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100% authentic wokeness.
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Dickens said, it was the best of the times, it was the worst of the times. The words have never been truer. Best because there’s never been a better time to be an entrepreneur. Worst because the clutter is mind-numbing. Founder Thesis breaks through the noise to bring you stories of success & failure, grit & struggle, bouquets & brickbats from some of the most brilliant entrepreneurs in India.
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On Trailblazers, we dive deep into the journeys of trailblazing South Asians. To date, Simi Shah, our founder and host, has welcomed ClassPass Founder Payal Kadakia, Coinbase Chief Legal Officer Paul Grewal, 49ers President Paraag Marathe, and other world-renowned South Asian trailblazers. Learn more at southasiantrailblazers.com.
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The Accidental VC | Arjun Malhotra @ Good Capital
1:14:48
1:14:48
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1:14:48
Some of the best interviews on the Founder Thesis podcast have been ones in which we feature founders of VC funds, and this one is no different. Arjun Malhotra is the founder and general partner of Good Capital - a high conviction early stage VC fund. Arjun has gone through his own journey of pivots in building Good Capital, with some unexpected tu…
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Building India's largest gold loan aggregator | Rajesh Shet @ SahiBandhu
1:12:30
1:12:30
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1:12:30
Regular listeners of the Founder Thesis podcast would have heard so many stories of young founders who build their venture straight out of college and keep at it for a decade until they find success. This episode is the exact opposite of that kind of Story. Rajesh Shet had more than two decades of experience in the corporate world when he started S…
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The journey of building a 2000cr MCap MFI | HP Singh @ Satin Creditcare
1:24:28
1:24:28
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1:24:28
There are two types of entrepreneurs that we celebrate. The first one is the founder who raised a lot of money and built a highly valued startup on the back of investor money. The second type of entrepreneur - which we think is really the more special type of entrepreneur, is one who started from scratch and built up a business brick by brick on th…
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A masterclass on the services to product pivot | Nishant Patel @ Contentstack
2:05:44
2:05:44
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2:05:44
What’s the first thing that comes to your mind when I tell you that in this episode, we are featuring a Patel who built a business in the US? The stereotype says that he would be running a motel or a convenience store - but this Patel has built a b2b SaaS company that is almost a unicorn. Nishant Patel moved to the US when he was just 14, and then …
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The platform supercharging your reward points | Amit Koshal @ Twid
1:17:20
1:17:20
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1:17:20
Amit Koshal’s entrepreneurial journey began while working on a groundbreaking product at Intuit. Now, at TWID, he’s disrupting payment networks by turning reward points into a currency for transactions—an idea refined over five years of experimentation and failures, eventually leading to the product-market fit. This conversation delves into his pat…
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The investment banker who became an educator | Nikhil Barshikar @ Imarticus Learning
1:22:58
1:22:58
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1:22:58
After a career in U.S. investment banking, Nikhil returned to India to build Imarticus, offering offline-focused boot camps to upskill fresh graduates. Unlike many in the space, Nikhil views Imarticus as an education business rather than an edtech company, with a fundamental focus on delivering real learning outcomes. This approach has helped the c…
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The doctor who fixed co-living in India | Nikhil Sikri @ Zolo
1:47:33
1:47:33
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Every year millions of young people migrate for jobs or education, creating a big market for hostels and paying guest accommodations. However, succeeding in this business depends on managing the operational complexities and getting the small details right. Zolo, one of India’s largest co-living companies, has mastered this challenge, currently mana…
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Building India's largest crypto exchange | Neeraj Khandelwal @ CoinDCX
1:33:23
1:33:23
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Neeraj Khandelwal is a passionate Indian who aspired to serve his country as a civil servant. When his initial plan fell through, he channelled his determination into exploring new ways to fulfil this objective. He saw the transformative potential of cryptocurrency and invested in building India's crypto infrastructure, leading to the creation of C…
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A deep dive into Enterprise AI | Anand Mahurkar @ Findability Sciences
1:54:59
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Anand is an IT veteran who started his career three decades back and in his last role was heading an IT services company. Noticing the pain his customers were facing in searching and interpreting data, he recognized the need for a fundamentally new approach to insight generation, which led to the creation of Findability Sciences. In this episode, h…
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A masterclass on building a 500 cr business | Deepak Sahni @ Healthians
1:55:35
1:55:35
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Deepak Sahni shares his remarkable journey of building one of the largest diagnostics companies in the preventive space. Starting his entrepreneurial journey as a teenager, Deepak has consistently dared to dream bigger with each venture over the last two decades. In this episode, he reveals the secrets behind scaling Healthians to a revenue run rat…
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Building the B2B Payments Stack for India | Sundeep Mohindru @ M1xchange
1:38:37
1:38:37
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1:38:37
Small businesses in India often face delays in payments from large corporations due to complex bureaucratic processes and stringent payment terms. The TReDS system, developed by the RBI, aims to resolve this. With TReDS, businesses can receive immediate payment by selling their invoices to a financier, who then collects the payment from large corpo…
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Priyanka Salot reveals the science of D2C brand-building | The Sleep Company
1:23:12
1:23:12
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Priyanka Salot’s entrepreneurial journey began with her search for a good night's sleep. As a senior marketing leader at P&G, she made the bold decision to leave her corporate role and start The Sleep Company to help India sleep better. Drawing on her experience in building legacy brands at P&G, she guided The Sleep Company to the top of the market…
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A serial founder's journey towards the light | Shreya Mishra @ SolarSquare
1:23:39
