What's being posted about eChai.

If building a startup is a sheer resilience and mentors are the main reason for continuity and consistency

On the same lines, Jatin Chaudhary is someone whom I had been met a few years back and started hosting eChai Ventures events in Bangalore (even though the last few I had not been actively hosting) but the network, learnings and mentoring is a great support system

for Wanderfly.in our first partnership came from the event where I have hosted 3 founders and still going on after years as well

last week I had the opportunity to meet Subhadeep Mondal and I can only thank him for candidly mentioning what works and what does not and definitely what I have personally understood and learnt is "Listen with patience, respond with understanding"

starting my entrepreneurial journey a few years back, I never thought I would be hosting events, meeting investors, learning from their experience has been the best journey

if you are an early stage founder( even am), I would request to take up opportunities that are knocking on your doors!

you need to ask only one thing to yourself before taking up that opportunity is "Can I add value"

Thanks to Jatin ji for flying all the way from Ahmedabad and hosting 10 events in Bangalore and Subhadeep ji for taking time, looking forward

#Learnings #b2b #event #bangalore

What does it really take to build a consumer brand today?

Yesterday at Founder Startup House x eChai Ventures, that question took the room in a dozen different directions.

From how people discover products, to why they stay loyal, to what makes them switch overnight.

Listening to Dhananjay Yadav from NeoSapien and Vikas Bardia from Shoffr, I realized that consumer businesses are probably the closest you'll get to watching human behavior play out in real time.

One moment the conversation was around D2C and consumer brands.

The next, it was about the fitness industry and how rapidly it is evolving beyond just gyms and memberships.

What fascinated me wasn't a growth hack or a framework.

It was seeing how two founders look at the same market and notice things most people miss.

A customer decision.
A changing habit.
A small shift in behavior.

And suddenly, an entire business opportunity emerges.

These are the conversations I enjoy the most.

No pitch decks.
No buzzwords.

Just founders sharing how they see the world, and everyone in the room leaving with a slightly different perspective than they walked in with.

That's the magic of founder communities.

Sometimes the most valuable thing you take back isn't a contact or a note.

It's a new way of looking at a market.

Vikram Bharati Karan Bahadur Nivin Joseph Jatin Chaudhary Mansi Baheti
Suhani Jain

One thing I've started looking at differently after attending an eChai session on GTM & Distribution for Startups:
We often talk about AI as a feature.
“AI-powered.”
“AI integration.”
“AI-driven.”
But the customer doesn't really care that you added AI.
They care about what AI does for them.
Does it save them time?
Reduce repetitive work?
Help them make better decisions?
Solve a problem they've been struggling with?
That shift in perspective was one of my biggest takeaways from the session.
There's a simple test I found useful:
Try describing your product without saying “AI” at all.
Just describe the outcome for the customer.
If that's difficult, maybe the pitch is still built around the technology rather than the person using it.
That connects to another idea that stuck with me: start with the customer's problem, not your product.
When telling your startup's story, don't open with “Here's what we built.”
Open with “Here's the problem our customers are facing.”
The AI or whatever you built is simply how you help them get from that problem to the desired outcome.
GTM isn't just about getting your product in front of more people.
It's about understanding the customer deeply enough to explain why your product matters to them.
And in the AI era, maybe the better question isn't:
“Where can we add AI?”
It's:
“What can we make possible for the customer because of AI?”

Thank you to eChai Ventures for organizing the session and creating a great space to learn and exchange ideas.

#GTM #Startups #ProductMarketing #AI #Marketing #Distribution #B2BMarketing #eChai

Healthcare is not just about technology. It is about the difference that technology creates in someone’s life.

It was a real pleasure hosting Dr. Aditi Choksi and Shyam Parmar at the eChai Building the Future of Healthcare meetup.

Two young entrepreneurs. Two very different journeys. One common mindset — solve the real problem, obsess over the customer, and build with empathy.

Dr. Aditi Choksi is reimagining dentistry by using AI to stay accessible to patients, answer their questions, and make long, often unattended treatments easier to complete.

Shyam Parmar has taken a completely different path — developing technology that can enable mobility by translating brain signals into action. What started from a pivot became a product with the potential to fundamentally change lives.

What stood out was that neither journey was about simply “doing more of the same.” It was about rethinking what healthcare can be.

