Any service-based company founder I meet, invariably at least once mention that they want to build a product or they want to make a transition from service-based to product-based business! 😀

While many entrepreneurs are pursuing it, very few succeed.

To learn the challenges faced by entrepreneurs in this pursuit, "Transitioning from IT Services to SaaS Products" was organized by eChai Ventures at IIMA Ventures.

Yash Shah shared his experiences of a successful transition for Service based to SaaS product company and we had some insightful interactions on various points.

Some of the learning nudgets from the meetup:

👉 Start promoting product as soon as you start building product not after it is ready to launch. Most of the founders wait till MVP is ready and then start looking for initial customers to get their feedback. Instead of that, it was suggested that it is preferred to start searching for clients as soon as the development of the product starts.

👉 The challenges we face in service based company would be more or less same ( client not paying on time, employees churn rate, etc.) even when the company is scaled. While in SaaS company, as the product scales, the problems would be different at each stage of 100 customers, 10000 customers or a million customers. So, as a founder, you have to be prepared for managing new challenges and finding solution for it.

👉 Customers can come up with N number of requests or features in your product. It is not advisable to go for building each feature that is requested. Customization can be done up to some level but you have to put some line to it. If customer is ready for paying customization, that then can be prioritized.

👉 Having a product based company requires a completely different mindset than having a service based company. So, if you are trying both then keep both the teams separate and do not mix them up.

Overall, it was a great learning experience and interacting.

Kudos to Jatin Chaudhary for his efforts to bring all the people together. Looking forward to attending more knowledge sharing sessions.

If you are fundraising in 2024, then you should read this post.

Recently attended a startup event "Fundraising for Startups" as a panelist. As the only startup founder among the VC panelists, it was interesting to hear their perspectives and provide my own. The event was organized by HSBC in collaboration with eChai Ventures.

The panel was focused towards the early stage with the presence of funds such as Leo Capital, Warmup Ventures and Aeravti Ventures.

The overall takeaways were the following:

1. Dry powder money is still there and startups with clear vision and execution are getting funded.
2. The time for due diligence has increased and therefore, having enough runway is important before fundraising.
3. AI as a use case is certainly a favorite area but not the only one attracting funding.
4. College degrees are not that pertinent anymore as long as you have a solid business understanding and team (Lots of non-IIT and non-IIM founders are emerging) - alumni network may open doors but won’t convert only on basis of college.

Money flows where the innovation is and India now has the 3rd largest startup ecosystem in the world. In Q1 2024, Indian startups raised a total of $2 billion fund and added three unicorns to its fleet in 2024 so far - fintech SaaS Perfios, Bhavish Aggarwal's AI venture Krutrim and Logistics startup Porter. While overall investor sentiment has been cautious, the funding winter scenario is a bit milder than expected as the growth of the Indian economy encourages investment in new ventures.

Overall, lots of new learnings with old and familiar faces. Thanks to Jatin for bringing us all together to share our learnings and network with fellow founders, investors, and industry leaders. Looking forward to more such events in the future.

I had an amazing time speaking at the recent D2C Day event organized by eChai Ventures It was an honor to be part of such a dynamic and inspiring gathering.

The energy in the room was electric, and the level of talent and curiosity in the audience made me optimistic about where India's digital ecosystem is heading.

Sharing my journey with Minicult.in, from starting in my nephew's room to a Brand, was truly exciting for me. We also had a fantastic Q&A session, answering many insightful questions from the audience.

A huge shoutout to Jatin Chaudhary for organizing such a fantastic event and to eChai Ventures for being the perfect event partner and Nanda Kumar for hosting the panel and keeping the conversation dynamic and engaging!

It was wonderful to share the panel with Inderjeet Kaur Indy ↗️. Your insights were invaluable!

Met some awesome folks during my trip to Singapore where I also hosted the eChai Singapore meetup – Anupama Singal and Vikram Bharati 🌟 Doing seriously cool stuff in their worlds. 😎

Anu comes from such rich experience of being one of the key leaders who shaped Levi Strauss & Co. especially in Asia. She has then moved to build bigger things with her three own startup’s. At SLICeR. she has cracked visualising data for non-data folks!

Vikram is the most chill “bartender” who is the brain behind Draper Startup House and now is building this visionary community called “Draper Nation” - a Bitcoin native nation

Feeling pumped and ready for more meetings like these!

A discussion all about selling as an early-stage startup, building marketplace businesses, the maturing SaaS landscape in Asia, breaking silos and more with:

- Vamsi Krishna - Co-founder & CPO, Multiplier
- Hardik Batra - APAC Director, Commercial, foodpanda

eChai Ventures at Draper Startup House Singapore.