eChai Ventures New York will be hosting the small gathering of founders and startups folks on 16th February, Friday from 6.30 pm to 8.30 pm EST.

eChai Startup Socials are volunteer driven small gatherings with founders and startup folks happening all over the world.

These meetups are free to attend and open for all.

It will be on pay-for-what-you-order basis.

Details about eChai Startup Meetup in New York:

Format: Small Group. Candid Conversations. Startup Folks.

Date & Time: 16th February, January. 6.30 pm to 8.30 pm EST.

Venue: Mr. Purple, 180 Orchard St 15th floor, New York, NY 10002, United States

Map link: https://maps.app.goo.gl/ikjdUKCApzbZFbAq8

Fueling innovation at the @eChaiVentures Breakfast Social in Pune today!

Grateful to host 15 incredible startup founders on this exclusive fundraising journey.

Big shoutout to

Jatin Chaudhary

and

Malav Warke

for making it happen!  

dhandha chota ho ya bada dhandha hota hai, the use of #smallbusiness around women entrepreneurs is something I have never related to!

No dis but have you ever seen a man calling whatver they’re doing small? From thinking to start, to actually believe in your product, showing up everyday despite financial, operational impediments it takes confidence to step up. And none of the anxiety and tremors one goes through ain’t small.

Confidence sometimes come from within but as human we are vicarious learners. It’s not a sob story that I put forward but rather a perspective - no effort put in business is small.

Unlike businesses set by experienced consultants, bagging funding on nothing businesses run by women from home are frugal and community based.

Giving labels and comparing is not the goal.

Let’s just not call women run businesses small? #notsosmallbusiness

Today was a beautiful day in Bhopal’s Upvanam,as it’s been 6 months of regularly doing eChai Ventures Breakfast Social and seeing my goal become reality is just IT.

Meet my entrepreneur comrades, 3 of 7392 present today!

Isha , Founder Ithiha Gifting
Shuchika, Co-Founder Koozagari
Soumya, NES Studio

Loved how everyone came to support and shop!

It is true, it takes a community for a woman to succeed ✨ cheers to all

#notsosmallbusinesses

Meraj Faheem, CEO, Edventure Park will be joining the panel today evening at eChai's Hyderabad Startup Meetup at Draper Startup House Gachibowli from 6.30 pm to 8.30 pm.

Free registration @ https://lnkd.in/dGCDzV5h

eChai's Bengaluru SaaS meetup was held today w/ 

Sai Krishna

(Superblog) and 

Amit Chavan

(Vibtree) joining the panel.

List of featured participants at https://echai.ventures/events/bengaluru-saas-meetup-feb-16-2024

Similar to our Surat event today, we'll be hosting an exciting in-person eChai meetup this evening with VentureStudio at Ahmedabad University, featuring founders from Ahmedabad who were showcased on Shark Tank India.

Free registration @ https://lnkd.in/dxD4iYX5

Let me tell you a story that seems almost too good to be true. My name is Bhavesh, and this journey starts with a simple meeting that felt like fate. In 2019, in Ahmedabad, at a networking event by Patel Business Network, I met another Bhavesh -

Bhavesh Korat

. We both believed in doing good for others, and that’s what brought us together.

We quickly realized we shared more than just a name; we had a common dream. So, in 2020, with a small team of six, we started Brands.live. Our goal was pretty straightforward: help small businesses in India make a name for themselves without breaking the bank.

The idea was to make branding simple and accessible. We wanted every small business owner to have the chance to tell their story, to stand out, and to grow. It felt like everything just clicked into place as we worked on this.

Now, looking back, it’s amazing to see how far we’ve come. We’ve faced challenges, sure, but our belief in our mission has kept us going. We're not just building a company; we're hoping to inspire a whole community of entrepreneurs.

Our roles also complement as

Bhavesh Korat

  manages the Tech, Finance, and sales, I manage Content and Marketing.

