venture has grown from strength to strength, building custom analytics solutions for some of the world’s biggest companies. He also talks about how he’s always had an entrepreneurial streak; the advantages of not taking VC money too early; les…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep12: Why Rishi Navani seeks founders he can’t help, and what he means by that 46:32

1+ y ago46:32

46:32

In this episode, Rishi Navani, founder and managing partner at Epiq capital, a growth-stage VC firm, talks about never losing sight of the core idea of venture capital, which is to make substantial returns for his investors. Over the 25 years that he’s been backing ventures, including previously co-founding Matrix Partners India, Navani’s way of do…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep11: Arun Kumar at Celesta on tough times revealing resilient founders, great investments 43:58

1+ y ago43:58

43:58

In this episode, Arun Kumar, managing partner at Celesta Capital, talks about why some of the best VC investment opportunities can be found in tough times, as they reveal the most resilient entrepreneurs. Kumar’s career includes leading KPMG India and serving in former US President Barack Obama’s administration. He also talks about embracing change…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep10: SpotDraft’s founders on spit-and-a-handshake in the age of machines and AI 55:40

1+ y ago55:40

55:40

In this episode, Shashank Bijapur, Madhav Bhagat and Rohith Salim talk about how they got to build SpotDraft, which offers a machine learning and AI-based contract lifecycle management platform to legal teams at companies around the world. Founded in 2017, SpotDraft has helped customers process more than a million contracts since the company releas…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep9: Ganesh Rengaswamy’s fascinating trip from Travel Guru to Quona Capital 55:18

1+ y ago55:18

55:18

In this episode, Ganesh Rengaswamy, co-founder and managing partner at Quona Capital, looks back at how he once juggled being a co-founder at Travel Guru and an MBA student at Harvard Business School, and what he would have done differently. Ganesh also talks about Quona’s deep interest in fintech in India and several other markets; and how India’s…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep8: Nishchay Ag’s plan to stay scrappy, be shameless and build a Zoho at Jar 55:38

1+ y ago55:38

55:38

In this episode, Nishchay Ag, co-founder and CEO of Jar, talks about how there is a massive addressable gap in India's middle class with financial products that go beyond the top 30 million that everyone is targeting. Nishchay talks about how he and his friend Misbah Ashraf went from a few WhatsApp group pilots to 10 million users at Jar, in just t…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep7: Bala Srinivasa on the great middle Indian opportunity for startups and VCs 55:53

2y ago55:53

55:53

In this episode, Bala Srinivasa, managing director at Arkam Ventures, talks about experiences from the firm’s first set of 14 investments so far from their $106 million inaugural fund. Over the last four years, Srinivasa, and his fellow founding partner Rahul Chandra, have backed entrepreneurs who have successfully applied technology to create busi…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep6: Nitin Chhabra’s fascinating journey from Boomer bubblegum to SaaS to $50 mln retail operator 1:01:44

2y ago1:01:44

1:01:44

In this episode, Nitin Chhabra, co-founder and CEO of Ace Turtle, a tech-enabled retail business that’s the force behind brands like Lee and Wrangler in India, talks about how the company started out as a SaaS business, selling software for the so-called omnichannel retail. Nitin and co-founder Berry Singh then decided to risk that entire business,…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep5: Suresh Sambandam’s irrepressible optimism for India’s SaaS sector 48:59

2y ago48:59

48:59

In this episode, Suresh Sambandam, founder and CEO of OrangeScape, better known for its product Kissflow, talks about persevering for over 15 years, before he found himself at the right place at the right time offering the right product. Suresh now dreams of making his company at least one of the top three in the world in its category. He also talk…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep4: ‘To succeed as an entrepreneur, never lose sight of your end goal’ – Ben Mathias 41:59

2y ago41:59

41:59

In this episode, Ben Mathias, managing partner at Vertex Ventures for Southeast Asia and India, talks about how he decided to leave behind a nice life in the software industry in Silicon Valley, to come to India as a VC investor. With over three decades in the tech and VC industry combined, Ben talks about what investors did to startups over the la…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep3: ‘Small-town India remains a largely untapped opportunity for startups’ – Anjani Bansal 56:52

