“Coming together is a beginning, staying together is progress, and working together is success.” — Henry Ford

I met Haripriya Bhagat in the very early days of eChai, almost 11 years ago. What started as meeting a like-minded woman in the neighbourhood slowly turned into running marathons together, supporting and learning from each other, making business introductions, and, in the process, creating a strong support system.

And that’s exactly what Jatin Chaudhary has consistently done with eChai Ventures, and what Harsha Bhurani is doing so thoughtfully in creating space specifically for women, building a community where relationships don’t end with an event. They compound. That’s the long game.

This particular event, with a new generation of builders in the room, reinforced something important:

Some people already have a seat at the table.
Some are building the table itself.

But the real question isn’t how the seat was secured. It’s how you show up once you’re there, how you contribute, add perspective, and earn respect over time by consistently adding value with the content.

Excited to see what Ahmedabad is becoming, and a huge shout-out to eChai Ventures for quietly and consistently contributing to the ecosystem.

Last week’s eChai event was one of those rare, wholesome experiences where everything just comes together. Low effort, unplanned yet incredibly beautiful and festive ✨ These are the moments that truly feel worth it.

And it wasn’t just one or two things, it was actually few super cool, completely unplanned highlights that made the evening special.

First, we decided to bring in a panel to clarify all the common doubts founders have around compliance, accounting and legal. Even before the main event started, we hosted a free legal and compliance clinic for our in-house entrepreneurs. Huge shoutout to our partners at The Startup Zone. Sharath Shyamasunder and his team spent more than five hours patiently helping startups sharing expert opinions and answering questions non-stop. (If you’re looking for these services, we highly recommend Startup Zone). DM me and I’ll be happy to put you in touch.

Second, we tried a D2C pop-up stall by Jalsa Snacks. What began as simple sampling turned into actual sales. The audience absolutely loved it and we didn’t charge anything because this was purely about supporting an early-stage entrepreneur and helping bring something beautiful to life. If you’re building a D2C brand and want to put up a stall, DM us, we’ve got your back.

And my favorite part, the real rockstars are the ones who don’t wait for opportunities they seize them. Aditya Mittal from Christ University, Bangalore main campus stepped up and moderated the event. Total Draper material. We’re genuinely rooting for this new talent who is going to own this space 🚀

None of this would have happened without the support of Jatin Chaudhary and The Startup Zone. Grateful for partnerships that truly show up and make things happen.

Looking forward to many more imperfect but beautiful moments like this. Such a great way to end the year just kidding, we still have seven amazing days to go. Let’s end the year on a high note.

An interesting way to think about AEO 👇

What if you didn’t optimize just your brand - but each product or listing?

AI answers aren’t brand pages. They’re situational.

- “Best X for Y”
- “Affordable X with Z”
- “X vs Y”

Each product can win its own moment inside AI responses.

The future of AEO won’t be one homepage strategy.

It’ll look more like product-level visibility.

Anyone here experimenting with this? 
Let's connect. 


- Kalgi
"𝑂𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑑𝑢𝑐𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑙 𝑣𝑖𝑠𝑖𝑏𝑖𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑦"

Conversations matter as much as credentials.

Being in a room full of women founders is always powerful, but the eChai Ventures Women Founders Initiative was inspiring. 

What stood out this time wasn’t scale or success stories—but the quality of conversations. The discussions were thoughtful, grounded, and deeply founder-led.

Every conversation revolved around real journeys, business challenges, leadership doubts, financial pressures, team building, and the invisible load women often carry while growing a company. There was honesty, vulnerability, and strength in equal measure. 

As a founder, my key takeaways were: 

1. Leadership evolves through challenges, not titles 
Every woman in the room had her own version of struggle, yet leadership showed up in persistence, adaptability, and clarity. 

2. Decision-making defines leadership
Founders spoke about choices, when to push, when to pause, and when to say no. Leadership showed up less in authority and more in intentional decisions.

3. Founders need spaces to think, not just execute
These conversations allowed reflection, something founders rarely give themselves time for while running daily operations.

Grateful to be part of a community where conversations go beyond success stories and into real leadership. 

Grateful for spaces that foster thoughtful leadership.

Had the opportunity to attend and speak at the AI × SaaS Founders Meetup in Surat, and it turned out to be a very meaningful evening.

What made this event special was the audience - largely first-time founders, aspiring entrepreneurs, and strong tech professionals who are at the idea or early execution stage. Their questions reflected curiosity, honesty, and a real desire to understand how AI and SaaS move beyond code into sustainable businesses.

The conversation was enriched by a diverse set of perspectives from the speakers.

Chirag Lathiya brought in a solid builder’s mindset.
Drawing from his journey of building remote-first teams and SaaS platforms, he spoke about execution discipline, long-term thinking, and the realities founders often underestimate - especially when transitioning from engineering roles into leadership and entrepreneurship.

Chintan Papaiya shared a very grounded perspective on applying AI to real-world problems. His insights made AI feel practical and purposeful, particularly for founders who are still figuring out how to align technology with impact, use cases, and market needs.

From my own journey as a founder, I focused on something I see many tech founders struggle with - the shift from building products to building businesses. AI and SaaS are powerful tools, but without clarity on customers, positioning, and execution, even great technology fails to scale. The discussion around this resonated strongly with early-stage founders in the room.

A special mention to Manoj Adwani Advani, who moderated the session beautifully - keeping the discussion structured, inclusive, and engaging while ensuring the audience felt comfortable asking beginner-level yet critical questions.

Kudos to eChai Ventures and Narola Infotech for creating a space where learning felt approachable and conversations were honest.

Events like these remind me that strong startup ecosystems are built not just by success stories - but by shared learning, openness, and community support, especially for founders just starting out.