#3 - Anant Vidur Puri | Venture Capital Investing and Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in India

Hi from Bangalore, India! In this episode,  Kostas Poulakidas and I, Volkan Emre, are hosting   Anant Vidur Puri, a technology and entrepreneurship enthusiast who is a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners’ India branch. 

Bessemer is one of the World’s leading VC companies, with more than 135 IPOs and 200 portfolio companies in the enterprise, consumer and healthcare spaces.  

Anant is an alum of the Harvard Business School. 

Transcript

Episode 3 - Anant Vidur Puri

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 0:04 

 You are tuning into the Lehigh Low Ego High Impact Mindset podcast. I'm your host Volcan, along with a dynamic team of Kellogg School of Management alums. We are here on a shared mission to uncover the mindset that drives impact and success on Lehigh. We have talked provoking conversations with incredibly successful entrepreneurs, business leaders and investors from around the globe. The uncover the mindset that drives them, allowing them to make a high impact without losing themselves to ego. Now let's get started with today's episode. Hi from Bangalore, India Today, Kostas Poulakidas and I are hosting on Anant Vidur Puri, a technology and entrepreneurship enthusiast who is a partner at Bessemer Venture Partners India Branch. Bessemer is one of the world's leading venture capital companies, with more than 135 IPOs and 200 portfolio companies in the Enterprise, Consumer and healthcare spaces. We are recording this podcast in Bessemer, Bangalore office in India. Anand, thank you very much for hosting us at your office on this holiday day in India. We really appreciate it and it's great to have this discussion with you. Thanks. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 1:35 

 No, thank you so much for having me. And I do want to call out this is the best name for a podcast that I've ever seen, really excited beyond this low ego, high impact. I like that. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 1:43 

 Great to hear. No, of course. And I think just in my line of work, when you're when you're working with entrepreneurs, I think the best part of this role and and my job and one of the reasons I like to do this so much is that you get this unique opportunity that when someone when an entrepreneur is building their business out, it's it's what they're doing. It's their passion. It's their dream. And they allow you as an external person, like who's not really involved in their life or their business prior to giving the money to get a ringside view of that business. Basically be on that journey with them while they're building out their dream building of their passion. And that is such a unique spot to be in. It's like it's like saying that somebody gave birth to a baby and they're like, Hey, you're not the parent. You're like, you know, you're like distant aunt. But we'll make sure you see everything that the child does, you know, grows up, learns everything. And that's such a unique, you know, point of view to be in. And you have to have low ego. Like you can't succeed in this role if you have a high ego. In my opinion, yeah, I think it's very great actually. Entry. Normally we have some warm up questions to get the to get you. Well, we should still do the weather, but we still can do it. You know, I, 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 2:59 

 I, I'm looking forward to the one 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 3:00 

 question. Yeah so, so the tradition for, for any new listeners that we have is we have a traditional warm up questions and you know, not only do we hope that you find them enjoyable to listen to, but also I think the answers to these questions maybe also speak a lot into someone's mindset, right into how they think and what they enjoy and what they like. So we'll let the listeners decide. But Volkan Emre, why don't you start off the questions? Okay. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 3:29 

 Coffee or tea? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 3:30 

 Tea 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 3:32 

 dogs or cats? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 3:34 

 Can I say neither? I'm a little afraid of pets

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 3:38 

 fish. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 3:41 

 Mountains or beaches? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 3:42 

 Mountains. Always mountains. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 3:45 

 Text to call. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 3:46 

 Call. God. God. There's so much context. There's so much emotion that gets lost in a text. You know, it's always called nice music or podcasts. Music, 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 4:00 

 PC or Mac. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 4:02 

 BC I tried using a mac I could. I think I'm not smart enough to use a mac, so stick to a PC drive or fly. I like flying. I don't blame you. Yeah. What's worse? Dishes or laundry? 2s Hmm. I think doing like washing the. So the thing is, the laundry machine does most of the job, but then folding the laundry is what really makes it complicated. That's the backend that gets you. Yes, exactly. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 4:32 

 I never I never would have thought about 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 4:34 

 that. Yeah, the process. Yeah. Yeah. Um, what's the first app you open when you start your day? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 4:42 

 So I actually open. I actually open my personal, uh, I, I open my personal app. It's. It's like. It's like it's like my WhatsApp, but I don't see, like, the messages I go to. So we have a family group. I the first thing which I do on my phone is I go to the group, I look at the picture it has like me, my parents, my wife, everyone. So that's the first thing I do in the morning, every morning, because I feel if you see the people who are most important to you in the morning, your day generally goes slightly better. So that's what 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 5:10 

 I do. You know, that's actually a great idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 5:15 

 Always look at the. So, I mean, I look at my wife when I wake up because she's, like, right next to me. But then I. I open the app and I'm like, I go to my. I don't read any text messages or or anything. I just go to the group. I click on the group picture, I see my family, and that's the best way to start 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 5:30 

 my day. Yeah, yeah, I agree. So. So let's dive into what you do, what the firm does. Could you give us give us a little bit about your background and also what the firm does and how you're involved? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 5:45 

