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Where founders meet

eChai Ventures is a slow founder network. It is built by founders showing up at open meetups, demo days and dinners: every week they gather somewhere across 25+ cities in 10+ countries, and have been since 2009.

Join eChai Find your city

Sometimes what they find here matters right away. More often it matters years later, when something changes, and something always does: hiring, raising, going global, pivoting, moving city, starting over.

Find your city.

India

North America

Global

Every city on eChai

What eChai runs, and who it is for.

Different set-ups, because founders are at different stages. Most are open to anyone; a few are small on purpose.

Open to every founder in the city

  • Startup Open House

    An easy, informal evening with founders and startup folks from across the city. You walk in.

    For anyone building a startup, or thinking about it.

  • Startup Meetups

    Founders and operators on one question at a time: AI, go-to-market, fundraising, consumer brands, climate, manufacturing, product.

    For founders working on that question right now.

  • Startup Day

    A whole day with the city's ecosystem partners, with parallel tracks.

    For founders, investors and everyone who works with them, across a city.

  • eChai Startup Mixer

    The open evening in cities outside India, put on once enough founders in a city want it.

    For founders abroad, and founders going global.

On stage

  • eChai Startup Demo Day

    Every month, early-stage founders who are actively building show what they are making, and founders across eChai upvote it.

    For founders with something to show, and anyone who wants to see what is being built.

Smaller circles

  • FailCode

    The stories founders skip when things are going well: the launch that flopped, the hire that did not work out, the pivot that came late.

    For founders who have been through one, and those who would rather hear it first.

  • eChai Women Founders Initiative

    Conversations with leaders of women-led businesses, smaller and by application.

    For women founders and operators.

  • Founder dinners

    A small table of founders, by invitation.

    For a few founders at a time, for a longer conversation.

  • Startup Cricket Night

    Every week in a city, startup folks get together for cricket. Some play, some cheer.

    For anyone who wants to spend an evening with founders away from a panel.

Between the gatherings

  • Founder Notes

    Founders writing about what they are building, in their own words.

    For founders on eChai, and anyone who wants to read them.

  • The Startup Grid

    A city's companies on one map, and the walks through them.

    For anyone finding their way around a city's startups.

  • Explore

    The answers founders reach for: starting up, AI, go-to-market, consumer brands, their own money.

    For founders in their first years, and after.

  • Hummingbird Talent

    eChai's hiring arm: executive search and leadership hiring, from inside the network.

    For founders hiring senior people.

Whatfix CEO Khadim Batti hosted the eChai founders social at Whatfix Towers
Whatfix CEO Khadim Batti hosted the eChai founders social at Whatfix Towers
London founders met for the eChai Mixer at Temple of Arts, London
London founders met for the eChai Mixer at Temple of Arts, London
eChai and City of Melbourne hosted global founders at The Couch
eChai and City of Melbourne hosted global founders at The Couch

eChai works with select brands as their growth partner.

Partner brand founders together at Zestard HQ, Ahmedabad

A year inside the network.

Each partnership comes with presence across eChai, introductions to the right founders, and a team that stays involved through the year. And each one is shaped around what the brand wants out of it.

Who you meet

  • Founders here get to know you.
  • When there is somebody you should know, we connect you.
  • You get invited to the events that are relevant to you.

What we do with you

  • We sit down on your story, your brand, and your business.
  • We share what AI has changed for us, with your team.
  • Whenever you want to know something, just ask.

Where your name runs

  • Your brand runs across everything eChai publishes, for the full year.
  • You take part in the series we run online.
  • You are on eChai as a founder, not only as a brand.
  • You carry the mark, stamped with the year you started.

Some of the brands working with us

How it works.

A partnership is for growth stage founders who want to come in as a partner brand, and it runs one year at a time. The brand fee for the year is paid to eChai. An affiliate share runs alongside it, linked to the outcomes we drive together. Both carry GST.

Everything a partnership comes with

To come in as a partner brand, write to me at [email protected].

Jatin ChaudharyCo-founder, eChai Ventures

Founders who came to their first meetup years ago are still turning up, in cities they hadn’t moved to yet.

Joining is a profile: a photograph, your name and a way to reach you. With it, registering for a gathering takes one tap.

Join eChai