EP4: SHOPIFY, WIX and the ECommerce Boom in India ft. Vargab Bakshi

Every time I think about what they are selling, I think about Var. India is a great market when it comes to uh volume of users. I think there's a lot that uh the ecosystem has done for itself but the aspiration in our country is something that I'm very proud of as an Indian. We've got amazing videos, amazing content. People are learning so much from that. There will be a point when I'll be tired of my corporate life. Why? Why fear? What's the reputational risk that you have too early in your life? I want to be an entrepreneur, but I don't have the confidence. I don't

have the money. I don't have the knowledge, the knowhow, the right partners. And I've noticed this about you, you've been very particular about time management. Like I keep saying on multiple podcasts that time is the currency on social media. I have always learned from people and their experiences. What is the future of commerce going to look like? Today, tech companies do not have a long life cycle. It's very rare that you uh see a tech company having a 100year uh lifetime. Uh one thing people misunderstand about uh e-commerce. E-commerce is an easy

business to start, difficult one to sustain, right? And even more difficult one to scale. Do you think Shopify and Wix can be disrupted too? [Music] The Hustle Group Company. Let me introduce you to the Hustle Group Company. It's a lifestyle brand that's redefining street wear through the power of fashion, self-belief, and resilience. The second one being Discover Dollar, which is an AIdriven tech company that helps brands and retailers recover hidden dollars from overp payments and leakages. Docs Now's intelligent

platform empowers businesses of all sizes to rapidly collect, manage, govern, and collaborate on the data front, transforming your documents and making sure there's an impact on the business bottom line all in a secure and a single environment. Hey everyone, my name is Abh Tandan. I'm your host. Welcome to the Innovators and Disruptors podcast. As you are as you are aware we normally talk about a lot of impact stories and this impact is interlin with the human emotions and human philosophies behind these architects of impact and today's

episode is also going to focus on one such gentleman who I really admire for the work that he has brought in and he has done over the last few years. So welcome aboard Varab thank you so much for joining us. A quick introduction about you know at least dil introduction that I wanted to give. Varab has been in my mind for all the right reasons keeping in mind that every time I open my Instagram I see some D2C brand some brand selling some interesting products to me and every time I think about what they are selling I think about Varab because Varab has been

instrumental in the journey of so many SMBs D2C brands and even enterprises in this country having their online stores he has been the you know head for Shopify and Vix in India and has been able to bring in so much of innovation. It's made life so much easier for these SMDs and these sellers today to you know come up with interesting products and just start selling it to consumers. So thank you so much Vara for joining us for this episode. Thank you Abbe you're very kind. Um I think there's a lot that uh the ecosystem has done for itself uh how entrepreneurs have helped other

entrepreneurs in D2C especially. Uh I'm very glad I was able to play a role. Uh but the aspiration in our country is something that I'm very proud of as an Indian and uh I expect to see way more entrepreneurs uh than today starting T2C businesses over the next two decades. Well, that's fantastic. You know, you spoke about you being an Indian and how this uh I'm assuming that there are a lot of cultural nuances, you know, as an Indian when you grew up in this environment and then you bumped into Shopify along your career journey. You bumped into Vix, right? And you brought

them in these cultural nuances, how did they impact your innovation at these organizations or the impact creation specifically keeping in mind India as a geography? Um that's a great question. So I think one advantage that I had is that I had a very multicultural growth. Mhm. Uh so I was born in Kolkata. I was raised in Hyderabad. I've spent some time in Pune, in Bombay, about 9 years in Bangalore now. So I've stayed in multiple cities. I've uh you know gotten the exposure that a lot of people uh you know don't always turn up getting. when you meet people from uh you know various

walks of life your um your spectrum of thinking widens uh you know your your acceptance to radical ideas also uh you know improves um so so I think as uh if you see someone in India who's wellraveled and has seen various parts of the country I I've I've always observed that they have gone on to do well uh you know in their corporate career or entrepreneurial career if If I were to draw parallels that did this multicultural growth help me in my career 100%. Like uh you may have seen as well like kids who go to different schools u you know always uh find it

easier to make friends and um this the corporate world works a lot on relationships. True. Um and if you are someone who can make relationships easily and uh you know prove to be of value to another person, things become easier uh for your um career trajectory. uh for companies like uh Wix and Shopify and Google and Dell and all the tech companies that I've been a part of. I think um yeah I you know I the first time I traveled out of India um was in 2010. Okay. Uh when I was working in Google and uh Seattle was the first city that I went to. This is the first time.