 Sure. So, you know, I, I joined Bessemer back in 2014. And and, you know, like this will be a slightly long answer, you know, because the story of how I came here and then I get into what we do. But the story of how I came here is also, I think, interesting. So if you think back, like if you if you were in India in in that time in around June to 2014, it was very unique because 2014 was the first year when we had, you know, this whole, you know, large mega venture capital round. So like you had funds like SoftBank and Tiger and Co two and Naspers and name any large growth equity fund. And you had the first of these unicorns getting created. You had Snapdeal, you had Ola, you had, you know, you had you had, you know, a couple of other companies as well. And there was just so much exuberance in the ecosystem. And I graduated from this university in India called Indian Institute of Technology. I'd And if you've heard anything about the it is it's that a lot of Iot graduates go on to start companies 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 6:49 

 it's an exceptional school in India It 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 6:51 

 is it's a great school. It's a great school. So I was at it in in New Delhi and a lot of my batchmates, a lot of people around me were starting companies and I was in consulting and and I loved consulting. But then it's not as exciting as starting something of your own. And I would see all of these classmates are like, you know, people, you know, like maybe one year above me and they were all kind of starting companies and I was like, Damn, I don't have any great ideas. Like, what do I start? And then I was like, okay, I don't know what to start, but let me be close to these people. Let's figure out a way to be close to the, you know, to all these people. And that's when I learned what venture capital is because I was like, okay, this is great. So I can be close to entrepreneurs. Don't have to start something myself. And then over time, I learn something. So that's why I started to think about joining VC. And then the role with the role with this firm came along. And the interesting thing about about the firm at that time, you know, if you think about 2014 was and even today, you know, as a firm, we are a very tight knit, closed firm. So across the world we have around 25 world partners. And then we have typically we work in an apprenticeship model, so every partner will have like an associate. And then there's a common pool of analysts who work with all the partners in the associates. So what that means is that teams are always very lean. And if you think about it, we're currently managing, I want to say, around 10 billion or so, you know, a number like that in assets. And we have a team of like maybe less than 100 investing people trying to do it. And that's a very lean team structure. What that means is if you're a young analyst joining venture capital, you get a ringside view into a lot of things. So you have a lot more ownership, a lot more you know, things you can do learn. You're not just, you know, buying coffee for people or anything. You're actually doing the work. And that's what really attracted me to this firm because I was like, Hey, if I'm at Bvp, if I'm if I'm here, I'll actually do a lot more than I can do if I'm at, you know. 1s Uh, you know, some other firm because it was like a three member team. When I joined, I was the fourth person. So imagine being the fourth person of a venture capital firm. And you got and I got so much great access and that's how I came into VC. That's a little bit about my background as well. And I think my first day at my job was quite interesting and I want to I always tell the story. So my first day I came into this office. Exactly. This office. Yeah, yeah. And there was nobody in office, you know, because it's a three people team and I was the fourth person and there was nobody in office because here's what happened. One of the other partners, he was out for some meeting. So he was actually just like he was doing his work. Two other people, the two other VP's at that time, they were both independently, separately, having their own kids that same day. So on that same day, my first day of work at Bessemer in Bangalore, the two VP's in in the team were independently with their own kind of like, you know, like in their own families having their own babies. And there was nobody in office. So I didn't know what to do. I was like, okay. I was told I have to reach out to entrepreneurs. So I sent, I think, 22, 23 emails because I was like, okay, these are the most exciting companies. I think let me you know, let me just drop them all in email. And I still remember three people replied on the same day, and that told me a lot about the power that the of the brand that this firm has. So at the firm, you know we are actually over 100 years old. The firm actually started in 911. We've been doing investing since then. 1s The name of the firm that is, you know, comes from the best memorization of steel process, if you've heard of that. You know, that process was kind of, you know, developed by a person whose last name was was the name of the firm that is, I think it was something. And his last name was Bessemer. And he came up with that process. And that process made, you know, Carnegie Steel the lowest cost steel, the lowest cost steel manufacturer, which made them a really large steel manufacturer. And Henry Phillips, one of the co founders, made a bunch of money. And then he put that money into this kind of trust fund kind of stuff. And that became what is today. And so there's a very storied history. And because of that, I emailed 22 people and three of them replied on the same day, within like five hours. And I remember I was like, okay, can we do a call today? And they were like, Yeah. And I did a call and that's when I realized and I was talking about this that these people answered every question that I asked them. Like I was like, Oh, so when did you start? Where did you start this? Where do you choose this as your core customer segment? Oh, you know, you know, who was your first customer? When did your first kind of dollar of money come from? And they answered everything and I was like, Wow. Like, I literally am a new person on this job. I have no idea. I have never met these people. I don't know anything about their business. And they're giving me every single detail. And that's why I say that when you're in venture capital, especially for a firm like Bvp, you have this kind of responsibility because founders will give you a lot of attention. They will answer every question you ask them. They will value everything you say, and you have to be really responsible. What you do with that attention. Like you have to remember that it's their business. We we like to say that we are invited guests to any company that we invest in so they allow us to be there. We don't have any right to be there. And and yeah, like, like the reason I went on that entire detail, I know you just asked me one very small question, but the reason I entered that was because that's a large part why I joined the firm in 2014. I left them in between to go to my, you know, business school degree. And then I came back again because I was like, this is such a great place to work. This is such a great opportunity you have. I love working with the people here, really enjoy what I'm doing. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 12:31 