Had an incredible time at the eChai Startup Social Event! Connecting with professionals from diverse industry like #Technology, #Healthcare, #Food, #entertainment, #CA, #Sales & #Marketing was truly enlightening.
.
Throughout the event, we engaged in insightful discussions covering a spectrum of industries. From sharing experiences of success to reflecting on lessons learned from failures, our collaborative efforts aimed at fostering growth and development were truly enriching.

The enthusiasm and shared experiences highlighted the vibrant spirit of our startup ecosystem. It was pleasure moderate the event and share knowledge.

My co-founder Phani and I met while we were working together in our erstwhile employer, HDFC Bank, we were a part of the same team managing strategic accounts for the bank.

In Dec'2020, when the bank's servers had an prolonged issue and merchants started asking us to route transactions to other payment gateways, Phani and I had long discussions on while we can not do this as bank employees, we can certainly do this as a Fintech TSP for businesses. Thus, PayAid was founded.

While both of us bring in completely different mindsets and skill sets to the business, we decided early on what the roles and responsibilities of both of us would be. Phani manages Tech and finance, and I manage sales and alliances with payment gateways and banks.

Here is your chance to meet the Surat Founders who appeared in "Shark Tank Season 3" 🦈 at next eChai meetup in Surat.

📅 When : 16 Feb (Fri) - 6pm
📍 Where : Logicwind Terrace, Piplod, Surat

👉 Free Registration : https://lnkd.in/dykfdHdt

P.S. : Alpino Health Foods is from Season 1. They are more than a Guest, they are co-host ❤️

eChai Ventures | Jatin Chaudhary 

Pranav and I, co-founders of Global Vistar, are childhood friends and partners. Fast forward to 2020, fresh out of college, we stepped into the start-up world with a bunch of friends. After facing the uncertainties in the ideation stage, our friends chose conventional careers. But Pranav and I were gritty enough to stay. 

In 2021, we started with an e-commerce platform for good foods. However, the real struggle of the food manufacturers was distribution rather than e-commerce exposure. That realization pivoted our course, and Global Vistar was born.

Our roles naturally unfolded as we faced challenges - Pranav, has a keen eye for execution, and I, have a strategic approach. This creates a harmony of action and vision at Global Vistar. 

We have been starting up for four years. Today, Global Vistar is at its early stage looking for early traction for its MVP. 

From thick and thin, our perspectives, patience, camaraderie, and resilience as co-founders have only grown stronger.

We are coming to Delhi this Saturday, 17th February, 2024

We have fab lineup of speakers joining to highlight THE FUTURE OF PUBLIC SERVICES: IMPLEMENTING BLOCKCHAIN IN INDIA.

RSVP: https://lu.ma/nzud9v7j

One image, answering many questions 🙂

1. Because mein aap karte kya ho?

2. What does a day at Because look like?

3. What does outsourced CMO look like?

I'll be hosting the special gathering in Pune on this Friday morning - eChai's Fundraising Social - focused on bringing together a small group of startup founders and supporters.

This get-together is all about having honest and open talks with each other, sharing our stories of trying to raise funds, the ups and downs, and everything in between.

Event link

"I felt like the Formula 1 car driving in the rain knowing that the guy coming at the back is going to have a great time" shared Mithun Sacheti, Founder of CaratLane - A Tanishq Partnership

In my day's dose of podcasts, it was wonderful to hear an entrepreneur being born out of a family business, one that built in what wasn't a sunrise sector yet still a category creator - jewellery! Mithun not only set the path for start-ups in the space but paved the way for everything operations from negotiating the need for it with courier companies to convince the need for it to the banks and even had to explain the concept of online cross-border buying and selling of jewellery to the government, keeping it all ready for the ones to follow.