2y ago56:52

56:52

In this episode, Anjani Bansal, partner and India country head at Global Brain, a Japanese VC firm, talks about why certain opportunities in small-town India are ready for startups to grab and create disruptive innovations. The time is also right for Global Brain to step up its own operations in India, Bansal says, who is looking to grow his team a…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep2: ‘Find difficult and large problems and prepare for the long haul’ – Rahul Garg 58:50

2y ago58:50

58:50

In today’s episode, Rahul Garg, founder and CEO of Moglix, talks about what’s next for the company, which he says is knocking on $600-700 million in revenue. He also talks about his love of solving not just difficult problems, but difficult and large ones, which feeds his entrepreneurial decisions. Aspiring founders must understand this, and prepar…

1
Startup Fridays S4 Ep1: ‘I wish for India, many unreasonable entrepreneurs’ – Cody Friesen 52:25

2y ago52:25

52:25

In today’s episode, Cody Friesen, founder and CEO of SOURCE Global, talks about his dream of putting to bed one of humanity’s biggest and most urgent problems—the lack of access to clean drinking water for billions around the planet. Friesen is a scientist, engineer, teacher and entrepreneur. In this conversation, he also reflects on his approach t…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep13: Anand Lunia at IndiaQuotient on why we need ‘Hindustan Big Tech’ to level the playing field 1:08:02

2y ago1:08:02

1:08:02

Our guest today is Anand Lunia, general partner at IndiaQuotient, a well-known domestic VC firm that backs entrepreneurs attempting to solve large problems for the Indian market at even “concept stage.” In this episode, Anand talks about how 2021 was an exception, and for the startup ecosystem to come back to its mean, two-thirds of the startups ma…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep12: ‘Established entrepreneurs from the best startups in India must step up as mentors’ – Madhu Shalini Iyer 1:03:37

2y ago1:03:37

1:03:37

Our guest today is Madhu Shalini Iyer, a partner at Rocketship.vc—a Silicon Valley-based fund investing globally. Iyer started out with an engineering degree from the University of Sydney. In her 20-plus years as an engineer, operator and investor, her previous roles include chief data officer at Gojek, which she helped to grow into a business valu…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep11: ‘Strategic investors can make or break a deep tech venture, choose wisely, time it right’ – Sriram Viswanathan 59:02

2y ago59:02

59:02

Our guest today is Sriram Viswanathan, the founding managing partner at Celesta Capital. In this episode, Sriram talks about his long association with technology and investing in deep tech companies, and Celesta’s strategic focus on the US-India corridor. He also has some experience to share with deep tech entrepreneurs, in areas including product-…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep10: ‘From doer to enabler, I’m optimistic about innovation and inclusion in India’ – Sanjay Jain 36:27

2y ago36:27

36:27

Our guest today is Sanjay Jain, partner at Bharat Fund and chief innovation officer at CIIE.co. Sanjay, who played a leading role in building Google’s Map Maker, and later was the founding chief product manager at UIDAI, talks about his journey going “from doer to enabler.” With a master’s in computer science from UCLA, and experience as a serial e…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep9: ‘For your company to last 100 years, empower everyone to singularly focus on the client’ – Srikanth Velamakanni 1:13:10

2y ago1:13:10

1:13:10

Our guest today is Srikanth Velamakanni, cofounder, group CEO, and vice chairman of Fractal Analytics, which as the name suggests, provides deep analytical insights to customers in a range of verticals, including retail, financial services, and healthcare. Srikanth co-founded Fractal in 2000, and it turned unicorn earlier this year. The real aspira…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep8: ‘Climate tech is cause for optimism but we’re just not doing enough’ – Grace Sai 46:12

