Fortune India 40 Under 40 Awards: Key Insights on ‘Starting Up Again’

Panellists at Fortune India 40Under40 Awards 2024 shared their views on "Starting Up Again", highlighting the need for a clear vision and strong reason before restarting an entrepreneurship journey.

For Chaitanya Ramalingegowda, co-founder, Wakefit, the two takeaways from his previous startups were relationships and learning along the way. “Relations are built not because you want something out of them. They are built because it's the right thing to do. Relationships are an infinite game. No amount of interviews, focus groups, or observations can give you insights to create an MVP that iterating and learning along the way can do."

Anmol Singh Jaggi, co-founder and CEO, Gensol Engineering, says the key as a founder is to focus on certain things and have a complementary team. “For example, if I am a great zero to one guy, I want more people who think 1-10. If I have good fundraising capabilities, I want people stronger with operations," Jaggi.

Speaking about his journey of scaling up a business like Future Group to an enormous scale to starting up again with Broadway, a new-age departmental store that only retails new-age digital-first brands, Vivek Biyani, the nephew of Future Group promoter Kishore Biyani, says: "The journey from being a part of the Future group to the journey in Covid and then insolvency could have yielded in only two ways for me -- one where you could have yielded in your thoughts of why it happened, or create a new business is what gives you energy. That energy is what takes you ahead.”

Biyani adds it's a challenge (to start up again) but “amazing fun’. "In consumer business, unlearning is something you always do. I feel I am doing my first business right now," says Biyani.

GVK group family scion Keshav Reddy, who is also the Founder of Equal, a privacy-focused platform, sees himself at both ends of the spectrum — as a new-age entrepreneur and someone starting up again. "Building something of scale was super exciting for me. After I came back (from MIT), we transitioned GVK from a family business to Reddy Ventures as a family office. And now I have jumped into one of our businesses, which is called Equal and we are building it from scratch. Two years from zero to now we have done 55 million monthly transactions, so that scale is what excites me."

Talking about the lack of space for new ideas in large family-run businesses, Reddy says: "Family businesses don't innovate". "But when you step out, you can think and build from scale," says Reddy.

On her strategy of working with entrepreneurs who “start up” again, Sakshi Chopra, MD, Peak XV Partners, says: "In our business, failure teaches you multiple lessons, and hence a founder who has not been very successful in their prior startup, we love that, we are extremely excited to meet the second-time founders, irrespective of how the first one went. I think there are some inherent qualities that only a founder possesses.”

When asked about do's and don'ts when restarting the entrepreneurial journey, Chaitanya vouches for two key things: "One is intellectual honesty and the second is treat all people fairly." Anmol advises to “cut your losses in time and create wealth for everybody, not just for the founding team”. Vivek says one should have a “strong reason for starting up again”.

Reddy also talks about his position as both an investor and founder. “It is a blessing to be on both sides of the table. Before I became a founder, I also started our family office VC fund and invested in about 30 companies. What you learn as an investor is invaluable as you become a founder.”

What should entrepreneurs do to stay ahead of the curve? Sakshi says: "As the organisation keeps growing, a founder has to also think about his or her development in their journey. You have to also transition from being a founder to the company CEO and that means developing cross-functional responsibilities, leading an organisation, and setting the right culture, and that often is very ignored. That can only happen if a founder invests in his or her development.”