So I just had gotten my passport. So when I was growing up I never had traveled outside India. Um and I've traveled to what 25 plus countries now just related to work. some of course vacations etc with family but work related travel uh dominated in the initial part of my uh career and uh one of the things that I realized is that my u level of comfort with someone who doesn't speak my language doesn't look like me comes from very uh different value systems is is I am still able to connect with that person uh you know be be friends with that person really fast

and build build a bond that lasts over years. I think authenticity and genuiness and honesty and trying to actually be helpful to someone reaps a lot of benefits in any culture. Um so and whether it's India or whether it's you know anywhere across the world um Shopify is a fiercely Canadian company Wix is a fiercely Israeli companies and you will see both these companies embibing the culture of the countries that they started in like you you will see let's say a Canva uh being very Australian uh because you know the leadership is from Australia you will

see a lot of the uh tech companies that have um you know that have been born in the Bay Area have the Bay Area culture. Um so companies like Shopify and Wix have um you know have obviously taught me a lot about how things work in the western side of the world or the uh Middle Eastern part of the world but also I think I have been able to give uh both the companies there uh a great glimpse of what India looks like. How India is not one country uh but you know multiple small countries in one big country. sort of like a European Union where you know business changes or the

way of doing business changes um every 100 kilometers languages change the way people um interact with you it changes the food changes um so so yeah I mean I'm I'm personally you know very um tied to culture and the impact that it has um on business that's fantastic uh One of the things uh Vab that you spoke about was a lot of travel right a lot of different cultures that you've been exposed to and that's fantastic and I can probably relate to that because I've grown up in seven cities in India and three outside as well over my 38 years of uh life experiences right and

uh in each of these cities I was able to pick up something new as a child when you're traveling you're hearing so many new stories you become much more open in your mindset to accepting nuances right and that's so critical ult today because the world has become so polarized. You know, as a as as a young kid, you know, while you were growing up, what were certain elements, what were certain exposures, etc. that you had while growing up, certain value systems that got you to where you are today? H I think um was always this extrovert who would like go and walk up to anybody and

start a conversation. And I was like that since I was a kid. M uh so my parents would take me to a restaurant and uh you know I would just walk up to a stranger if I would find that person interesting and just have a conversation. Um when I grew up and I was in my early teenage I never had the fear to walk up to a girl uh in a pub and just ask her you know to have a conversation with me. A lot of men find that difficult, right? Like it's not easy for a man to walk up to a woman and just Yeah. just try and have a conversation, right? I was always good

at that. Oh, that's nice. And uh I mean that that's and I think one of the things that came out of it is a um courage is super important. True. Right. At every step of life whether it's personal or professional. Second, um don't be scared of failure and you should be okay with risks, right? So, I mean, uh if it's very much possible that you and your bunch of friends have gone to a a pub and you find a girl cute and you want to go and talk to that girl, uh but you you're scared that your friends are going to make fun of you if she, you know, doesn't talk to you or makes fun

of you, etc. But you should be okay with that failure, right? And you should be okay with that embarrassment. And if that happens a bunch of times with you, you suddenly become a little thick skinned and you become bold and more courageous than what you were. So with every little failure, you become stronger in your head and that actually impacts the kind of person you are and the decisions that you take later on in your career. Right? Um Kunal Sha recently I'd seen a tweet etc. He said that you know uh youngsters today care so much about their

reputation uh where they don't even have one. Um and uh yeah even even now that I've been in leadership in some uh tech companies I still don't think you know I I I should care much about my reputation. I think reputation is uh is something that's there today not there tomorrow comes back again later. Fame is very fickle. Right. and you sort of need to just stick to what you want to do and the noise uh that's around you try and avoid. makes a lot of sense. You know, it's very interesting two, you know, two follow-up conversations on this, right? One is that, you know, I I go back to

the drawing board and talk about Maslo's pyramid of needs, right? Where u as you know, the new generations have evolved, they have risen up the pyramid and psychological safety is now very important for them. Ruti, Kapra, Makan and you know basics are all being taken care of because more often than not these kids today they have already been provided that right they don't have to worry about some of these aspects they have to worry a lot more about psychological uh safety and that is why if you see the the the career paths have traversed or changed so much right you

