Fintech - The Entrepreneurs' Journey

foreign [Music] everyone it's a pleasure to be here with someone that has undoubtedly had the most impact the most transformative impact on the uh on the on the broader space of Education a space that is very very close to everyone's heart here I've Had The Good Fortune of being a small part of the Journey of baijus which started as a little app in 2015 and has now grown to become the world's largest edtech company about a two billion dollar Revenue company impacting about 100 million customers across the world something that is global Beyond India now and it's a real pleasure to have baiju here with us this morning welcome thank you since our session is called the entrepreneur's journey we'll we'll try and stick to all of the all of the interesting stuff around just how this journey has panned out for baiju and the rest of his crew over the last 7 10 15 years you come from very humble beginnings by Jew tell us a little bit about your growing up years where did you grow up who were your biggest influences how did you become a teacher good morning everyone uh I'll give a short answer to that I'll also wait for everyone else to come back because they've just gone for good coffee outside I'll dramatize the story by telling that I come from a small village which is a fact uh how I got into teaching and how that ended up becoming uh a business there's something which I'll try capturing a norm in the next two minutes I went to a government school where forgot about finding good teachers finding teachers itself was a challenge and some of us started teaching I I love math so I ended up becoming a math teacher first started in school I used to teach in my Village in college and then later my friends in India attracting students those who are hungry to learn very aspirational is not that big a challenge so starting in India is is a huge advantage in this case my first formal session was for 30 students by the time I took my sixth session there were 1200 students so it moved from a classroom to an auditorium and at its peak uh this is maybe a few hundred people at its peak I used to handle math classes in stadiums with 25 000 students but had the conviction to disrupt that and move move from stadiums to smartphones in 2015. so this love for math learning math and teaching math is what Tom and ended up becoming a business in one sentence I normally say that if you are good in math and south of India you'll end up becoming an engineer an engineer by chance a teacher by choice which made me an entrepreneur by chance but still in that pursuit of how to make it bigger more importantly better would want to believe somewhere in the beginning of that Journey because it's such an important sector unfortunately grossly neglected by most of the investors it's not it's it's you can't get into education or education technology keeping uh thinking about uh making money out of this you have to think of 10 20 30 years if you want to make an impact but one thing which I can guarantee as an investor or as an entrepreneur is that this is one of those few sectors where if you do good you'll end up doing well or if you do well you'll end up doing good so just to cut short that so it's it's uh it's close to all of us it's a sector which is very close to all of us and uh I'm my aim in this short period will be every country needs a by juice if I can Inspire at least five of you to actually start an education technology company I will uh both I'll believe that uh this 25 minutes 30 minutes is worth my time and worth your time no that's fantastic so you started as a teacher and you started as a teacher because there weren't enough teachers in the at the school you you went to and you filled up stadiums you set up a 25 000 people teaching math almost like math concerts at what point did you decide that it was time to start a business out of this and create a technology company and how is that Journey for you even when I was doing in stadiums it was a business it was just that it was offline and uh in 2015 uh when apps were taking off smartphone penetration was increasing we just decided that what we wanted to do have never changed how we have done business we moved from offline to online and that's been a turning point uh launched the first learning app in 2015 which is the largest learning app in the world today with more than 100 million students and over the last seven years we have created something we have created a lot more learning apps starting from 4k12 Beyond K12 in subjects like math science coding reading um we own some of the largest learning apps in the world but even at our scale by no means I'll say it's successful it's just relative success uh there are around 7 million plus paid subscribers in India on our paid platform and there are five and a half million students on our not-for-profit platform so there's this huge aspiration of creating one of the largest education companies in the world but a bigger aspiration that in the meantime we will also end up creating one of the largest not-for-profit initiatives in the world now it's very interesting talk a little bit about EFA education for all you just signed Lionel Messi to be your Ambassador you're obviously sponsoring the FIFA World Cup you've been a big uh sponsor of sports in India uh talk about the the the mission for you on EFA and what what you hope to achieve in the next 5 10 15 years if you look at most of the large philanthropic organizations they'll all focus on education and healthcare because these are the two sectors which everyone will think once people start making money so to enable a bigger impact by using technology as an enabler what we have done is we have partnered with uh 175 plus global ngos we have partnered with multiple state governments in India to offer the same product which we monetize on one side of it to offer completely free so we only monetize the top one third those who go to a private English medium School but we give it completely free to students those who go to a government school just to give you an idea I come from a government School even the average English which you hear from me is what I've learned by listening to Cricket commentary on radio sports commentary on radio so uh if if we would have got something like this it would have been a lot easier for us to learn so what we are trying to solve on both sides uh by investing in creating products which are very appealing for students to learn on their own uh we are if you ask me what what's the biggest impact we are creating is we started we created a product which is built around love for learning in a country obsessed with spoon spoon feeding unfortunately in India is very Rob learning is still driven by fear of exams and not love for learning how we have achieved this or how we are trying to solve this is by creating movie like videos game like interactions and by offering it talk through a platform which will personalize the way students learn based on their proficiency level is how we are trying to make an impact uh and we are off to a good start but there's a long way to go before we even think of this as success no absolutely education I think is a massive massive white space one of the things that I remember was