Startups, jokes, kids and cricket (my cricket tweets are tagged #Cricket, so please mute that if you don't like the sport)
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Mar 9 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
In my work i meet a lot of very ambitious people, and take great pleasure in figuring out the source of their hunger.
Some are endearing: the desire to prove your worth to a parent or a partner; others pedestrian, like keeping up with your batchmates from college. /1
A particularly sad one is the sense of time running out to fulfill your unmet aspirations. The desperation of the middle-aged to have one more tilt at greatness is responsible for a lot of progress in the world.
May 4, 2023 • 13 tweets • 5 min read
A few years ago, we surveyed hundreds of credit card users in the country. We realized that credit cards were a rare financial product in India with very high NPS - people love the product and wanted more and better cards.
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People cited many benefits of the product: interest-free credit, wide acceptance, rewards and cashbacks, predictable cash outflow etc.
This customer love is reflected in growth in credit card spends: monthly transaction value grew 3x over 5 years to Rs. 1.28 Lakh Cr ($16B).
Apr 19, 2023 • 24 tweets • 5 min read
My father is 74 years old. A couple of years ago, some of his FDs were maturing. So he did what old people do: he walked into the bank to redeem them. Big mistake.
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The moment he placed the redemption request, the bankers descended on him like vultures on carrion. He walked out not with a fat cheque but instead with a 10-year illiquid insurance policy. Now a retiree can't touch his money till 2031,but at least the banker made his commission.
Jan 31, 2023 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
I used to be on the board of a startup that reduced salaries across the board due to the poor economy. Everyone got a 20% salary cut, and the founders/CXOs took a 40% cut. The founders expected this to bring people together - one for all and all for one.
Instead, the following happened:
1. *Everyone* started negotiating.
"I came to you on a flat salary"
"I got a low raise last year and didn't complain"
"I have fewer ESOPs than my peers"
...
"So the salary cut should apply to everyone else but not me"
Jan 21, 2023 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Fasten your seatbelts for another Rajasthan story, this time from the slightly more recent past.
In 2015, the Rajasthan government launched an ambitious scheme under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan: door-to-door urban garbage collection.
Municipal vehicles started doing the rounds of every street. But entrenched behaviour is hard to change - people continued to throw garbage in open neighbourhood dumps, defeating the purpose of the scheme.
Dec 10, 2022 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
How do you solve for India's lack of trust in financial institutions? A taxi driver i met in Delhi pays a *30% premium* to a broker to get prepaid tax receipts from MCD, though he knows he can link his bank account to it. "Ek galti hui to poora account khali kar denge".
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Another taxi I took in Bombay didn't have a Fastag. The owner didn't want the amount to be blocked, so prefers to stand in the cash line for 20 minutes every time he crosses the Sea Link. Imagine the productivity lost due to this lack of trust.
Aug 28, 2022 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
A decade ago, I learnt about a most innovative corporate scam.
We were hiring a CFO for a portfolio company, and the best applicant was the CFO of a much larger, recently PE-funded company. This was puzzling because CFOs usually measure their worth through balance sheet size.
When we asked him for his reason for leaving, he was initially evasive. But a finance head wanting to leave for no good reason is a pretty big 🚩, so he eventually came clean.
Mar 4, 2022 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
My favourite Shane Warne memory is from a meaningless IPL game from 2010. #Cricket
I had already lost interest in the IPL by then, and had no idea how the league was going. But flipping through the channels in a sad hotel room, I caught a glimpse of Warne bowling.
The match situation was hopeless. The opposition needed 68 off 54 balls with only three wickets down. But Warne was bowling, so you knew it wasn't over.
Feb 18, 2022 • 17 tweets • 3 min read
April 2020. India was in the middle of the harshest lockdown in the world. The economy had ground to a halt. Millions of Indians were in danger of slipping into poverty because of the loss of jobs and business.
To help tide over the crisis, the RBI announced a moratorium on loan repayments. From April till June, people and businesses didn't need to pay their EMIs.
Oct 3, 2021 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
I love myself a Salade Niçoise (French tuna salad), and had finally found a place in Bangalore that made it well. But last week they suddenly removed it from the menu.