know today you don't talk about people talk about being an engineer they do not want to be engineer they want to be something more creative they're going into philosophy they're going into policym and so on and so forth which is very different as against you know what earlier career choices look like probably because of that they there's this intent or innate fear about their psychological safety and confidence around approaching new things but I've still seen um you know that's a very valid point that you know why why fear what's the reputational risk that you

have too early in your life you know and eventually as well uh you know I've come from a place where I have made the statement so many times I've created certain credibility around myself and I do not want to do anything shady in my life which pulls that you know credibility down. So there's any anyway it's very different from doing shady versus uh you know taking bold risks right risk is something that I also take but uh coming back to this do you still go to pubs and you know you know talk to random people it's time that I start teaching kids

that I am married with a baby now so I don't do that anymore but happy to share some tips with youngsters you know I mean like like I said what's the worst that can happen right what's the worst that can happen so I I mean not you're not going to die. Um and and what's like what people are going to laugh at you what they're going to laugh at you for some minutes and then move on to the next thing. So you probably made a few people laugh. So it it doesn't really matter um you know if if you get embarrassed I think every embarrassment leads to something uh better. So yeah, I

I I I think today's generation um is so much around validation what people think and that's because of social media. True. And it's super important to kind of uh take yourself out of it. Um and don't have like an image of yourself that you've got in your head and you build that image in such a way that now you think that nothing can go wrong with that image. I think that's a very wrong way of looking at things. Keep life simple. Uh keep take every day as it comes. Some days won't be as great as the others and that's okay. I think just be very

comfortable with those ups and downs. That's fantastic. You mentioned that you're about about your kid, right? Parenthood. Uh what's that like, you know, and how do you want to raise up your kid? Uh my little girl, I've named her Jana Bakshi. Um she's she's 3 months old. Um yeah, it was it was a my wife's pregnancy was a really interesting experience, you know, just just taking her through each of the trimesters and um yeah, I think some someone told me and I'm trying to adhere to that is your wife,

your baby needs uh the mother most of the time, you know, for feeding, for taking care, the mother's warmth. In fact, for the first few months, the baby doesn't even realize that the baby's not a part of the womb anymore. Um, so the baby will need the mother uh, you know, more than the baby will need the father, right? Um, but you as the father need to take care of the mother. So, you take care of your wife, your wife will uh, be able to take care of the baby. Of course, like, you know, I've I've uh um been very hands-on with my baby. And um you know I I I walk her around

the house. I sing her songs. I play with her. Uh I put her to sleep. I help her take those burps. Uh so so yeah, I'm I'm I'm sort of doing my bit. Um and it's it's a it's a very fulfilling experience and it's great to see little life form grow in front of you every day. The little things that she does that she wasn't doing a week before and now she does it. And I'm like, "Hey, this is there's something new that she's doing." And these little nuances actually um really make my day. Like I may be having like a tough day at office, but my baby's my baby the first time she smiled

at me, I just forgot everything. Like I was like, "Wow, this is the most awesome feeling in the world when your baby smiles at you." Um and I became a father. I'm I'm 37 years old. Um and I just became a father. So obviously I married late. I uh you know had a baby late. Uh so and like now I realize I get it now you know that that yeah probably these little happiness uh you know these happy moments could have started earlier in my life now to think of it you know if I make uh plenty of money I'm very comfortable with the idea of staying at home and taking care of my

child because I think there is there will be a point where I'll be tired of my corporate life. Uh um and I think I've got a solid 10 to max 15 years more uh you know to to to give it my best shot. Um actually I am lucky that I've been able to take a 3 month paternity leave um and you know like just be with my baby and my wife and uh take care of them during this particular period of infancy. Um and yeah not everybody is lucky enough to take a break from their work or uh get so much leave uh or even you know you get unpaid leave will you be able to sustain uh so I I think I've

been sort of lucky that I've been able to u structure that in a way that uh you know I've done justice to my work life as well as um you know take care of my family as and when uh it's needed. Um, so I I have been I've been hated on social media a lot of times because I've been an advocate of, you know, 70our work weeks or even more. Um, and um, there's it's not that, you know, people like me do not have a family life. In fact, I can perhaps challenge a lot of people who keep hating on me when I advocate for 70 weeks that probably I spend more family time, more quality

