Forbes India - Tech Conversations
-
Best of 2022 Ep7: Narayan Subramaniam, Niraj Rajmohan and Vishesh Rajaram on learnings from building the F77
In this episode, from September, Niraj Rajmohan and Narayan Subramaniam, co-founders of Ultraviolette Automotive, and Vishesh Rajaram, managing partner at Speciale Invest, talk about the importance of strong local R&D for the long-term growth of the EV sector in India. They also talk about how developing Ultraviolette's first electric motorcycle, the F77, which has since been launched in the market, helped the company build a connected vehicle platform that can support multiple future products and services
-
Best of 2022 Ep6: Saravana Kumar on his dream of building Coimbatore's first SaaS unicorn
In this conversation, from August, Saravana Kumar, founder and CEO of Kovai.co, recalled how he bootstrapped his company from one customer—a casino in Hong Kong—to thousands, including Shell, Boeing and Ikea, in a niche software area, growing to a $10 million ARR SaaS venture out of London and Coimbatore. Saravana—who went from a distance-learning MCA degree to a successful software entrepreneur—spoke of tripling revenue by 2024 and creating the first SaaS unicorn from his hometown
-
Best of 2022 Ep5: Ankita Thakur at GeoIQ on turning her fascination for data into a business
In this episode, we go back to a conversation from August with Ankita Thakur, co-founder and chief data officer at GeoIQ. Ankita spoke about how her fascination with data brought out the idea that became her first successful startup. She also explained the connection between the availability of rich location data and real-world business outcomes for customers—made easy through the APIs that GeoIQ offers, with all the heavy lifting happening in the backend. At the time of this conversation, Ankita was expecting to grow revenues fourfold in the coming quarters
-
Best of 2022 Ep4: Karthik Rajaram at Freshworks on the India opportunity and top priorities
In this episode, we go back to a conversation from July, with Karthik Rajaram, VP and country head for India and ASEAN at Freshworks. At the time, Freshworks had been recently empanelled as a vendor on India's Government e-Marketplace and Karthik spoke about the public sector opportunity. He also spoke about his reasons for joining Freshworks, and his mandate to add many more customers in this market, including the larger established enterprises. On the SaaS ecosystem, Karthik highlighted the growing trend of global enterprise software being developed from India
-
Best of 2022 Ep3: Neha Singh and Abhishek Goyal on dream of building the Bloomberg of private markets
In this episode, we go back to a conversation with Neha Singh and Abhishek Goyal, co-founders of Tracxn Technologies, from July 2022, when they were preparing to take their company public. The company was listed on the stock exchanges in Mumbai in October. In this conversation, Neha and Abhishek spoke about how they teamed up, why they decided to start Tracxn, back in 2013, and their plans ahead. The aspiration is to make Tracxn synonymous with private markets intelligence, just as Bloomberg is with public markets
-
Best of 2022 Ep2: Manish Dabkara on how he built EKI, India's first listed carbon credits company
In this episode, we go back to a conversation from March 2022, with Manish Dabkara, CMD and CEO of EKI Energy Services, India's only listed carbon credits company. EKI Energy, a BSE SME listed company shot to a billion dollars in market value within nine months of going public in April 2021. The company's market value has not been spared by this year's downturn in the global economy. In this conversation, Dabkara spoke about what EKI did, how he came to start the company and the opportunities ahead
-
Best of 2022 Ep1: Francisco D'Souza on the vision for IP-led tech services companies at RECOGNIZE
In this episode, we go back to a conversation with Francisco D'Souza, co-founder and former CEO of Cognizant Technology Solutions, from February this year. In 2020, after more than 25 years at Cognizant, Francisco stepped back from the IT services giant he helped found and build. Since then he's been working on his next innings, as co-founder and managing partner at RECOGNIZE, a $1.3 billion private equity firm in the US that focuses on intellectual-property-led tech services ventures delivering business outcomes
-
Avinash Godkhindi at Zaggle on why expense management SaaS will soon be big in India
In this episode, Avinash Godkhindi, CEO and MD at Zaggle, a fintech SaaS company, talks about why expense management solutions will see strong demand in India soon. He also talks about how, over the last 10 years, keeping Zaggle focused on enterprise customers has paid off. The company has grown from offering employee benefits all the way to vendor management, with customers including some of the biggest Indian and foreign names in operating in India. Plans include some fund raising and acquisitions
-
Bharani Subramaniam at Thoughtworks on what CEOs and young techies should know about tech
In this episode, Bharani Subramaniam, a head of technology in India at Thoughtworks, a well-known software and consulting company that has a strong presence in India, talks about being a lifelong techie. Heading into the year ahead, he also talks about what businesses should know about getting better returns on cloud investments, what CEOs should know about the shifting sands of cyber security, and what young and aspiring techies should learn—beyond coding—to work effectively because software is most often a team effort
-
Sashank Rishyasringa and Gaurav Hinduja at axio on the credit fintech opportunity ahead
In this episode, Sashank Rishyasringa and Gaurav Hinduja, co-founders of axio, a well-known fintech venture in the lending space, talk about how they found their niche with what they call checkout finance. With some six million consumers using their product and adding hundreds of thousands more every month, they also talk about the opportunity ahead to build on top of the checkout finance product, which they've developed into a strong business in partnership with some of the biggest ecommerce players and go deeper into small-town India
-
Brian Stafford at Diligent on tech for the modern board's complex challenges, and plans in India
In this episode, Brian Stafford, CEO of Diligent Corp., talks about how the modern corporate board's mandate has become much more complex and different from the traditional mandate of helping the chief executive to maximise shareholder value. Board members, often outlast CEOs and must take a longer-term view of their companies' futures, he says. Technology, such as the software offered by Diligent, can be useful. Stafford also talks about developing more of that software out of the company's growing office in Bengaluru