Further investigations revealed that their hand was forced by the mysterious disappearance of canned tuna from the shelves. Apparently no supply has come in since June, and we've exhausted the inventory built up during the pandemic. Good thing canned tuna doesn't go bad.
Jun 24, 2021 • 24 tweets • 4 min read
When I was 18, I lost my entire month's income in 10 minutes of gambling. It was totally worth it. <story>
In 1996, I spent a year in France on a college exchange program. As a poor Indian student, I was entirely dependent on my scholarship: 1200 francs a month.
Jun 14, 2021 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
Heard this incredible story from a senior PSU banker today:
Years ago, when he was a branch manager in Assam, he gave a loan to a farmer. The collateral was a bunch of goats.
The monsoon failed, the farmer defaulted and the banker went to collect the loan. As the borrower was unable to pay, he had to repossess the collateral. So the goats came back with him in his official car.
Jun 11, 2021 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
A less-obvious effect of the pandemic is on the emotional development of children. I hadn't fully realised how large a part social interaction plays in making us fully human. The past 15 months have brought this lesson home.
My wife made an interesting observation recently. The incoming class of 6th graders is much more "childish" than previous classes. In online classes they ask the teacher permission to go to the toilet in their own homes. They complain to the teacher if their pen leaks.
May 30, 2021 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
Can someone who knows economics help me understand this:
Why does the government need tax revenues? A sovereign can print as much money as it wants. It can simply announce in its annual budget that it will print so many rupees to spend in the next FY.
Sure, the value of money will come down proportionately (like share price when a company issues new shares), but that gets baked into the budget. This "dilution" ( inflation) reduces the purchasing power of the currency, and that acts as a constraint against printing too much
She fell in love with a cardiologist, but her heart wasn't in it
May 13, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Random memory:The only perfume I have ever owned was a gift from my co-brother. He's a wildlife conservator who spends half his time in the jungle,and has never worn perfume in his life. The fact that he thought I was this "corporate guy" who wears perfume to work is beyond funny
It is totally on brand for Twitter to focus on an obscure term describing a relation, rather than the essential and entirely hilarious fact that one guy who never wore perfume thought it's a good idea to gift a bottle to another guy who never wore perfume.
Let's forget Pfizer for a minute. Here's a timeline of the AstraZeneca vaccine:
Feb 2020 - Development started at Oxford
May 2020 - Licensed to AZ, 1 BILLION doses ordered (100M UK, 300M US)
June 2020 - SII license granted, WHO orders 300M
July 2020 - Clinical trials begin
May 2, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Genuine question for the advocates of compulsory licensing: what's the long term plan?
Say we can get anyone to manufacture Covishield in any quantity. How do we get mRNA vaccines? How do we get drugs that treat covid? New vaccines and drugs for TB, malaria and AIDS?
Since we don't have any domestic R&D, we depend on western pharma companies for IP. Our domestic pharma industry only manufactures under license. Why will big pharma trust Indian manufacturers again if they believe the government can break their patents any time?
Apr 25, 2021 • 20 tweets • 4 min read
I want to talk about children's mental health in these times.
Advance apologies because it is totally trivial compared to people losing their lives and loved ones. But till you d*e you gotta live, so here goes:
Children, both my own and among friends and family I've spoken to, are terrified with what's going on. They're also lost and confused.
Apr 14, 2021 • 5 tweets • 3 min read
It's a real delight to back an entrepreneur like @Kunal_credflow. He's 25, comes from a small business background and is on a mission to ensure SMBs get paid on time. In our evaluation, *every single* business owner we spoke to identified cash collection as a top business problem
Credflow provides a "collection dashboard" to business owners that tells them who owes what, how long it has been pending for, and who is responsible for collecting it. It talks top the vcustomer to validate invoices, send payment reminders and provide early payment discounts.
Mar 3, 2021 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
My parents told some heartwarming stories about the vaccination drive in Jaipur. At 6.30 this morning, government nurses went around neighborhood parks to round up senior citizens on their morning walks. "Auntie please come, we are open", it seems.
Doctors are specifically requesting those who got the vaccine to post their pictures on Facebook and in WhatsApp groups. Apparently nothing convinces the skeptics better than seeing their friends smiling for the vaccine pic.
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