family time uh with my loved ones than probably them who don't even know how they manage their time. I'm very particular about how I stick to my calendar. Amazing. So I have been um you know following a routine whatever is on my calendar I try and follow it to the tea and let's say if it's in the evening from 8:00 to 11:00 in the evening if that if it's u blocked there as you know um let's say dinner with wife or take wife out for shopping or take baby to the doctor or take mommy to the mandr I I stick to that not cancel that. Um, and it's it's just so that look, it's not

possible for uh senior execs to do a phenomenal job at their workplace as well as u, you know, do a phenomenal job all the time at a family level. But it's super important that if your family expects you to do some things for them, you turn up, show up, and do a good job with it. And don't cancel them at the last minute. That really hurts hurts them. So as much as you want to uh you know prove yourself in your career uh I'm I'm an ambitious guy. I know my family wants me to succeed at the highest level. Uh but I also know that if I'm not there in the most important

moments when my family wants me to be there um they would probably look back and think does he actually have to make more amount of money than we need? Uh so so these are things that I've often thought about you know just plain looking into uh the dark and just thinking what like is it really worth missing important family time to make more money um and vice versa. So yeah, I think that work life balance is super important. But um I often think it's the life balance. Don't don't call it work life balance. Call it balancing life. Like how do you manage everything in

your life in a nice way? Um and if you're able to do that in a nice way, then like kudos to you. That's fantastic. That's so beautiful and profound and you know the way you put it across. Time management is so essential today. uh in one of my conversations, you know, I remember I was supposed to meet with Ronnie Screw back in 2017 and uh one of the gentlemen who was arranging that for that conversation, he told me just before I was supposed to go in, he said, "Ronnie is very particular about time. He manages so many different things and he has given you a half an

hour slot, but I'm going to give you a couple of pointers up front. one if you are not able to keep him engaged he's going to truncate the meeting in 15 minutes because he's going to value those 15 minutes of you know time that he can get back on the contrary if the conversation is so riveting that he's hooked into it he might extend your meeting by another half an hour as well if required right happy to say I was in that meeting room for 45 minutes so that means I must have had some good conversation there but that was such an important lesson for me as well that you

know someone who has to manage so media houses, cupboard teams and you know fund houses and so on and so forth. I mean Ronnie Skola does a bunch of different things. He was so particular about time and that was my lesson from that conversation that you know if you have to get into a conversation make sure that you know you are utilizing those 30 minutes, 20 minutes, 1 hour to the max make the most meaningful impact that you can create out of that and then move out. Cut off move to the next one. Absolutely. Sometimes you have to do that to ensure that you know you're able

to contribute and balance your life like you said right beautifully. Absolutely super important and time management if done well can do serious wonders in your life. Uh you do not you don't need to be you know studying from a premier institute or uh you know like be be a part of a very prolific alumni network. All you need to really be cognizant of is the way you spend every minute of your day. Um, and it's not that like I play PlayStation, I play FIFA almost on a regular basis. Like at at least every alternate day I will play for sure unless I'm traveling or

whatever. But I make it a point that's my d-stress after dinner. like I work, I spend some time with my wife, then I eat dinner, then I play one or two games on FIFA. Uh you know like on PlayStation I play I love playing FIFA and u yeah then I sort of go to bed, read a book, uh spend some time with my baby and then you know call call it a night. Um and this that half an hour PlayStation break is also marked on my calendar. Oh, brilliant. Wow. So, uh, it's a lot of people think it's stupid, but it's just that I sort of look at it as a ritual. That's amazing. And sometimes, you know,

when I don't get um wins in my real life, I try and get that in my video game life. It boosts my confidence sometimes. Some days test you, some days push you to the edge. The obstacles, they'll always be there. But the secret is in owning this moment, right here, right now. Because greatness isn't built tomorrow. It's for today. One step, one choice, one heartbeat at a time. Coming to coming to your journey, how exactly did Shopify and then Wix happen and you know you know what was your experience been in creating so many

