<div>Over the last 20 years, <strong>K Ganesh</strong> has been a maverick entrepreneur along with his wife Meena Ganesh. They have created businesses that have delivered wealth for shareholders and employees alike. Their last exit, when their venture Tutor Vista was sold to Pearson’s PLC for $220 million, made them household names. It was their fourth venture and the companies were sold at a very decent valuation too. Perhaps they have perfected the art of creating successful startups and have created exits worth $300 million. His philosophy is to create and seed ideas that can become long-term businesses rather than setting up an investment fund. His angel investments through his incubating company-- Growth Story -- in HomeLane and BigBasket have endeavoured to solve consumer problems through a combination of engaging customers through technology and delivering the final service at home. His own startup, Portea, has solved the problem of post-surgery home healthcare for patients and is currently on an expansion mode. He spoke to BW | Businessworld's <strong>Vishal Krishna</strong> about the future of startups in this country and the ideas that can currently be scaled to become big businesses. Here are the excerpts:</div><div> </div><div><strong>What does Growth Story want to look at over the next five years?</strong></div><div>We have a specific view of the world. The way I see it, in five years, India stands at a huge opportunity and startups are the cente of it all. Firstly let us look at software-as-service; it is not a scalable business anymore. The technology should now look at consumer services; technology should solve problems such as handyman availability, healthcare delivery, fresh food delivery and creating home interiors. There are several such ideas which can create the next valuable businesses. These are some macro level themes too because there is no brand being built. By brand I mean a service that can offer reliability and consistency. The consumer today wants things at an instant and is worried about the quality offered. In our grocery business, BigBasket, we have our own private label which we are building as a brand. Organising the unorganised is one of my favourite themes to. Can we organise carpenters and plumbers and bring them on a Uber like business model? This is what Indian startups can do. So the first two themes; one to create a brand and then to organise services.</div><div> </div><div><strong>Can these services really be organised?</strong></div><div>In our startup, Portea, we have physiotherapists that are independent consultants. These people used to do 2 treatments a day, today by giving them location based requests the number of patients per physiotherapist has gone up to 6 per day. These consultants have to be on time, manage a smile and deliver consistent service; this is our promise as a brand for the consumer. This leads me to my third theme, which is creating on demand services and this is what all our investee companies are doing. This will be a large theme going forward and many services such as banking will get disrupted. The fourth theme is more around delivering micro services through the mobile to disrupt the food industry, the housing and healthcare industry. We like the vertical play and horizontal services, like organising physiotherapists, plumbers and carpenters. </div><div> </div><div><strong>There is talk about full stack businesses, what are they?</strong></div><div>A full stack business means an entrepreneur's ability to understand the entire business that he wants to serve, with technology as the core, which includes design, manufacturing, supply chain and delivery. HomeLane is a perfect example of a full stack interior designing company; the founder Srikanth Iyer is solving a real world problem of reducing the timeline of delivering interiors to home owners. The business manufacturers and builds to order, its engagement model with the customer is unique. </div><div> </div><div><strong>What about technology businesses that offer B2B services?</strong></div><div>Data services will be big if you have to understand consumers. But Growth Story has not yet looked at this space. In the long run as our businesses scale data crunching will become a crucial part of the service. Data allows companies to deliver on campaigns and win more customers. Data and location based services should make sure that the cost of delivery should not go up. This is what we call actionable insights. Similarly I think the internet-of-things will become an important business. Its early days and the technology is still being built to offer connected services. Let me be honest with you in the next ten years there will be technology being built for Indians who need access to good healthcare and financial services. This is 85 percent of India. You and I are living in a gated world. But the services are needed for people who will use the internet for the first time and they will be income groups that will spend a portion of their earnings if technology reaches them. These are people who will consume information for the first time through the smart phone. Local services will become big businesses. Amidst all this, execution is the key and entrepreneurs need to solve this piece first. Ideas are a plenty.</div>
_20240904170929_original_image_33.webp)