 There's there's another detail about your background that I also find interesting. You know, Wark and I are here. We're in India. It's been incredible. We were in Delhi, now we're in Bangalore. And, you know, we're with we're fortunate to be a part of the Kellogg 1s School of Management at Northwestern's program that allows us to come over here and and study and focus on India Tech and all the things that are going on in India. And, you know, I was talking to you earlier, and in many ways, I you know, this experience has been you know, I feel like I've come to India and I've seen the future. Right? So, you know, with your background, you know, maybe if you would have studied you went to Harvard and you came to India, maybe if you would have studied a little harder, you would have been able to go into to to if only yes, yes. If only, if only Anyway, But but no, I mean, you went to Harvard Business School. Yes. And you came to India. You you could have probably gone, you know, any place, um. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 13:32 

 Including Bessemer in the US, right? Yes. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 13:35 

 Yes. Right, right. I mean, I'm making some assumptions, but. But no, that's right. That's right. Right. And so. 1s Why did you have a crystal ball that you knew that this was coming? Or what was the motivation? What was that thought? This is. I'm coming home. Yes, there were three different dimensions of reasons. So one was just pure. Um, you know, the US is a 2 to 3% growth economy. India is a 6 to 8% growth economy. If you take a 10 to 20 year view, there's going to be a lot more value generation in this part of the world that, you know, I mean, the US already has had a lot of great value generation and but India is a little bit earlier in its journey, so that was like the pure economical reason that, hey, it's more likely that you'll make more returns as an investor if you're in this part of the world because the returns are just higher, the economy is growing faster. But that was, I think, the, you know, like the more logical way of thinking, I think the more emotional way of thinking was. I, um, I feel that investing is such a people's business and it's got like, you need a lot of context when I, you know, talk to an entrepreneur in India, I don't just want to know that. What's your business? I want to know where you grew up. Where do you make the, you know, choices that you did? Why did you decide to go study here or, you know, go work there? And I can understand a lot about them as a person when I hear those answers. If I do that same thing in the US, I just don't have that context and that's the honest reason I wouldn't have I don't think I'll be as good as good of an investor in the US as I am here in India just because I understand Indian people better, because I grew up here and I live here. And the third reason was that, look, I think we spent 8 to 10 hours of our day at work five days a week. So it's a considerable part of your life and you don't and, you know, you want to spend that at a place where you like spending time. And I have heard so many stories about people who are like, Oh, I don't like my workplace, I don't like my manager, I don't like blah, blah, blah, blah. And I remember that I. Really missed this office when I went to business school. Like, I remember my last day before I went to business school, I was talking to our legal counsel and he was like, So are you like excited that work is done? I'm like, No, I'm actually feeling a little bit bad that I won't know what you're all doing in the next two years. And I realized that's such a unique feeling. I didn't want to live like there was no way I was going to leave that. If I found a place where I like the people, I like the firm, you know, it's fine. Just just stay there. I think that's that that's the optimization I did. So those are the three reasons. That's great. That's 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 16:17 

 great. Great. So, um, one question. Like, we are mid-career professionals, that Kellogg's executive MBA program and we have surrounded by really brilliant Indian, uh, immigrant tech leaders and, um, but they belong to it. Different generation. India currently has a population of like 60% of the population is aged 35 and below. Yes. And 50% of the population is aged like 25 and below. Yes. And you have a different generation, um, with a very high confidence. Yeah. And it seems that there has been a shift in the confidence of Indian Indian youth. Yeah. And, uh, we have been observing that there is a possible reflection of the shift in confidence to the entrepreneurial scene and ecosystem. Um, how would you. What would be your your comments on that trend? And do you see any risks in terms of like the sustainability of that? The number of people we are having in India in terms of like being employed and keeping their hopes up and potentially having any risk for potentially an 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 17:40 

 erosion in that particular risk in the short and long term future. Sort of if the question is too long. But the confidence needs to be kept up to give hope to millions of hundreds of millions of people. And there may be some challenges. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 17:56 