impact stories and can you also talk to us about maybe a few incidents or instances where you saw those impacts really transforming lives of people out there? Absolutely. Um first off like I have been incredibly lucky to have great people around me uh who have inspired me. Um I have uh I have always learned from people and their experiences in my humble opinion what you can learn from someone's personal experience can be way more effective than a book sometimes. Um, like for instance, if you and I sit over a drink and you tell me five reasons why

um you and your ex boss didn't click and I'll be like, well, those are, you know, and you tell me those five things and I'll be like, hell yeah. Like those were the three out of those five things resonate with me. It's happened with me in my career. And then we discuss and there's a two-way interaction and then we eventually lead to hey were there mistakes on our end as well could we have done something better and then maybe at the end of two drinks like we both take back about my different perspective of how I manage up uh you know the up in terms of manage my

leadership versus how you do and there'll be some good elements from me that you can learn and some good elements from you that I can learn and that I think that's something that often a book uh you know misses right um because the book is is a very singular lens of how that author perceives uh you know a certain situation and goes about solving that um of course there are books like hard thing about hard things by Ben Horowitz which tries and explains how you know every angle that a leadership has to look at while taking you know hard decisions um And you know

there are great books. I'm not denying that. But um there's no two-way interaction. I can't talk to a book, but I can talk to you. And if I'm able to loosen up and talk a little more, perhaps I'll get some insights that can, you know, open my eyes to something that I was just blind to so far. Uh so I love you know speaking to people learning from experiences and uh meeting new people and that sort of um you know like open doors to meeting some people uh in the leadership team of Shopify. It was through cold uh emails um that I you know started a conversation didn't get

responses uh early on but then they started responding uh you know sent multiple documents around what the strategy should be in this part of the world and um yeah then they decided that I should be their first hire in Asia Pacific and uh then I went on to you know head India then went on to uh drive the APAC business went on to uh head their emerging markets business um and uh at the end of 8 years I uh quit Shopify uh became an angel investor uh you know took a break was an adviser to multiple startups in the e-commerce D2C space um then after that I joined Wix.

Wix had been reaching out to me and I wanted to work for an Israeli company because the tech there is awesome. Uh plus I didn't have any network in Israel and now I do. Uh so so huge one if I yeah a huge one. Um so uh I like I'm I'm very lucky that I've been able to meet the right people at the right time. Um if if I were to you know like share tips on how do you crack such opportunities I think u do not be someone who's waiting for let's say if today you want to work at open AI or perplexity or any of the top-notch uh AI companies like start doing cold reachouts to their leadership

to their engineering manager to you know based on whatever role that you're looking for and you know create a role for yourself like I'm sure that they are aware of some of the problem statements that you are thinking about when you identify that hey open AI is doing this well but perhaps it's not doing this well and I think this could be solved in so and so way start writing an email like it's okay if you don't hear back from them a dozen times continue to do that till you hear back get a no like honestly I I either get a no and stop disturbing me kind of a response and I'm

like thank you I'll close the thread here or like I'll just you know keep writing and and a lot and you need a lot of uh patience you know to in in this entire process but that's how I got the Shopify job that's what made me good amount of money like which which kind of keeps me financially secure um look like risks are super important important calculated risks are even more important for people who have family like us because you can't really take absolutely radical risks that can put you in a a spot of worry. Um so I I've and I've always been someone who's been like hey

what's the worst that can happen? So I I will I will always continue to use that mantra. Yeah. Um I consider myself as someone who understands India, understand how uh India's business metrics work. Uh for instance, India is a great market when it comes to uh volume of users. But India is not a great market when it comes to average revenue per user. For instance, you know this well like uh for telecom companies, the average revenue per user uh in the US is $30. In India, it's $6. So there's there's a 5x difference, right? So how do telecom companies easily make money

in India? It's a difficult process, but you've got over a billion people to serve. So at volume, you'll probably be able to make money and margins, but uh at the smaller your um your audience is, the more difficult it gets. you you can sell exclusive products, sell products to the rich, sell products to enterprises and make good amount of money. So either you try and cater to that top.1% of the audience in India or try and crack uh the bharat which is tier 2, tier three, tier four etc. Um and you try and crack that long tail. Uh so it's

