Podcast · 45 min

Why mChek Failed Before UPI Took Over India (Sanjay Swamy on Building Too Early)

Prime Venture Partners Free Intermediate India

Sanjay Swamy built mobile payments in India in 2006, roughly two generations before Aadhaar, smartphones, and UPI made them work. In this candid conversation he explains what it feels like to be right about the idea and wrong about the timing. For an Indian founder this is the clearest local lesson that infrastructure and behaviour have to arrive before your idea can.

  • mChek had the right idea but the ecosystem, phones and rails did not exist yet
  • Distribution does not equal adoption when the surrounding infrastructure is missing
  • Aadhaar, Jio and UPI show how much a "why now" depends on enablers you do not control
Open on primevp.in ↗

It answers 2 questions

  1. Why does 'why now?' matter so much for a startup idea?
  2. Is it smarter to enter a market while it's still forming, or wait until demand is obvious and proven?

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