 Yeah. So I think the heart of you know, so I think there is there's two parts to what you said. One is this sense of confidence that the new generation has that we can we can be world beaters, we can do whatever we want. We can, you know, we can go get whatever we want. I think that's part one. And part two is, you know, so why is that happening? Why is this different in this generation? And second is, can it be sustained? Like, is there enough, you know, meat behind it? You know, it's you know, it should not be false confidence. Right. So I think the first part. Why is that? You know, the generation of people who were born in the 90s, I think, or like after 85, 88, they have seen in India, which has opened up economically like 1991 was the great kind of, you know, was a big kind of it was it was a watershed moment when we opened up our economy, a lot of FDI, a lot of, you know, capital from from many different parts of the world. And so this generation grew up in a world where globalization was the norm, as opposed to the prior generation, which grew up in a world which was, you know, just kind of getting independence, just finding their feet. And so this new generation is like, hey, we saw global products and global brands and global people coming into our country the day we were born. So they just, you know, it's very natural for them to assume that they can also do the same thing. And the reason you see a lot of Indian immigrants everywhere is because they're like, hey. You know, people can come and sell stuff here. We can go and sell stuff there. And that's really the philosophical source of that conference. As for me, as for me, you know, And how can that be sustained? I think I think yes. And the reason for that is, look, we're depending on which and I'll probably cite this fact two times again, but depending on which economists you believe, we're between a 6 to 8% growth economy. And when you're a 6 to 8% growth economy, you're adding at the scale of the economy that we are, which is around between I think close to around 3 trillion, you know, is the last number. You're basically adding close to like 150 billion, like 160 to $250 billion of GDP every year. And if you think of the people that you have, you know, that is a large number. You're adding $250 billion of GDP every year. That is more than enough to sustain the hopes, dreams, ambitions of whoever or the entire generation. And the secular trend of that growth is something that's super interesting. The fact that, you know, if you look at like the last, say, 15, 20 years, that growth has always been in that ballpark. And that's what gives me the ability to say that, yes, I think there is enough depth in the ecosystem. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 20:41 

 So thank you very much. It's great answer. And you are confident that this level of confidence is going to be sustained and hopefully it will increase too. So you are professionally investing, right in 1s in. Founders belonging different generations. Yes. And how are you like seeing the difference between the generations, like the group of people who were born safe after 1999 and the ones that before that time period? I think you have both sides of the question in your in your investment portfolio, What are the main characteristics and differences of these two two generations in your view? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 21:25 

 There are a lot of them, but I'll try to like maybe give the 2 or 3 which are key. I think the first is just building for India versus building for the world. So, for example, you know, a lot of people, a lot of the entrepreneurs are a little bit, you know, who have more work experience. They tend to build companies for the Indian economy. Whereas the, you know, the young college graduates like the 23, 24 year old, you know, and we have those young founders in in our portfolio as well. They are the ones who are like, hey, we want to build for the world on day one. And so a classic example is we've invested in this banking software company. It's called Perforce, and it's like pretty much like the go to banking software company in India. Every bank in India uses them, you know, super high growth, you know, profitable, all the good things. And they made like they spent the first 8 to 10 years of their journey only selling to banks in India, and now they're thinking of going global. On the other hand, I've invested in this company called Pepper Content, which is a AI enabled content company, and that's founded by the company, was started by these two young college graduates. They actually started the company before they graduated their bachelor's degree and their first customers were global because they were like, We want to build for the world. And I think that is one big difference. The other big you know, the other differences, the, you know, and is that the people who've been like the this new generation, they are a lot more optimistic on their product talents. So the folks at Pepper are like, hey, our product is is going to be the best in the world. Like, why wouldn't it be? And and I'm not like, you know, and I'm not saying it's not. I mean, it is, but, you know, the ability to say that when you are 21 versus you have, you know, you know, you know, the founders, I'd say perforce, were like considerably, you know, they've got a lot more kind of, you know, experience. And they were like, hey, we want to build a great product for India and then we'll make sure it's also great for the world. And that's, you know, that's another kind of difference. So I think that's, for me, the biggest, biggest, you know, I mean, there's many other differences, like work experience kind of, you know, brings a lot of pros and cons with it. But I think that's the biggest axis of differentiation, which I find 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 23:46 

 that's interesting. The the kind of sticking with that that point, you know, when you're analyzing an investment. Right. Right. A potential startup the. You know, this is the number side of it. Right. And then there's what I like to think of is the the EC side of it, particularly around the entrepreneur founder. 2s What if you see a deal on the numbers just look great. 2s What do you look for in the entrepreneur? Right right. So taking taking out that that the numbers the model 1s all work. Yeah. Now let's just look at the investor. Right. Right. You know, I think some of our listeners are entrepreneurs. Right? And, you know, I think sometimes I hear entrepreneurs and it's the business model, the business model, and they don't realize, well, actually a big part of the equation is, is you. Could you maybe talk and maybe if you were giving some some of our listeners advice on what you're looking for in an entrepreneurial even if you had the best, most disruptive idea. Right. What might turn you off? What might turn you on to wanting to become a partner with them? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 25:00 