Some aspects that stayed with me-

- Relationships and your network: The importance of building relationships leading to mentorship backed by one's capability. He mentioned two core ones with Srinivasa Gopalan and how he got Raakesh Jhunjhunwala to listen to him while he got his numbers up after the insights Raakesh Jhunjhunwala shared (listen for more context- it's worth it)

- Partnerships led growth: Partnering with Cartoon Network to introduce a range of products for the 0-5yrs old and also working closely on introducing products with themes like Doremon and Harry Potter exponentially increased their TAM (total addressable market)

The Titan Company Limited partnership is one that went through its course, it gave both brands enough leverage to grow. #Founders, if you want to hear your heart drop for a few minutes, listen to the Titan-Caratlane story shared in the first 30 minutes of the podcast

- Reverse due diligence: The team travelled across the country and even to the US to understand their potential investors. While VCs have a stringent DD (due diligence) process, the founders knew they had to be aware of who they were getting onboard

- Holocracy: Roles > Titles ( What's in a name right? It's more about what you do) and that's exactly what the CaratLane - A Tanishq Partnership spirit was. Your work defines your role, not your title.

It made me smile to hear this last bit when Mithun Sacheti shared with Karthik B. Reddy that the Power of compounding = Sleep peacefully!

Podcast link

🇸🇬 Singapore: Enterprise Singapore is leading a business delegation to Estonia and seeking promising Singaporean companies to join them.

Calling all Singapore-based #startups and #founders!

Explore #Estonia, one of the world's most spectacular countries. We proudly established Draper Startup House presence there years ago 🚀

What does Estonia share in common with Singapore? A vibrant digital economy and a launchpad to our respective regions.

Estonia has a world-class track record in building unicorns. So far, Estonia has been the birthplace of 10 unicorn Startups:

➡ Skype in 2005
➡ Playtech in 2007
➡ Wise in 2015
➡ Bolt in 2018
➡ Pipedrive in 2020
➡ Zego, ID.me and Gelato in 2021
➡ Veriff and Glia in 2022

That’s 7.7 unicorns per million capita, that's the highest in the world!

Join this seminar to find out more on how you can tap into opportunities in Estonia and across Europe! Hear firsthand from our lineup of experts:

Ambassador H.E. Priit Turk (Estonian Embassy in Singapore), Liisi Org (CEO of Latitude59), Carmen Raal (Digital Transformation Adviser e-Estonia), Vijay Sirse (Founder of Destiny Energy Pte Ltd)

Register here: https://bit.ly/49rWg1w

Let me take you back to where it all began - how I crossed paths with my co-founders, Bharat and Vipul. We were buddies who embarked on our entrepreneurial journey in 2011 with our SAAS venture, "Depasser Infotech," where we dabbled in tech services. Fast forward to 2016, the eCommerce scene picked up pace, and we decided to dive into that realm alongside our existing venture. However, navigating the eCommerce landscape proved challenging, especially with the logistical hurdles we encountered. During this time, Vipul reached out to his friend Paresh, who had a wealth of experience in logistics, seeking advice on our predicament. The more we delved into it, the more apparent it became that many others in the eCommerce sphere faced similar issues.

That's when Paresh brought Nikul into the fold, leveraging his expertise in logistics and finance. In 2017, the five of us came together to launch iThink Logistics. We each brought something unique - Vipul's strategic acumen, my knack for communication, Bharat's tech savviness, Paresh's operational prowess, and Nikul's financial wizardry. With a shared vision to transform eCommerce logistics, iThink Logistics was born.

Today, we proudly stand with over 10,000+ eCommerce brands, providing them with a one-stop solution for all their logistics needs.

So, back in 2019, I just tagged along with a buddy of mine because he had this meeting about some Women 4.0 ML workshops happening across India. Honestly, I wasn't all that into it; just wanted a quick way to hitch a ride to LD BRTS and head home. But then, things took a turn.

We met this guy who was all pumped about organizing the event. They were chatting away about plans and execution, and there I was, just hanging. I had a bunch of ideas popping into my head, but I kept quiet. Then they shifted gears to talking about growing their community, and I couldn't help myself—I just blurted out my two cents on how design and branding could really make a difference. That's all I really knew back then.