if you're cracking metros, try and go after the rich segment. If you're going longtail, try and crack that tier 2 and uh tier three cities etc. But your um it's super important that companies which are entering India know that there are multiple indas in one India. And I think u the better job people like you and I are able to do uh in in in that aspect uh the better opportunities will come up for us personally as well as for entrepreneurs who were enabled through these companies. Um you were asking me about stories of entrepreneurs you know who've been successful. Um first of all

like it'll be wrong on my part to take credit for anything that um these entrepreneurs have achieved. uh because I know so many entrepreneurs in the Shopify ecosystem who have made millions of dollars every year by either running an e-commerce business or by building an app which helps e-commerce bu businesses or by selling services of website development digital marketing and still making tons of money. Like you'll be surprised like Gujarat has uh tens of thousands of such small dev shops of 10 to 15 20 people companies doing like well over let's say 5 crores uh in

annual revenue and in that you can say this there's almost like a 40 to 50% take-home margin um and like services businesses um there's always that arbitrage especially when you're trying to sell to US UK Australia and developed markets and they pay you in uh dollars and pounds and you make a fat margin as as the founder. Um and I've seen like thousands of such stories. I think uh what what people like me probably have done is that we've localized the product and we've um you know gone above and beyond to make people in India feel that Shopify is a company that actually cares

about Indians, right? and what Indian businesses want and Wix as a company cares about how Indians want to design their websites or what kind of a brand that they want to build. U as Indians love it when foreign companies give them that due respect and attention. Um when you look at let's say a McDonald's introducing a paneer burger or a macalloo kind of a burger the vegetarians here appreciate that. vegetarians appreciate that there's probably no beef burger in in a McDonald's because that would have sort of stopped someone you know who's who's

purely vegetarian to go into that uh particular restaurant. Uh these little things, these cultural nuances when foreign companies take that into account while entering a market like India, you know, definitely contributes uh to the success for sure. In fact, even VIX has been a keystone in itself, you know, specifically the India presence, the price points at which they attracted the markets. I'm assuming you are the man behind that as well. Yeah, we s we we've been selling Wix at what $1 a month. No one would have heard of something

like that till we saw Wix doing something like this. And you know in India specifically it was like a shocker that you know wow someone can afford to now have a website at such a low cost and the look and feel of the website was actually beautiful. It was grand you know they had so many options to choose from and now you could own that build your businesses get it up and running so quickly with all the possible integrations possible there and such a low cost. You hooked them in and you empowered them. That's the thing. India is a very valueconscious market like you

know there's a lot of people uh on Wall Street who say oh you're expanding into India it's a very price sensitive market. No. Yes we we are probably uh you know one of those parts of the world who love a good bargain. So are the Chinese. Um but um I think we we u we are a nation that's extremely value conscious. We are okay to spend 100 rupees on something if we see there's actually you know worth spending 100 rupees on. True. Um like my father would gift me uh you know a very good pen if that pen helps me write faster in an exam. Right? So and that's okay. My

father may be probably earning 10,000 rupees a month but if that uh you know that pen cost 100 rupees and that's going to allow my kid to give a better examination I will spend that money to do it for sure right and uh that's uh like that's that's 1% of my salary and I'm spending that on a pen but the value of that 1% is my son's going to be educated and someday that this all of this uh sacrifices that I'm making these little investments that I'm making is actually going to come back to me um with in a grander bigger way. Um so India is a very value conscious market

uh and the more you are able to uh provide value the money comes out very easily. Um like for instance um when uh Dove shampoo came out I was I think you and I were kids back then and then uh all all the moms used to love Dove when it launched because oh there's more moisturizer there's but Dove used to be expensive and then Dove launched those sachets and then suddenly that was democratized like even someone whose salary whose family income wasn't very high would still be able to uh buy a Dove sachet because now it's been democratized. The barrier to entry in

accessing a product like Dove back in the day, you know, changed completely, right? So, u it's it's super important to lower barriers of entry for anyone to do entrepreneurship, for anyone to start a business and solve a problem. U and for that it's super important to have social media handles, to have a website, to have a voice on the internet. The best part about the internet is that it has disrupted the way things have always worked. Distribution is now in your hands. You can build your uh distribution. You can tell your own story. You don't need to go to a media