 Yeah. No, I you know, I think at this, you know, you know, we mostly invest at an early stage, which is like a a seed series. A series B series C, like, you know, the company is still fairly young at that time. And the entrepreneur is everything, to be honest. Like the number of companies where we invested in an X business and the business became something completely different y business later. But the entrepreneur remain the same because you can change pretty much everything you want. Like you can, you know, you can you can change your market, you can change your customer segment, you can build a new product, but you're pretty much you can't change your team. You know, I mean, I mean, theoretically you can change your team, but that's not I mean, that's not why a VC investor would like, come behind a company, right? So the team is really everything. And the biggest there are a lot of good qualities that I look for, but the two ones which I really, really want to see in an entrepreneur and I think that's which I think are super important. One is the ability to attract people who are more talented than you are to come work for you. So another test that I do and is that, hey, would I want to work for this entrepreneur? And if I don't feel 101% convinced that I would definitely want to work for this founder, You know, it's always a question in my mind because like, if they can't attract me to work with them, can they attract people better than me or better than themselves to come work for them? Because eventually I think the number one job of an entrepreneur, of of a founder is to build a team of operators more skilled, more talented than themselves so that they can make themselves redundant. Honestly, that's the best thing you can do If, if if the founder can take a three week break and go to like the Bahamas or something and come back and the business hasn't changed one bit, that's really, really strong. And that happens when you can hire people smarter than yourselves to do the things that you can do, but they can do it much better than you. So that's one big quality you look for. Can you attract high quality talent? Second, are you humble enough to take feedback? You know, and that's really important because in every entrepreneurial journey, in every investing journey, in every deal journey that I have done, there are ups and downs. There is no you know, there's no risk free return. There's risk in everything, Right? And there will be ups and downs. There will be times when you'll get things wrong. There will be times when, you know, a strategy fails. There will be times when you launch the product and it didn't take off quite the way you expected it to. How comfortable are you taking feedback, acknowledging that, Hey. Something didn't work. Let's go back to the drawing board. It's fine. We tried. We learned a lot from it. We don't have to, like, feel sad about it or bad about it. But yes, we have to course correct. And let's go into that problem solving mode back again. So I think that's the humility of accepting that you can you will make mistakes and you it's okay to make mistakes. So those are two qualities which I specifically look for. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 27:49 

 Yeah, it seems like the ego, right? Yeah. Is, is I, you know, interestingly enough, part of, of a good investment. 1s Yes you know, I know I could actually I think Vulcan a couple of years ago when we first met I was looking at a at a deck and just analyzing the investment. And part of the pitch was, you know, world domination was was part of their their business model. Right. And, you know, I get that. But there was also bravado that that came with that, that that was a genuine part of of their business model. And you know, it kind of you got to stop and pause what you're investing in when 1s you know it's it's your there's too much hubris in the investment I guess. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 28:41 

 Yeah yeah I think it's you know, and it's going to happen See that's people call me pessimistic, but every entrepreneur that I invest in, like before I finalize the investment, I asked, I actually tell them that, hey, look, there will be times when you and I will not agree. You know, we have differing points of view and there will be times and you will always have the final call. But then there will be times when you make, you know, that final call and you realize it wasn't right. And I promise you, I'm not going to be in the mode of I told you so, but you have to promise me that you will be humble enough to see what happened and kind of, of course, correct. And that's the agreement that we both come to. Yeah. Uh, because that's so important. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 29:22 

 Yeah. Yeah, absolutely agree. It's a partnership, 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 29:24 

 right? It's a partnership. You got to. You got to learn from each other. Yes. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 29:30 

 How do you. 2s Then identifying 1s risks and creating a mitigation like for them. How do you distinguish a real risk? And just something like this, not really real, like just a sound. 1s What type of judgment mindset like do you have when it comes to identifying risks and developing a mitigation strategy? Especially you are investing using someone else's money, which is a very big responsibility. Yes. And how about your risk assessment mindset? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 30:10 

 Yes. So the way I think about risk when I'm making investments is so so first of all, so so when we make an investment, um, so we, you know, at bvp, we follow this, this approach called roadmap driven approach to investing. What that means is we will first build a roadmap. And the best way to think of a roadmap is it's a thesis, but on steroids. So it's literally for us, it's a map to find the best companies. So we'll spend a lot of time on a space. So let's say I'm looking at, you know, financial software in India. So I'll be like, Hey, I'll go and meet like. See 100 companies or as many companies as I can. I'll talk to industry experts. I'll talk to potential customers and I'll come back and think, okay, fine, This is these are the seven different problems that financial software company is trying to solve in India. I think these four are large enough and real enough based on my judgment. And I think within these four, these are the qualities that these are three qualities that an entrepreneur needs to have. A company needs to have the pricing model business model. So I come up with like a very detailed framework. And then by the way, we publish all this like this all in the public. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 31:19 

 So I've already done that work. So when I'm looking at an investment in that space, I've already identified that, Hey, these are the only four kinds of companies that I'm going to look for, or the four kinds of problems of, you know, companies which are solving one of those kinds of or solving one of those four kinds of problems. And so I and I know, you know, as a part of the roadmap process, I would have thought of what are the risks to this roadmap or the risks to investing in this space. So that's one kind of which is the roadmap risks that, hey, if people just stop buying financial software and I have already accounted for that when I build that roadmap that, hey, I think I'm fairly comfortable and, you know, like I take that call as an investment manager. But then there are, you know, there's execution risks and then there's like, you know, real market risks that I think you can never do enough to as an investor, you can't really do much about them. The honest answer is I can't do anything about those risks. So if I'm investing in a financial software company, I know there is a risk that, hey, one customer becomes so large, they come back and, you know, start, you know, really pulling you down on the price that you're charging them. There's a chance that your product only works for the three customers that you have today, but you're not able to scale your technology team to really scale the product. There's a chance that three other competitors come up with a newer technology stack because technology is like changing every day and your team is not able to keep up with it. Like there's so many of these things, right? But I really can't do anything about any one of them. The only person who can do something about them is the entrepreneur, which is why when I think of any risk in investment, I always discuss every risk, risk that I have identified with the entrepreneur. I'm like, Hey, I thought, this is a risk. What do you think? And usually the answer that I'm looking for is that, yeah, I agree that the risk, but these are the reasons why I think we will not kind of run into that. But if we do, this is what we'll do. And now usually most founders will not have as structured an answer to it at the stage that we invest. But directionally, that's what I'm looking to here. What I'm not looking to hear is, Oh, that's not a risk at all because. Right. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 33:20 