The audience brought equally powerful questions — founders eager to build, solve and leave their own mark in healthcare.

A room full of ideas, ambition and possibility.
Healthcare needs more such builders. Thank you eChai Ventures Jatin Chaudhary GVFL for enabling this.

#HealthcareInnovation #HealthTech #Startups #Entrepreneurship #eChai #Innovation #AI #MedTech

One of the most beautiful things about startups has nothing to do with funding rounds, valuations, or exits.

It’s community.

Over the last decade, I’ve been fortunate to be part of founder ecosystems across London, San Francisco, Boston, Nagpur, Pune, Mumbai, Delhi, and many places in between.

And the pattern is always the same.

A founder needs help.

Before investors show up, before customers sign, before the media writes about them, someone from the community steps in.

An introduction is made.

A deck gets reviewed.

A candidate is referred.

A customer call is arranged.

A founder who has already walked the path spends an hour helping someone they’ve just met.

No invoice.

No equity.

No expectations.

I’ve experienced this repeatedly through eChai Ventures.

Over the years, I’ve hosted and spoken at eChai Ventures events across multiple cities. What has always stood out to me isn’t the event itself, it’s the culture that follows.

Founders helping founders.

Operators helping founders.

Investors helping students.

People making introductions simply because they believe it might help.

A lot of that culture comes from Jatin Chaudhary.

For years, he has quietly connected thousands of people across India’s startup ecosystem. Most of those introductions never become LinkedIn posts. Most of the support never gets announced.

Yet opportunities are created because of it every single day.

I’ve seen the same spirit in communities like NSRCEL, in Boston startup circles, in San Francisco founder networks, and increasingly in India’s venture ecosystem.

The older I get, the more I realise that careers are rarely built alone.

They’re built because someone opened a door.

Someone took a call.

Someone made an introduction.

Someone helped when there was no immediate benefit to them.

In a world obsessed with transactions, communities like these remind us that generosity still compounds.

And often, the most valuable people in the room are not the richest.

They’re the ones willing to help without keeping score.

Capital builds companies.

But community builds everything else.

A productive weekend in London.

We had some wonderful meetings to shape the startup ecosystem globally. Discussing plans for next year on bringing big tech giants closer to the startup #ecosystem, dining with a few investors, exploring the ecosystem, and attending the refreshing eChai Ventures event, thanks to Abhishek Singh for organising.

Had a fascinating conversation with Roop Bhadury about #AI's transformational impact worldwide and how it will reshape industries in the next decade. The kind of conversation that reminds you why we're building what we're building.

This week, we're opening applications for Platvix Build Studios for those who pre-registered (link in the comments).

Next year is going to be big. Democratising the creation of startups and raising capital for early stage founders. We're doing the hard work so you don't have to.
Stay tuned.

#BuildStudio #Startups #London #AIStartups #VentureCapital

People ask me this question a lot, How do I start building a community?

Me:  Borrow Inspiration from Existing Communities to Find Your First Members
Don’t reinvent the wheel — your first community members are already hanging out somewhere else.

Back in early 2020, during the peak of the COVID pandemic, I wanted to create a space for founders who often felt invisible because they were not in Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi, Singapore, London, or San Francisco, but were building startups from Nashik, Kochi, Guwahati, Bhubaneswar, Coimbatore, and even Milpitas.

My goal was to enable founders from 2nd/3rd-tier cities building Startups to get support in their journey to overcome challenges.

I looked at communities I admired (eChai, TiE global chapters, SaaSBoomi, Super Morpheus, Headstart and a few more) and realized my first members were already out there — I just had to find them.

By the end of 2020, Grittiest had served 170+ founders from underserved cities.

Founders loved it! Grittiest's focus was to serve unserved founders in 2nd/3rd-tier cities and magic happened.

Here’s the hack for How do I start building a community👇
1. Identify 3–5 communities where your ideal members already gather
2. Observe what people love & what frustrates them
3. Engage authentically before inviting anyone over
4. Reach out personally, not with a broadcast message

The most loyal members often come from the margins, not the mainstream. Start by borrowing energy from the communities your people already love. Just focus on what they get from your community initiative.

Built /building a community? Where did you find your first members? #CommunityGrowth101