On our final episode, we speak with Sanjeev Bikchandani – a messiah of India’s Internet start-ups. The founder and Vice chairman of InfoEdge and also the co-founder of Ashoka University. He was recently awarded the Padma Shri in Jan 2020. He got into the IITs and IIMs - the crem de la crem - but he pursued advertising. A free thinker who started Naukri.com as a small idea within a string of ideas. Tune in to hear about his spectacular journey, views on venture capital and education.
Quotables:
“We’re prisoners of our visiting cards, EMI’s and I didn’t want to fall into that trap of chasing success of false proxies”
“ I said no to so many pre-series A like Ola and FlipKart without meeting them, Taxi, BigBasket, LensKart and the only reason was that I could not figure out how they make money. But in all the companies we invested in - we knew how they could make money”
“Truly great entrepreneurs don't listen. They have a conversation, but they will do what is right. Not so great entrepreneurs also won't listen, but they will end up doing the wrong thing”
“ If you invest behind a team that needs more than 2% hand holding, you’re after the wrong company ”
“Your reputation is your biggest asset”
Episode notes and transcriptions available on: https://lightbox.vc/new-thinking/