 You know, I know eventually you as the entrepreneur, I'm going to have to solve for that risk. So if I feel that like I need to feel comfortable that you understand this is a risk and you've already thought about it because that's what eventually that's what it will solve for that risk. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 33:35 

 On the risk. Yes. I want to open a different dimension, uh, in the topic of risk. Right. Indian diaspora members. Indian immigrant professionals. Indian tech professionals. Right. Um, I think number wise, most of them, they live in the US and some, some in the UK. Um, for them, like leaving the corporate ladder and coming back to India to start something new, maybe a very big risk, right, for them individually. Um, what would be your message? I think in your listening audience there will be a lot of, um, Indian immigrant tech professionals and we would be very interested, like in, uh, in this podcast, in my opinion, this episode specifically. So, um, what would be your recommendation for the diaspora members who may or who are considering coming back to India and starting like in India? Uh, what would be your advice like for them? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 34:38 

 Just come 2s reach out to me, we'll help you find a job. No, but seriously, uh, you know, I go back to the same question. If you're living in the Bay Area or like, you know, UK or Germany or wherever, like Tel Aviv, Israel, wherever there's a tech hub. The fact of the matter is that none of those tech hubs are growing as fast on a macro scale as India is. And if you're working in a company, you're most of the value that you're kind of going to generate for yourself. Like in pure monetary terms, just looking at that is going to come from your stock options. ESOPs whatever the chances of your ESOPs growing faster in India are just so much higher. So that's just pure financial terms I think on a. Non financial terms as well. I go back to the thing that you can, you know, problem solving and you know, entrepreneurship is something that's a lot to do 1s about, you know, it has a lot to do with the context of the local economy and the people in that local economy. And if you are an Indian kind of student who grew up in India, went to study in the US for their masters or whatever, and is now been there for like 3 or 4 years. Yes, you've been in that economy for three, five years, but you spent like maybe 20, 22 years of your life in this country and you just understand the problems and the solutions to this problem so much better. You'll have an unfair advantage if you start up in this country as opposed to if you start up in that country. Because if you start up in a country where you lived for six years, yes, you can be the smartest person in that country, but you still have at least 20 years less experience of living in that country, of dealing with those problems, of working with people in that geography. And that's always going to be a disadvantage to you. You can overcome it. A lot of entrepreneurs have overcome it, like it's totally possible to do it. But if you want to play the odds, the odds are just the odds of you succeeding are just better here because you understand so much more about the economy. And in today's job market today, the economic environment, I mean, India remains the oasis of economic development and growth. Like if you look at what's happening in the US, especially around inflation, you know, all the rising interest rates, all of that, India are still where it was like our interest rates, you know, have been steady or have have been pretty much constant. Our inflation hasn't kind of spiked our our market hasn't dropped 30%. So even at a macro scale today, there is no better place to be than India. And if you grew up in this country, you have such a big unfair advantage when you come back here. Yeah, you should just just come right now. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 37:11 

 It's 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 37:13 

 definitely a good pitch here. The so along those lines, 1s let's talk about deal flow. And also in the context of you just mentioned Silicon Valley versus versus India and there's the ecosystems and and what they're putting out in terms of startups. 2s There's so much activity going on on here. And maybe from an investor perspective, you know, are you seeing more, you know, and I'm painting with a broad brush when I use some of these words, but are you seeing just generally more potential potential unicorns here then you might say in the United States, you know, United States, it's fast, Right. But what in terms of the potential, not not trying to make account of what actual unicorns are coming out, but the future is is where are you saying. Are there more potential? Is the potential greater here for that unicorn to happen or is it in the United States still or 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 38:15 

