Nikhil Kapur, Partner at STRIVE Ventures, explains his investment thesis when translating successful Indian startup models to the Indonesian market.
Insight
Kapur: SaaS startups must rely on founder-led sales until $1M ARR
“Initially, till that first, maybe even a million dollars, right? Like, it should all be done by the founders. And if the founders themselves don't have the skill set to do it, then either they should learn it, or they should bring another founder, co-founder o…”
Insight
Kapur: A startup's true moat is its go-to-market engine, not product
“Most of the people, they think, you know, my product is my mode, my data is my mode. Actually, if, and this is something that A-sixteen Z wrote about also recently, that your mode is your GTM. Your mode is like the channels that you build, the sort of capabili…”
Opinion
Kapur: Most Asian VCs overlook the importance of local SaaS
“Mentioning the second bucket, which is as important as the first one, and probably a bit more overlooked by most VCs in, in this part of the world. And this bucket is what we call local SaaS.”
Insight
Kapur: VCs must build software themselves to truly evaluate developer tools
“Only when you actually build something yourself, you realize sort of the nuances of technology, and, you know, code bases, and stacks, and technical stacks, and hence you're able to see, like, where a particular solution fits in.”
Insight
Kapur: Startups only truly validate market demand after crossing $1M ARR
“Only once you've crossed a million ARR, like, that's when you really know that you're on to something, right? And I think the speed at which a company crosses that million dollar line from zero to one that also gives us an indication of, like, how solid is thi…”
Disclosure
Kapur: STRIVE rejects traditional venture hierarchies for 'full-stack' individual investors
“What we've done is we've sort of twisted that model and we've created internally what I call full stack VCs. So we go sort of play the role, each one of us, all the way from a partner to an analyst to even like administration of the fund. Completely full stack…”