etched in my head as I was learning about baiju a couple of years ago was your Beginnings in Bangalore where your first cohort of Partners employees people that were around you and really wanted to convert this this sort of vision or dream into a reality was um you know the fact that you had 300 of your students come along uh people that you had coached for Math and Science but that were now willing to be a part of this journey how did you attract them what did you tell them how have you retained them how many of you how many of them have actually continued to be around with you could you talk a little bit about those pieces you're asking all easy questions he's also one of our investors he normally asked tough questions when it's it's in a close room but I'll answer this question there's an easy one today is easy it's easy to attract talent in in a sector like this because of the same reason because because of the Double Impact sector which I talked about I didn't start this company with my friends I started this with my some of the top students those who join me for Right Reasons uh not we were not a brand at that point of time we were not VC funded the first five years it was bootstrapped that's why when when some of the new entrepreneurs when they come and ask should we start a company in this funding window my answer to my answer is generally is that business is not about fundraising we've also raised a lot of capital and that's why we've got a lot of media attention you will get for fundraising but the real thing is about following your passion creating a product finding the product Market fit and then raise Capital when you need uh to accelerate now to answer the question on attracting talent in a sector like education is always easy if you can show scale for me it was easier because uh the first 300 employees all of them came from the student base 10 years on 261 of them are still there there's a clear indication that they joined for right reason six founding Partners all of them were students all are still there so uh Jen and that's very important if you when you move from zero to one one to ten ten to 100 what really matters is whether you are able to significantly increase the founder mentality most of the companies struggle not because of external reasons but internally in in many cases 10 years on Founders themselves lose that founder mentality but if you can increase that fundamentality by having more and more owners those who think like honors is not just about Founders it's all about having found a mentality that's that's very important to make sure that um your you continue making bigger and bigger impact sure look in in my experience building scale in India has always been tough it's not an easy Market to to crack but also to take a business from you know a couple of million dollars to hundreds of millions dollars in in terms of Revenue scale uh you've done that incredibly well over the last six seven years uh you've grown maybe 40 times now to be a two billion dollar company as we spoke about how how did the process of scaling up work out for you and could you also maybe talk a little bit about how easy or difficult it was to build something that is potentially an emerging Global Champion out of India I'm happy that you talked about revenue and not valuation so in India in this sector especially starting in India as an advantage because uh the like as there is no need to create awareness for learning students are hungry to learn the reason why uh 25 000 students used to sit for three to four hours even when we were doing offline sessions is a clear indication that uh uh the hunger to learn that's inherent so starting in India is a is a big advantage in a sector like this I strongly believe that uh education and education technology uh India has a big opportunity to create Global Champions now it's it's a long process in terms of what we have been able to do we start uh if you take something common if you take a look at all the large education education technology companies most of them are built by teachers those who use technology as an enabler the the good part about that is as a teacher you'll always think of what students want and not what technology can do but using Tech as an enabler solving for both access and efficiency when I say efficiency in terms of improving engaging engagement and Effectiveness by personalizing the way students consume and today's kids in 21st century illiteracy is not about or illiterates are not the ones who can't read and write in this like in this uh in this world it's all about uh learning unlearning and then relearning how do you make sure that uh some someone who's going to in school today is getting ready for a future where most of the jobs are not not even getting defined it's very important to create the habit of self learning how to learn is a lot more important than because our curriculums and uh education systems will struggle to catch up with the changes which is happening so there is clear focus on creating self-learn all of us learn today all of us are learning because we want to learn we're not learning because there is an exam and that's where self-learning or Active Learning or creating lifelong Learners is is the more if you ask me what is the future of learning it's all about that how do we make sure that we are all that we all love learning is is an exciting thing we all learned before joining in school and after leaving universities we learned a lot more when you learn only for an exam only for uh looking at just to score more in an exam or or in an assessment that's when uh that's not learning that's just a shortcut so Building Products which can find that right balance between keeping it engaging without losing it Effectiveness uh and in common language I'll say that putting the right amount of chocolate coating before we take them through the broccoli is very important but if you can do it right you can easily convert students from those who are learning out of from out of fear of exams to those who want to learn out of love for learning no that's fair and when you think about the last two two and a half years I suppose covet was obviously a massive Tailwind for edtech a lot of schools were shut people were unable to get the right kind of uh instruction and people moved online do you think there's been a little bit of a pullback how's your experience been the last year or so especially as the macros turned around a little bit and things have gotten tougher for most Founders uh how's edtech played out how's it been for you personally and for your team in in markets where we have strong presence which is it like India is 75 percentage of our Revenue Middle East is almost 10 percentage of our Revenue just from Indian students so these are some of the bright spots in the world so we see continued momentum uh what you're seeing in U.S and especially higher education where the narrative around because people are earning more they are not learning that's not applicable here so we don't so we are still growing uh we just finished our best half year where we saw 50 year on year growth from last year to this year what kovit did to online learning is it gave a chance for all stakeholders to experience one of the other format