Video · ~45 min

Jatin Chaudhary on Building Global Startup Communities with eChai Ventures

KU Podsquad (guest: Jatin Chaudhary) · YouTube Free Beginner India

EChai started as casual chai meetups in Ahmedabad in 2009 and grew into a founder network running weekly events across 25+ cities, most of them well outside the obvious startup centres. This conversation is a concrete look at how that multi-city model actually holds together, run by local hosts and repeatable rituals rather than one big hub. If you are building where the scene is thin, it is a working example of doing it city by city instead of waiting to move.

• A founder community can scale across many cities by empowering local hosts to run their own chapters, so no single metro has to carry it.
• Simple, repeatable rituals (regular meetups, demo days, small dinners) build a scene over time better than one-off large events.
• Consistency and genuine relationships, not headcount, are what make a founder network in a place without density actually last.