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As solar panels become more affordable and government subsidies make them attractive, homeowners can now switch to solar energy for the same cost as their current electricity bills. In this episode, Shreya Mishra provides practical advice and insights from her entrepreneurial journey- she talks about her first venture, Flyrobe, and how she joined S…
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A crypto founder's contrarian take on the future of money | Edul Patel @ Mudrex
2:47:41
2:47:41
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2:47:41
Edul Patel founded Mudrex with a strong belief in cryptocurrency as the future of money. For the past 7 years, he has been building the infrastructure for its mass adoption. He estimates it might take another 10 years to see widespread use. This episode dives into the concept of money and the potential future of currency, offering thought-provoking…
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A Founder's Journey from Transport to Personal Care | Gaurav Agarwal @ Nat Habit
1:32:59
1:32:59
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1:32:59
Every few years, a new trend in the startup world catches the attention of VCs and this episode features a founder who has successfully navigated multiple such trends in the Indian startup scene. Gaurav Agarwal began his entrepreneurial journey with ZipGo, a ride-hailing startup that competed with industry giants like Ola and Uber. After an excitin…
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A computer scientist's hunt for Hard Problems | Sriram Kannan @ Routematic
1:41:24
1:41:24
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Sriram started his journey solving security problems for Texas Instruments, but his passion for tackling hard issues led him to the world of entrepreneurship. Now, 17 years later, he’s taken on the challenge of building a platform enabling companies to provide convenient, safe transportation for their employees while minimising the number of vehicl…
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A serial founder talks about building a Neo Bank | Kunal Varma @ Freo
1:40:50
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Kunal is reimagining banking with Freo, a digital platform that covers all three key financial services: payments, savings, and lending. In this conversation, he spills the tea on the rollercoaster journey of his first business in talent assessments, which eventually got acquired, teaching him valuable lessons along the way. He talks how these expe…
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The investor who built a 250 Cr skincare brand | Romita Mazumdar @ Foxtale
1:39:21
1:39:21
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Romita was working as an analyst for a VC fund when she started working on weekends to build Foxtale. Foxtale quickly became a successful D2C brand, reaching a 250 crore ARR within 2 years of its launch. In this conversation, she explains how her background as an investor helped her become a successful founder and shares her big goals for the futur…
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A deep dive with Kunal Dalal on the business of running schools | JBCN Education
1:26:11
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Explore the critical role of high-quality schools in addressing the root causes of low education standards in India. While Edtech solutions provide temporary relief, Kunal argues that building and running schools is a lasting solution. He shares his journey, his significant challenges, and how he successfully scaled JBCN Education. Get notified abo…
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The monk who sold his Santro | Pankaj Bansal @ PeopleStrong
1:54:36
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Hear how a pivotal moment during his child's school admission led Pankaj Bansal to create PeopleStrong, a pioneering HRTech company. In this conversation, Pankaj shares his journey, from winning prestigious clients to facing tough business challenges. Today, PeopleStrong competes with the biggest global names in HRTech, boasting massive profitabili…
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Rohit Bhayana demystifies private market investing | Oister Global
1:19:21
1:19:21
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Rohit Bhayana, founder of Lumis Partners, one of India's oldest venture investment firms, discusses his latest project, Oister Global. Oister Global is a leading institutional investor endeavouring to invest in a curated selection of top-tier alternative funds in India. Rohit talks about how private investing became mainstream in India, his journey…
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The 'reluctant' founder pioneering energy transition | Bhaktha Keshavachar @ Chara Technologies
1:36:50
1:36:50
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1:36:50
Once a tech wizard at Intel, Bhaktha Keshavachar shifted gears to co-found Ezetap that shook up India's fintech scene with its innovative digital payment solutions, and was eventually acquired by Razorpay. Now, at Chara Technologies, he is engineering a revolutionary Reluctance motor engine that's free of toxic rare-earth minerals.This nifty invent…
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The engine powering India's D2C revolution | Akshay Ghulati @ Shiprocket
1:34:07
1:34:07
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1:34:07
Did you know about 10 to 12% of India’s GDP goes into logistics? That's even more than what the software or automotive industries get! In this episode, we delve into the remarkable journey of Shiprocket as it shakes up the world of e-commerce. Akshay Ghulati talks about Shiprocket’s vision and how they're tackling unique challenges in India's marke…
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Niraj Rajmohan & Narayan Subramaniam are revving up innovation, from garage to global | Ultraviolette Automotive
1:42:13
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1:42:13
We’re living in the golden age of automobiles when they’re shifting from gas-guzzlers to clean, cool electric vehicles (EVs). This shift is creating room for new iconic brands to emerge. One such future iconic brand is the performance EV bike-maker Ultraviolette Automotive whose EV bike F77 has been turning heads. In this episode, Niraj Rajmohan an…
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Exciting Updates: Upcoming Events, Season 8, and our Agency
2:55
2:55
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Send us a text Happy AAPI Heritage Month from South Asian Trailblazers! 👋🏼 In this short soundbite, I’m sharing exciting updates about events we’re hosting around the world(!), Season 8, and our Agency. The highlights: Season 8 goes live this Fall! But we couldn’t wait to share a sneak peek with you…which is why you can enjoy our latest LIVE record…
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Sanjay Ghare takes a masterclass on building vertical SaaS | Vervotech
1:23:26
1:23:26
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1:23:26
Building a successful SaaS business is both challenging and rewarding. There is a real risk that you may end up solving a problem so narrow that it has a very small market but if you focus deeply on solving a common problem, more people will choose your product over a one-size-fits-all solution. In this episode, Sanjay Ghare spills the beans on bui…
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