Turns out, this sparked a whole new conversation, and before I knew it, I was deep in discussion with Tirth, who was running this Instagram community with over 18K followers. We met again the next day, and bam, we were on the same wavelength, dreaming big about starting our own thing in the ed-tech space, which was pretty fresh at the time. We quickly cooked up MAD—short for Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, and Data Science. Fast forward six months, we were teaching over 300 students and had made some good cash. But then, COVID hit, and everything just fell apart. We had our share of clashes and decided to call it quits.

Fast forward again, two years later, I hit Tirth up out of the blue, thinking we should give it another shot. This time we launched HYPR, aiming to shake up the ed-tech scene. But turns out, the timing was off; the market wasn't looking for another ed-tech player. So, we had to pivot from that too.

Now, we're onto something new called YOMO. 

YOMO is a user insights platform that enables product teams to build better customer-centric products by going beyond basic analytics. It's been quite the ride, from a random meetup to launching not one, but two startups, facing setbacks and still pushing forward. If you told me back in 2019 that tagging along for a ride would lead to all this, I'd have laughed. But here we are, proof that sometimes the smallest decisions can lead you to places you never imagined.

 My co-founder is my mother and has been an inspiration for me always, we started this business in covid as we did not have any source of income.

We were having tea in our flat balcony and decided that to run our house we will have to start something from home.

Each co founder should do what they love and where their interest lies and give their 100% in it. With division a fluid structure is always important to learn what happens in the other departments.

I believe Valentine's Day holds special significance for every individual, as it's a day dedicated to love and spreading affection. Everyone assigns different values to Valentine's Day. Here's why it's meaningful to me: I found my calling on February 14th, 2022.

It was the day when I took the first step toward Hummingbird. I had been associated with Cadila, and on that day, I resigned from the company. After resigning, as I made my way home, I passed numerous flower shops and realized that after making that decision, it was fitting to treat myself to a bouquet on Valentine's Day. I love roses like crazy, so I asked the cab driver to wait for five minutes while I gifted myself a bouquet :D

Journey from the office to my flat was very difficult and I was feeling “ Aaj ghar kyun nahi aa raha hai” . I questioned myself, wondering if I had made the right decision or not but Abhi to decision le liya tha. I was feeling quite emotional that day as I went to meet everyone. Some of my colleagues seriously started crying and were saying, 'What is this nonsense? Why are you making such a stupid decision but boss samjh to aaya us din ki insaan to apan ache hai Harsha Bhurani :D

I decided to spend quality time with myself when I reached home. The first person I called was Sumita Sharma and I shared the entire scenario with her. It was challenging for her to accept, as she, along with my colleagues, knew I was expecting a significant appraisal after months of hard work. However, she supported me nonetheless.

That day was simply amazing, still, I can recall spending a peaceful evening, enjoying the sunset with a cup of tea, and dinner at my favorite Pav Bhaji place near IIM, Vastrapur.
Eventually, till that time, I gathered the courage to inform my parents about this news. My father was initially shocked but he asked if I was okay, which meant the world to me. I reassured him, saying I was celebrating my day with Pav Bhaji. And then, I concluded my day with a brownie, and you can see the sheer joy reflected in this picture:D

After a brainstorming session with myself, writing three different Harsha on sticky notes and pasted them on my wall. I decided to go with 'Harsha Pro', who wanted to start her own business.

Feeling unsure of my next steps, I called Jatin Chaudhary for guidance and asked if I could meet him, and he suggested meeting half an hour before eChai event at IIM later that evening. I was extremely excited to meet him because I never thought that day would come that soon. So when I met Jatin I said , “Abhi resign to daal diya hai immediate basis par, entrepreneur hi banna hai but pata nahi iske baad kya karna hota hai?

He explained various aspects of HR, training, and development, providing valuable insights and references.