 what are your thoughts on that? So so first, I would encourage any entrepreneurs who are hearing this podcast try and be a centaur. A centaur is a company that's got into $100 million of revenue, okay, as opposed to a unicorn because a unicorn is with a certain valuation and valuations are not in the entrepreneur's control. You know, this is just something and I'll come to your you know, no, I'll I'll give the answer. But the thing is that the valuation like, you know, the Fed wakes up and raises rates and all of a sudden the public markets tank and the market, you know, revenue multiples are down and and all of a sudden your company is worth less. You really can't do much about it. So don't focus so much on the valuation, focus on the revenue. Because if you're an and hence we kind of we as a firm came up with this world called you know, so we said don't try to be a unicorn. Try to be a centaur or a centaur is a company with $100 million of annualized revenue. Because if you have $100 million of revenue, you are probably going to be really valuable as a company. And then, you know, the valuation that's so external, you can't really do much about it. But coming back to your question, do I feel there'll be more centaurs or more valuable companies in India? Right, 100%. See, because the way to think about it is the number of problems that need solving in India right now. There's so much more than the number of problems that need solving in the US. And that's not because there are no problems in the US, but it's just that the US has solved those problems. Like the entrepreneurial ecosystem is so deep in the US, like it's been around for like 40, 50 years. Whereas in India the entrepreneurial or like the venture ecosystem, especially on the technology side, is maybe 15 years old at Max. And so you're still in the early stages of that journey. So there's so many more problems to solve. Hence probabilistically, there's going to be more companies, there's a more there's a higher likelihood that a company that you're investing in here goes on to become a large outcome because there are many, many more large outcomes that are that need to be created, that many real problems that need to be solved here. The other thing is the amount of capital, especially the you know, and you know, this is more from a VCs perspective, me as a venture capital investor, the amount of capital that's invested in India as an economy relative to the economy size and versus, say, the US, we're still very capital, we're still very under penetrated on on like the venture capital in the economy. There's you know if there's only a like if you think of a ten, 15, 20 kind of kind of, you know larger like a Series C and beyond, there are very few funds still who actually come and play in that space. And so, you know, you have the ability as an investor to pick and choose better companies because you have less competition. And I'm not saying that like I want more funds to come into India because that gives more capital to entrepreneurs that levels the playing field more. But as that's happening, we're still a very under penetrated market in terms of venture capital. So it's better to you know, I think it's yeah, I agree there will be a lot more valuable companies created here. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 41:11 

 Yeah. One question like, um, we learned here that the most of the, um, capital equity comes from within, like domestic capital in India. So the majority of the investments are actually through the domestic. Domestic. Yeah. I think 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 41:27 

 we heard it's somewhere between 80 to 80 to 85% right now of investors in Indian startups or Indian as opposed to outside of India. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 41:39 

 And with that, I think the the Minister of technology like status to us and the numbers can change. Maybe it can change the proportion, but it seems that the majority of Indian capital, uh, as an entrepreneur like former entrepreneur, I will say now maybe, maybe entrepreneur in the making again. So, uh, we are really very energized and impressed by what we saw in India. But there hasn't been like many mentions like to us for foreigners, like coming into India and starting in India. And I will I will love to hear that like more, but somehow it didn't happen. It may be. 2s The problems it needs to be solved are like very domestic, and we may not be able to like understanding what one one thing that inspired like what causes us and I earlier today was we visited a 2s toddler. Yeah. Yeah. He builds like he builds and unicorn. Yeah. And and we invested 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 42:41 

 in that company. Yeah. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 42:42 

 He's right now like he's right now on to like something different and the problems that he solved at scale and we understand that they are really important problems but it seems that the beginning points are simple like it's simple problems that in everyday person is facing. Right, Right. And how about like, I'm just like really curious, Like, is there room for like, non-Indians coming to India with their entrepreneurial entrepreneurial drive and 2s try to solve like, similar simple problems? And is there any path for them or any any likelihood for them to be successful in India by starting something from scratch? 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 43:26 

 So I think anecdotally I can think of a couple of companies which. Have done fairly well. I'm not sure of the exact numbers, but there are definitely companies in India that have been started by founders who are not Indians. But that number is extremely like I can think of maybe 1 or 2. And I think the reason for that is, you know, what you said is correct, that the the problems in India are so unique to the Indian economy that you need to have experienced them first hand to really solve for them. So I'll give you an example. When we invested in Bigbasket, which is the company that that Abhay kind of he was, he was the founder of Bigbasket is a grocery delivery company in India. Now, we had several other so they were like, like with every category in India, they were like, there was always competition. So they were like maybe ten other grocery companies which existed at some point, which were backed by like venture capital. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 44:25 

 And a lot of them were being backed by investors who were not who did not have a team on the ground in India. And what we realized was that a common theme there was a lot of people were looking at, Hey, how was grocery built in the US? Or if it was and I believe there was a big company which raised a lot of money, I'm forgetting the name. And then it kind of shut down. And then I think Instacart was the model that really seems to be working. So a lot of people are trying to invest in Instacart like companies in India. Now, the challenge was that. Instacart works where you go. You have Whole Foods and you have, you know, you know, H-e-b and Kroger and, you know, all these different grocery chains and somebody goes and picks up the right assortment that you want and comes and gives it to your house and you pay them a convenience fee and you give them a tip and like that's how they make their money in India, the problem is there is no Wholefoods, there is no Kroger, there's no H-e-b, there's no for local grocery stores in every state. And so if you ask someone, Hey, I want to get these 20 things, they don't know where to get it from. Yeah. So what big baskets for was, you know, the reason Big Basket was unique was they were like, Hey, we don't want to pick up groceries or somewhere else. We will build the supply chain. We'll go to the farm, we'll go to the farm at 4 a.m., we'll pick up the produce, we'll grade it sorted, make sure it's in our warehouses, ready to be sent out by, like 637, and you can start placing orders at seven. And our own delivery people will pick it up from our warehouse, which we sourced from our farms, which we have contracts with, and we will give that to you. And that model was extremely hard to get off the ground because it required a lot more investment. You know, you have to like build these warehouses, go to these farms. But that's the model which if you fast forward, that's the model which is working. And that's because that's such a uniquely Indian thing that like, if like I know that if I want a certain SKU, I, I'm not sure if it'll be in there in that store. And availability itself is a challenge. It's not about getting it from the store. It's just that, you know, I may not have the exact milk that I want in that store and I need to find the store which carries that. And the Instacart equivalent business model is just harder because you have to go to five stores to find the stuff that order. Sure. So now that is an example of the problem being so domestically focused. You can't take a foreign lens to it. That being said, I don't want to sound like I'm discouraging entrepreneurs from other parts of the world to come to India. We are very open to people coming in. But my sense is, I mean, if you do want to do that, come and spend some time here, live here, see the problems before you apply a global first solution to the problem 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 46:56 