2y ago46:12

46:12

Our guest today is Grace Sai, cofounder and CEO of Unravel Carbon, a company that is making it easier for businesses to track and reduce their carbon emissions, with a focus on Scope 3 emissions and Asia. Grace is a serial entrepreneur and also a VC investor as a Kauffman Fellow. She has an MBA from the University of Oxford (where she was a Skoll S…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep7: ‘If you are among the top growth drivers in any company, why not build your own’ – Ajeet Singh 1:03:29

2+ y ago1:03:29

1:03:29

Our guest today is Ajeet Singh, cofounder and executive chairman of ThoughtSpot. In 2009, he co-founded Nutanix with Dheeraj Pandey and Mohit Aron. Today, it is a listed company in the US with $1.2 billion in ARR. In 2012, he co-founded ThoughtSpot with Amit Prakash. The company is seen as a leader in enterprise data analytics. At its last funding …

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep6: ‘Choose your stakeholders, investors wisely, and you won’t get pulled in different directions’ – Smita Deorah 1:06:49

2+ y ago1:06:49

1:06:49

Our guest today is Smita Deorah, co-founder and Co-CEO of Boulevard Leadership, better known for its edtech business LEAD. Smita and her husband Sumeet Mehta started LEAD in 2012. Today the company reaches a million students in 3500 schools in more than 400 cities in India. It is now a unicorn, privately valued at more than a billion dollars, by in…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep5: ‘Think big; one launch a day is aspirational but possible’ – Pawan K Chandana 51:27

2+ y ago51:27

51:27

Our guest today is Pawan Kumar Chandana, co-founder and CEO of Skyroot Aerospace. Pawan and Naga Bharath Daka, both former ISRO engineers, started Skyroot in 2018 and over the last four years they—and their team of 200—have reached a point where their next big step will be the space flight of their first rocket, Vikram I. Earlier this week, they al…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep4: ‘To win in startup investing, bring differentiated value to founders’ – Ashutosh Sharma 55:32

2+ y ago55:32

55:32

Our guest today is Ashutosh Sharma, head of investments in India for Prosus, one of the world’s biggest technology investors. In this episode, Ashutosh, who has led Prosus’s investments in India for some six years, talks about how an emerging trend in the country’s startup ecosystem is led by entrepreneurs “building in India for India.” That is rea…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep3: ‘If your conviction is strong, follow through, as there’s rarely a right time’ – Bobby Balachandran 50:33

2+ y ago50:33

50:33

Our guest today is Bobby Balachandran, founder, president, and CEO of Exterro Inc., which provides a sophisticated tech platform for global corporations to better manage their governance, risk, and compliance needs. Bobby started out with a BSc in computer science from Government College of Technology in Coimbatore in South India, and an MS in from…

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep2: ‘Deep tech founders need tech-biz grasp, patient money, and stamina for the long game’ – Krishna Rangasayee 50:19

2+ y ago50:19

50:19

In this episode, Krishna Rangasayee, founder and CEO of SiMa.ai, a 30-year veteran of the semiconductor industry, with more than 25 patents to his name, talks about why the edge is the new battleground. He also delves into the reasons that compelled him to take his first entrepreneurial plunge after a long corporate career, building a cross-border …

1
Startup Fridays S3 Ep 1: ‘That teaching hasn’t kept pace with the world became my idea’ – Aditya Prakash 39:44

2+ y ago39:44

39:44

Our guest today is Aditya Prakash, co-founder and CEO of Skidos Labs, an award-winning maker of a children’s educational apps company headquartered in Denmark. Aditya co-founded Skidos in 2013, which today offers a software development kit that can infuse math education for children into any game. Before Skidos, after an MBA from the Indian School …

1
Startup Fridays S2 Ep.15: ‘Entrepreneurship is about selling a future only you see’ — Rajesh Jain 55:51

2+ y ago55:51

55:51

Our guest today is Rajesh Jain, founder and group MD of Netcore Cloud. In the world of entrepreneurship, he is best known for selling one of his earliest ventures, IndiaWorld Communications, to Sify—then Satyam Infoway—for $115 million, in 1999, one of the biggest internet deals of the time in Asia. Jain founded Netcore in 1997, and has bootstrappe…

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