Every argument clarity score on this site is built from rows on this page. Each
question and answer was assessed with names hidden, the host's own answers included, on
four things from 1 to 5:
directness (does it answer the question asked), coherence (do the ideas follow),
precision (concrete details and clear references), compression (says a lot per word). The weighted
mix (30/30/25/15) is the exchange score. A person's published score averages their exchange
scores on raw tape only, at least 8 of them, shrunk toward the cohort mean.
Full method →
Answered raw tape
D 5 · C 5 · P 5 · Cm 5 5.00
Q And you were managing the trading desk for Asia?
A Not trading desk. I was the junior most trader to start off. And when I joined in 98, I was lucky to, you know, After three months of rotating around various rice trading, coal trading, green coffee trading, uh, I found my boss, Jens Nelson, his name, he was trading in, uh, in coffee and he was ex, uh, head of Goldman in Asia. So with him, I actually built entire desk from fifty million to billion dollar book in about two years time. So that's where I got a lot of exposure. I used to go to travel, 29 days a month. I used to start making calls at seven AM till two P two AM in the morning. All across the globe selling coffee from Vietnam. So I actually spent a lot of time in popularizing Vietnam origin coffee.
AI assessment note: “Not trading desk. I was the junior most trader to start off.”
Answered raw tape
D 5 · C 5 · P 5 · Cm 4 4.85
Q The number of AI companies getting produced from India will be huge, right? Because we are now running the way of where people have made money from Freshworks. They have made money from a car. And I assume in the next 10 years, there might be hundreds such outcomes. Now we have a handful of outcomes.
A So I'll tell you, it's a very interesting, you brought up the statistics, right? So in Together Fund, when ChairGPT was launched, first six months, any silence. We saw maybe one company a month, which is an AI. We thought something is really wrong. Maybe Indians are not getting it. We are not able to get it. What we can do as a fund. After six months, we started seeing more 10 companies a month. Right now, for last three months, we're seeing a hundred companies a month. Yeah, that's the scale. And all kind of people are jumping in. So the first time we are seeing actually people from MNC is also coming. Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, they've all worked on, you know, AI teams, and Indians are there everywhere thanks to technology and our superior education. So we are seeing that cohort. We are seeing very young people from the college who are coming in saying, I want to do a small project in AI. We started seeing that. We're seeing a lot of second time founders who are coming into play as well. I think it is because the scale of the value creation opportunity is huge. So you're absolutely right. So we're going to see huge amount of companies getting started. And some will break out from that.
AI assessment note: “Right now, for last three months, we're seeing a hundred companies a month.”
Answered raw tape
D 5 · C 5 · P 4 · Cm 4 4.60
Q And what were the first two, three years like from?
A So first was, you know, funding. I had, the way I had thought about is okay. I have one year of salary saved with me. I can always go back to India and do some job. I am from IFT. HCL had given me an offer so I can do some job. So we'll figure it out. So first 12 months was to figure out what to do actually, because systems, I don't know funding. I have no idea. India had no angel VC ecosystem back then. So somebody introduced me from a trading connection into me to head of JP Morgan in Asia. So they actually spent three months with me. And they, they say, we like you, we love your profile, but we can't invest in you. You're not from IIT, not from IIM. You never run a business. You never know about technology. And even if you start a trading company, we can consider you, but you are now coming, you will run a technology business that too globally, that too building products without having any experience. And today also, you know, in our ICs will pass such talent. It's very difficult to invest. So they are saying, you know, it is very, very hard for us to, To therefore invest behind in data point. So they passed.
AI assessment note: “So first 12 months was to figure out what to do actually, because systems, I don't know funding.”
Answered raw tape
D 5 · C 4 · P 4 · Cm 4 4.30
Q And it, it has been like brutally tough because there was no playbook back then, right? Now today we have playbooks.