house. You don't need to go to let's say someone who controls that distribution. You can build it yourself. I think this is the opportunity of our lifetime and everyone should be thinking how to leverage that for their own benefit. That's fantastic. That's so true and that's so fantastic to hear that from you because uh it truly is a gamecher. I mean India is known for its SMBs as their backbone. Correct. We have huge number of startups today. Yes, we have huge number of enterprises but India is predominantly a SMB environment and them being enabled solves for economic level

problems and challenges of India right and like you beautifully mentioned about leveraging internet to its fullest very easily is what you crack and that is why today there's a huge penetration of even this new wave of dark stores that you see coming up given quick commerce is absolutely booming and the reason is convenience Right? Because you and I, we may not have the time to go to a shop, buy something, and in 15 minutes if it's getting delivered to my home, nothing like it. Right? And the supply of dark stores cannot be done by a Zeppto or a Instamart alone. Right? You need people

who are ready to um you know give their space and start a dark store. And um Adit Pala of Zeppto was mentioning how these dark store owners are also starting to make substantial income. Um so opportunities around entrepreneurship will continue to 10x over the next decade especially with AI and AGI come in. You will see micro entrepreneurship uh rising significantly. you like be very comfortable with the fact that there will be five people running a billion dollar company in the next 10 years. There'll be a five people team

running a billion dollar company in the next 10 years because a lot of the technology builds um would be done by AI. Um and it's not that people will go out of jobs. Um that may happen in the interim but what's going to essentially happen is that three or four people here you know come together and start things uh that solve a very niche problem statement and these bunch of people would probably solve that problem statement better than someone else and that's how you will see smaller companies being created. So, this is a great time to actually start something.

Amazing. That's so so so true. Uh, do you think Shopify and Wix can be disrupted too? Great question. Um, yes. Um, I think there's always um, you know, disruption opportunities in in the way things work today. I'll give you an example. Look, today you can get a bunch of IIT engineers and build a Shopify for yourself. It's not very hard. But uh what's difficult is to create the partner and developer ecosystem that Shopify has built. Um because the difference between a platform and a product is that Shopify is a platform company and people who are building

businesses on top of the platform make more money than the platform. Right? U for instance uh Shopify from the time it started the number of sellers selling on top of Shopify cumulatively have sold more than a trillion dollars worth of goods just through Shopify's platform and um the partners who are on Shopify uh if Shopify is doing let's say $10 billion in revenue the partners would be doing north of $20 billion in revenue cumulatively so it's a platform it has enabled multiple businesses to make money on top of their platform. They have given more they've created more

value for the ecosystem than they have retained for themselves. And that's what makes Shopify a very difficult company to disrupt, right? But their technology can be disrupted. There can be a better technology than Shopify. For instance, I I'll give like um so I've quit Wix uh very recently as you know and I'm on a paternity break and now that I'm don't work at Shopify and I don't work at Wix, I've got some freedom to probably talk about, you know, the positives of of both uh companies. For instance, Wix does a better job than Shopify if for any novice to create a website. It's

super easy on a Wix. Even though Shopify says that it's super easy to build a website on uh its platform, it's not as easy like you you will be able to do it but more often than not you need like a professional developer to sort of you know put that finesse in the uh in the website. uh but Shopify does a way more stellar job when it comes to managing an e-commerce business uh versus let's say a Wix uh and like Shopify is a more mature platform. Wix again let's say caters to multiple verticals like hotels, restaurants which Shopify does not. So both of these companies they

they try and do different things but um it's possible for each of these organizations to be disrupted today if AI you know helps a website and there's already a lot of companies which you know you put prompts and the website is designed Shopify launched something called Shopify magic through which you can uh do a lot of these e-commerce operations through prompts. uh Wix has a website uh designer which uh you know just through prompts design your website. So with AI and AGI coming in over the next decade uh the you know you will see that what Shopify looks like

today would wouldn't be what it is 10 years from now and that applies to Wix as well. So, expect to see that every kind of legacy software that's been there in the um ecosystem from the last 10 or 20 years, expect them to change or expect them to be disrupted. But but it's going to happen uh for sure. Anyway, tech companies do not have a long life cycle. It's very rare that you uh see a tech company having a 100redyear uh lifetime. If you look at IBM started off in in the ' 70s '8s late '7s ' 80s they did really well but today IBM is dying. They may have cash

