A wanderer who asks questions - and strives to find answers. A very small part of the resistance to authoritarianism in India. X posts are personal views.
Apr 28, 2022 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
Source: Praveen Khandelwal is on the ONDC Advisory Council.
Me: No way. That would be brazen.
(The CAIT's Secretary-General represents 60 million traders, and has been on an anti-Amazon crusade.)
I cited the ONDC consultation-paper, which didn't have Khandelwal's name. (1/7)
Source: He was on the advisory council.
Turns out Khandelwal was on the ONDC Advisory Council from July 2021 onwards. The government announced it, plus this screenshot from the brief to the Advisory Council dated July 16, 2021. (2/7)
Apr 26, 2022 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
To understand the need for an Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC), let's begin with a look at how far e-commerce has come in India.
Since 2015, investments in e-commerce are > $30 billion, excluding Amazon's $6.5 billion. This has ushered in 200 MN transacting users. (1/6)
This is powered by sellers on the marketplace: Flipkart has 90,000 active sellers, as against Amazon India's 100,000 active sellers. In this backdrop, ONDC aspires to create flexibility for sellers to operate between digital platforms, get discovered on B2C apps... (2/6)
Mar 28, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Have you wondered why agtech/ agritech hasn't produced a #unicorn yet? Why has an agtech venture's valuation not crossed a billion dollars?
It's possibly because the global market for software in farming will cross $5 billion in 2026 — farming discovered software recently. [1/5]
My story today is on a pioneering software company from Bengaluru, @CropInTech (Estd 2010) which built its management muscle in the past year on the back of two intuitive strategic calls by Co-founder & CEO Krishna Kumar in mid-2018. [2/5]
Serial entrepreneurs like K Ganesh, who is an investor in @PorteaMedical, note that the centre of gravity and decision-making are very much in India for both Accel and Sequoia. That has helped them come farther than @kleinerperkins, @DFJvc, et al in the region. (2/5)
Mar 11, 2022 • 7 tweets • 4 min read
Few might remember that @Sequoia_India began as a partnership with Westbridge Capital in 2006, or that @Accel_India began as Erasmic Venture Fund. In both cases, a marquee VC brand trusted a local fund that was running and operational with startups in India (1/6)
In my latest article for @thecaptableco, I explore the roots of the two funds, and their contrasting approaches to India. In particular, how Accel India has honed its 'pick and shovel' approach to discovering B2B ventures operating in India. (2/6) the-captable.com/2022/03/accel-…
Mar 1, 2022 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
If you had any doubts that @bharatpeindia's board has been giving Co-founder Ashneer Grover sleepless nights, it literally happened last night.
Minutes before midnight of March 1, Ashneer got an email inviting him for a board meet at 1930 (IST) today. At 12:05, he resigned.(1/7)
The full text of his email is here. yourstory.com/2022/03/ashnee…
But what's this fight boiling down? It's for Ashneer's ~9 percent stake in Resilient Innovations, which runs BharatPe. (2/7)
Mar 1, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Ashneer Grover resigns, but the board meeting must go on. Just another day in the @bharatpeindia saga.
It's a source of wonder that #BharatPe, run by Resilient Innovations, is less than four years old. In August 2021, it raised $370 million in a Series E round!!! Imagine that - for a <4 year old startup. 🧵(1/6) yourstory.com/2022/02/ashnee…
Since the $370-million round in Aug 2021 led by Tiger Global, the BharatPe board has former SBI Chairman Rajnish Kumar heading it, and a non-founder CEO in Suhail Sameer. Significantly, founders — Ashneer Grover and Shashvat Nakrani — backed Suhail in August 2021 (2/6)
Dec 27, 2021 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
One of the pioneers of VC-investing in India passes away: Narendra Gupta, Co-founder of Nexus Venture Partners, died on December 25th. He was 73.
Why was he a pioneer? In 2005, he posited that a VC fund for India needed to operate in the Valley and in India. (1/5)
He pointed out that the cost and quality of product engineering in India was exponentially better than in the US. This became the reason for a spate of investments that his fund, Nexus Venture Partners, made in India. He had to prove this thesis to LPs for nearly a decade. (2/5)
Dec 3, 2021 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Keep a close eye on @DealShareIndia's growth story. The social-ecommerce venture expects to clock $750 million in annualised GMV this month. What's amazing: it raised just $35 million in three rounds of funding since 2018, and unearthed 2 million customers by Dec 2020. (1/4)
Since then, DealShare has added 4 million new customers in a year, raised $144 million by June 2021 in a round led by Tiger Global, and begun to invest in its senior leadership hires, five of whom have been onboarded in the past three months. (2/4)
Dec 1, 2021 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
@BessemerVP has deployed less than $800 million in India before its latest $220 million India fund, announced yesterday.
Its portfolio has @pharmeasyapp, Matrimony.com, Swiggy & LivSpace. A quick 🧵of quotes from this interview with @avpuri by @AmishaA90947916 (1/6)
"Out of the 35-odd deals we have done in the past five or six years, we probably had competition in five of them. Out of those five, we would have been the preferred partner for four — and we lost in one deal." (2/6)