of online learning and that will help us skip a few years in our next 10 20 year Journey uh online learning though it was always there it was a big challenge to make all stakeholders when I'm talking about stakeholders all students parents uh teachers institutions they all tried out one of the other format of online learning during the two core videos now it's it's not that things will move 100 online or 100 offline just like all other sectors the future of learning is going to be hybrid where we have to find the best of what can be done online and what can be done offline Fair let's switch gears a little bit entrepreneurship is never an easy Journey as as you know better than many other people when you think about the last six seven years and particularly the last 24 months or so what do you think were some of the toughest moments in your journey this is a tough one you asked for it uh what do you think uh were some of the most tough times and how did you wither those uh just examples would be great yeah if people think entrepreneurship is easy now the thing is it's all about uh it's never easy and uh bigger you create something the challenges are bigger now uh like with the apart from macro environment challenge we had to go through multiple challenges because we were growing at 100 year on year for the last uh five years now in an environment where Rob uh like the revenue multiples were driving valuation uh suddenly when you are shifting towards profitability if the foundation is not strong those companies will struggle but it's also an opportunity for the segment leading companies to define the segment by making the right shift towards finding the right balance between growth and profitability so that's an opportunity as challenging as it can be that's a big opportunity for companies those who are defining the sectors so and every crisis is an opportunity to start something new every crisis is an opportunity to uh go back to your roots and find out uh like the the kill the inefficiencies in the system and focus on things which are and and focus towards sustainable growth so I know it's been challenging but uh it's also been exciting now it's if you are thinking of for me it's like I've been teaching for 18 years I want to do this for 30 more years anything over that kind of that long period of a time is bound to work especially if you are following your passion especially when you are living your dream now Cycles like this will come and go six months 12 months Cycles fund like many funding winners have come and gone but building long-term businesses if the aspiration is to build something which will last for decades chances are that Tom you will succeed over that period that longer period of time if you're trying to do something in the next two years it's difficult to define success so yeah no absolutely the longer you arise and the easier it is what you have this region I think over the last year or two has seen a lot of activity on the entrepreneurial side there's a lot of people that are looking to go out and create something of Their Own what would you say just as advice to budding Founders or entrepreneurs that are starting up in this region this part of the world I am someone who strongly believes that um as and when countries move towards a knowledge economy that's very strong focus in the region towards that it's an opportunity to first start something new and start when I like if you see what's happening now like in this region is that there are so many people starting out there is nothing like it's too late to start though I see uh like uh it's uh the the moment you uh start pursuing your dreams and uh it's it's more about uh again you should not start because someone else is asking you to start you should start and uh because I I've heard a lot of people telling it's like it's very difficult to raise 10 million but you don't start a company with the 10 million you start a company started with three people and an idea or one person and an idea everything else will follow so uh at the end of the day entrepreneurship unlike what people think it's not a skill it's a mindset it's a mindset where people where you don't take no for an answer so there is nothing like this is okay this this is not the best time to start you can always start the impact which you can create I normally say that top you will find out there are 75 000 startups in India and uh if uh if the potential to have a million startups and 100 jobs for startup is like 100 million jobs that's opportunity when you when you think from like the place where we come from but that opportunity exists across the world there is a lot of entrepreneurial energy it's the right time to start and uh one thing which all of us will realize once we get into something like this is that you will immediately realize that top all of us are all of you are Lord better than what you think it's it's almost like you're far better than what you think you are you can do a lot more than what you think you can do that's the first thing which you will realize once you enter your entrepreneurial Journey I'll repeat that once more all of you are far better than what you think you are and all of you can do lot more than what you think you can I come from a small village uh south of India if I can't do this much or if I can do lot more so go and start up well said excellent like when when you scale a business like this there'll always be challenges yeah so but right now there is huge momentum on the ground so so you believe that you can Tide over this very much very much thank you I've just seen like I'll give that answer objectively over there uh we have 71 investors and there are at least I can see at least five existing investors sitting on the in the crowd including him not a single investor I've exited the company they are the closest to the action not a single top level employer have exited the company business at this scale when there are six million students and uh there it'll have its own challenges but there is nothing which can't be solved I just invested 400 million back into the company so it's it's going all in now if your question is ah how are we solving challenges there are many challenges at this scale all companies go through challenges but so with that with the end of uh and I believe you had made some acquisition in Australia also right am I right how do you see uh do you think uh in in the coming years uh you are disciplined will be uh you believe there will be virtual more of virtual universities than than physical universities or how do what do you have to say because I am this question is specific to your business what's the future of learning I think the future is going it's going to blend it where the you will find be allow to find the best of what can be done online and offline so hybrid learning if your question is will AI completely replace teachers tutors I don't think so not in the next five ten years uh teachers will always have in in an Ideal World student in like in next generation will learn on their own teachers ideally should play a mentoring motivating role and rather than spoon feeding okay thank you yeah I'm told we're out of time thank you very much baiju it was a was a good thank you thank you [Applause]