 or get inspired by the solutions in India and bring it to your country. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 47:01 

 That is. Yeah, I think that's that's actually happening. So that's it's really interesting that you kind of talk about it. I remember one of our investors in the US who also spent some time looking at startups in South America. He's like, Hey, so he, he dropped me an email. He said, Hey, I got this pitch from this company. They want to be the Me show of Brazil. Have you heard of me show? And I'm like, Yeah, Me is a pretty large company in India. It's it's doing fairly well, I believe. And that was the first instance. We were like, oh, something started in and that's like a, it's like a social commerce company which started out in India. It's a very India first kind of kind of a problem. And now people in Brazil, it seems like, are using that as an example site like. And that was really great to hear. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 47:41 

 Yeah, I guess it's showing a milestone in the development of the Indian ecosystem. The, you know, along those lines is. 2s Is. Where do you see? I mean, we're sitting here in India. What do you see? India 15, 20 years from now. And but also, what do you see your role in that? 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 48:05 

 Yeah. So, look, I think India, if I take a 20 year view next two decades are going to be super interesting, super exciting for India, you know, depending on which economist you believe. Like I said before, 6 to 8% growth compounding every year. We're probably going to grow from a 3 trillion to a 10 to $15 trillion economy. 2s And I think that's going to happen irrespective of, you know, you know, what I do or what someone else does, because that's just the macro. That's just the country. There's enough people in this country who are moving this country forward. And hence in that context, like when you ask me what my role is, it becomes interesting because I'm not like, it's not like I am like I'm not definitely I am not the one like. Like I said, whether I am here or not, somebody else is here to do the work. And hence I think of this more as. A privilege to have the ringside view to these companies being built like, you know, when we invested, when we invested. So the first company, which I which I sourced when I was when I was an analyst here at Bvp was this company called Urban Company. They're a home services company being built. So they're basically aggregating local service professionals like electricians, plumbers, carpenters, you know, and so on and so forth. And they're kind of organizing them and they train them, they provide them like a lot of, you know, tools, etcetera, etcetera. And they and then those service professionals come to your house and do the service. And I remember when we first met that company and we were like, so like, like one of the things that we asked our biraj, the founder, was that you realize these are people who haven't really worked in a formal economy. How are you going to teach them or train them to go into someone's house, provide like a five star service? And he's like, but that needs to happen. If India has to be grown like that is going to happen. And, you know, the way they solved it is so interesting. They have they go so deep, they have the ability to like. So when they get these these, you know, service people, they're like, hey, we'll make sure you stay in a good place. So they have deals on housing, on the uniforms, on training, on education, on their kids education, on like home loans, like they have built an ecosystem. And so I always think of if, you know, I had the ability I had the good fortune of sourcing, of kind of sourcing that deal of being a part of the initial urban company investment. The company continues to go from strength to strength. And I feel there are so many other, you know, urban companies which will be built in India. There's so many other people who come from very different backgrounds who will come and say that, hey, something that I as an aunt feel that, oh, is that really possible? And then they'll come and tell me no, but that needs to happen. If it's vision of a $10 trillion Indian economy needs to be panned out. I'm like, Yes. And the ability to have a ringside view into that being created. I just want to make sure that as many people can be touched by either Bessemer or me and can be inspired to do that. That's that's my role. That's my job. That's if I do that, you know, irrespective of how the investments show up kind of turn out, I think I'll have done my bit. And that's the most important role. Just keep giving advice. Capital where possible, you know, help but keep inspiring people to do stuff that they're already doing really. But it's it's a it's a unique privilege to be in this position, I think. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 51:29 

 And I thank you very much for your time. We appreciate learning from you. 

 ANANT VIDUR PURI 

 51:34 

 No, thank you so much. This was this was a great conversation. A lot of a lot of interesting, you know, questions. And yeah, to all the audience who are thinking about India, please come here. 

 KOSTAS POULAKIDAS 

 51:44 

 It's a great place to be. 

 VOLKAN EMRE 

 51:50 

 Thank you for diving deep with us on another episode of Lehigh No Ego High Impact Mindset. Join us every week as we discover the stories, strategies and insights that will empower you to grow personally and professionally. Stay inspired and catch you in the next one.