A Yeah. So I tell everybody that when you were building India back then, and Grish also went to the same thing, right? You're actually building the infrastructure. You're not only building the company infrastructure. I mean, you have to first hire people, then train people, then they will not know the function. You have to almost convince the investors investors also very early in their journey. So, and then the customers market is equally tough. So there's, so you get two levels of infra. One is a core infra. It's like, you're not only running the train, right? You're putting the, you know, real tracks as well. So that's what we did. That's how I actually met Grish in. When we were building this, uh, you know, Abhinash who runs SaaS for me now. So Abhinash along with Sharish Sharma started something called iSpirit, uh, and then product nation was the theme. So, 2015, I met Grish for the first time. We have, we have said, okay, let's bring, you know, 30, 40 software companies from India together and start writing the playbooks. So that's how actually SaaS for me was born along with Abhinash, you know, from, uh, charge B, Suresh from, uh, kiss flow. So they all, we all came together saying, okay, let's, Start building the playbook of how to really build the software company from India. And one, I think good thing we decided that we will be very honest. We will simply share what ha…
AI assessment note: “we have said, okay, let's bring... software companies from India together and start writing the playbooks.”
Answered raw tape
D 4 · C 4 · P 4 · Cm 4 4.00
Q And the other thing is that, right, these are the internal circumstances. What are the, the external circumstances? Like, is there enough inbound from, let's say, the US market, which is the largest acquirer for SaaS companies globally that, hey, we want to acquire more Indian SaaS companies or built out of India SaaS companies.
A So the global buyer doesn't look at India SaaS, first of all. They look at what is the value I'm getting. Right. So what are the values Indian companies are bringing? One is your market share, customer, churn, NRR, which is how much you are making from existing customer cohort and horde you can leverage in India center. So India, so typically in an acquisition Uh, cohort. You're going to compete with other us companies also, right? Then what will tell the balance towards them? So the two fundamental things, which I think can really help is your customer score customer NPS voice of customer. I think always stands out. If your customers is raving what your product or service or the company, you will stand out. And second is the profitability profile. The gross margin profile, natural net profitability does matter a lot because inherently if you're India based company, right? You should be more profitable in a U S based company, right? So why you are not, if you are not right to that question, somebody has to answer really in a hard fashion, because so far we went to hedonistic wave of growth. Cost of capital was almost zero. So people just invested crazy after growth. Now the question is, can you be more profitable in the U S counterpart? The answer is yes. I take a, we were more profitable in the U S counterpart companies, a beta can go up to Our customer profile is the best, be…
AI assessment note: “So the global buyer doesn't look at India SaaS, first of all.”
Partly raw tape
D 3 · C 3 · P 3 · Cm 3 3.00
Q And you talked about manufacturing co-founders, right? Tell us more about that. How did, because you and Girish know that you are complementary to each other at that point in time, and how did you start building that relationship?
A So I think it is when it started about how do you, I think we're talking about a lot of emotional rollercoaster, right? So one thing is very clear, and we were talking in the break. In the US, they're more dispassionate culturally, right? Because that's how they're born and brought up. So I think the first, therefore, is a business is an enterprise by itself. Business, a founder and business are not, not to one thing. We believe that they are one, but they are actually not. Business has its own journey. You have your own journey. So first of all, I think we need to learn how to emotionally separate ourselves at some point in time from the journey of the company and the journey of your, you as a founder. So that's the first step towards, towards getting to understand, uh, how to, now if I have, I have hindsight of doing that. Lot of us just jump into entrepreneurship. Now I will see who is my best team to be successful in this particular area that I'm starting on. So I think you have to choose for the best team. It's the same as, you know, a cricket team, right? We don't choose all the people from Bangalore or Bombay, right? Our Indian team is all from tier three, tier four towns, because now there is a system of IPL, system of meritocracy where people are coming in, right? So your co-founder has to be meritocratic in nature instead of your, the first friend from school Uh, or y…
AI assessment note: “I think that's what I'm calling manufacturing co-friends, which means co-founders”