And so began my rollercoaster journey with Hummingbird, which continues to this day. It's been a journey filled with challenges, triumphs, and failures, and I'm ready to build HummingBird whatever it takes.

Taniya Biswas

and I are sisters – we met when she was born (since she is younger to me)! But the decision to become co-founders was made roughly a decade ago. We toyed with a few ideas before finally founding Suta in 2016.

Before co-founding Suta, Taniya (Ta) and I were both passionate about creating a venture of our own, which would serve the greater good. We both let go of lucrative corporate jobs, driven by this vision and our passion for meaningful change. Suta was born of our own nostalgic love for cotton sarees – those worn by the womenfolk in our homes. 

We wanted to bring back sarees into the mainstream as versatile garments for everyday wear, instead of being relegated to pujas and festivities alone. That’s how Suta came to be. 

Today, we’re focused on reviving heirloom Indian crafts through our products and finding them audiences across India and even internationally. Our motto is to ensure that the weavers and artisans we work with (17,000+) have a regular source of income, the means and motivation to pursue their crafts, and do not have to migrate from their ancestral homes to larger cities in search of work.

As co-founders, we follow a very fluid process and both of us jointly undertake our responsibilities. We believe that we work best when we work together, and that our two minds are better than either by itself. That said, I am better with more analytical processes and decisions, while Ta is a creative minefield. 

I met my co-founder, Tuhin in 2008 at The National Institute of Design. At NID we teamed up for projects, eventually falling in love, our relationship sparked a realisation to Tuhin about the lack of menstrual education and the stigma surrounding it. My personal experiences and Tuhin's newfound understanding inspired us to address this gap. Leveraging our skills in communication and user experience design, we sought to provide trustworthy and accessible information on menstruation, recognizing its potential impact not only in India but also in other countries facing similar challenges.

In India, every year 1.2 core girls reach puberty. Since periods are a taboo, 85% of these girls would follow one or more restrictive customs.

1 in every 4 girls start to miss out on her school as she starts getting her periods . When a girl misses out on her education, she goes through systematic gender discrimination throughout her life. 

Also in schools, the chapter on periods comes much after the girls have started getting their periods. And in most of the cases teachers skip the topic. As they don’t know how to go about teaching about periods and puberty to their students,

Periods are a taboo in India. Tuhin and I saw it more like a communication design problem.

Menstrupedia Comics are now available in 17 languages and are being used by more than 25,500 schools as a part of their curriculum across India. Apart from India, the books are locally printed and published in 11 countries in their local language.

Tuhin and I are fundamentally different people with distinct skill sets, but when we work together, something magical happens. It's like we're yin and yang, complementing each other perfectly. Tuhin excels in product development, being very diligent in his approach. On the other hand, I bring strong research and people skills to the table. This is how we define our roles: Tuhin takes charge of all decisions related to product development and content creation, while I handle decisions regarding marketing and sales strategies for the book.

⁠I was associated with iBall Brand since 2001 and Vikalp joined in 2008 and we did lot of projects together for 11 years.

When I discussed about the idea of making a business intelligence software with Vikalp, he immediately came to Ahmedabad from Delhi to discuss about the next steps.

Our approach to defining co-founder roles was intuitive rather than structured. Vikalp naturally gravitated towards product management due to his deep tech background and passion. Our mutual understanding was that, regardless of our individual expertise areas, we would maintain an open dialogue, challenging and questioning each other's decisions. 

This dynamic allows us to progress collectively, guided by the strong conviction of the decision-maker in any given situation.

Haripriya Bhagat

  and I met first-time as co-workers at part-time roles at the post office while studying in the UK. 

We became friends and then got married eventually. She worked in finance, and I worked in business growth roles in the UK.

We decided to launch www.indiabizforsale.com to solve issues of Indian businesses and investors during M&A to start with and then investments and more.

She looks into product/analytics/HR/Finance, and I look after business growth, investments, marketing, and more.