reserves but IBM as a company isn't innovating at the pace at which it was doing back in the day. So all tech companies have you know a certain time where they try and make the most of it and if you do not you know make the most of it at that time then you'll probably get disrupted. You know it it is true. I mean technology volatility is so damn fast today. Every week I see a new model coming up in AI right which is beating the precursor in one or multiple parameters and you're wondering you know what would really succeed correct

because this race on top of the ethical AI on top of it is making it so super crazy in terms of just following what is going on in the world. Right. I think I sometimes feel that there's a need for me to spend an hour or two every day just to keep a breast of what's happening in the space right because it's just so quick and changing. So here in this case what I also realized from the conversation the points that you just shared Vab is the mode has always been the ecosystem the marketplace the community the community right as against the tech correct so disruption in this

space is not just going to be on tech it's going to be a combination of tech plus community correct the whole ecosystem coming in together to disrupt that that's fantastic and that brings me to another very interesting question what is the future of commerce going to look like and what is the future future of I mean it's not just limited to building websites but at large what's the future of commerce going to look like personalized I think personalization is something um that everyone enjoys when I get a gift I really like uh you know my name

addressed a product that has probably got something inscribed which is personal to me hyperpersonalization is is something that we're moving towards I think that's something in commerce that I'm personally very excited about. I also think interactive experiences will uh will elevate especially with you know glasses coming in and with glasses becoming more seamless over the next uh decade. Imagine like um I don't know if you've seen spatial websites where you have this 3D experience of maneuvering like you are in a store. Um and uh websites of the future could be spatial

as well where you just say wear glasses and you're almost like stepping into a store and you're able to see clothes and you're able to see shoes and you're able to almost feel the kind of stuff uh that you feel uh when you go to let's say a showroom and an offline retail store. Um I think it's about it's how much are you able to merge online and offline and how much are you able to create this multiverse and what how is your avatar uh acting in that multiverse versus how it is acting in real life and how blurry are those lines and how accurate can they be over time is something that's

going to be very interesting o over the next 10 20 years. Um for example I I think you've seen my content creation uh journey as well and uh some of the videos that so 80% of the videos I shoot in the studio but sometimes when I'm traveling and uh you know a video needs to go out uh we we use AI to uh you know shoot to do that uh produce that video and uh we use let's say softwares like hey genen and 11 labs you know to get to get my voice right to get my actions right etc but more often than not the AI I hasn't become uh so good that my uh so every time I make like an AI video,

there'll be someone coming and hating on me that oh this is AI this is shitty and I'm like yeah I mean he's right uh that this hasn't come out um that well but over time like I would want my AI avatar to be as real as who I am in real life the way in terms of how I talk I talk, I behave, I respond, I take decisions and the closer your avatar is to your real life, the easier things become in in the multiverse. Awesome. Vio, you yourself had a brilliant journey as an influencer talking about such impact metrics and impact journeys and hacks to

build companies, to grow brands, etc. Right? uh grow quick is the name of your uh social environment where you know you've been spreading amazing messages if I'm not wrong 300,000 plus uh followers or subscribers on Instagram and a lot more on YouTube as well right could you talk to us a little bit about that journey you know how did you even put together something so up so quickly you've got amazing videos amazing content people learning so much from that could you give us a bit of a perspective on that um so a bunch of us got together and thought that uh India

needs an infotainment D2C channel. A couple of reasons is a um if you were to look at entrepreneurship overall, it's obviously growing uh because barriers to entry have have been taken down. Um we've also seen that um people the aspirational entrepreneurship quotient in our country is extremely high. So, but there is a bridge between aspiration and execution. So, I want to be an entrepreneur, but I don't have the confidence. I don't have the money. I don't have the knowledge, the knowhow, the right partners. There's there's like 10 problems that someone

can just spill out to you when you say that okay, what's stopping you uh you know to become an entrepreneur? So we thought let's start a channel where we'll we'll sort of share tips uh share stories of other entrepreneurs uh specifically in the D2C segment because uh we think that D2C is an evergreen sector anyone can start a D2C business uh if they are able to make a product and if there is certain customer base for it there you go you've probably got a lifestyle business not not all of these businesses need to raise funds they could very much be you know

lifestyle businesses which make you a few lakhs every month and that's that's quite decent, right? Um and uh I think one of the reasons that the channel did really well is because we spoke specifically about what businesses are doing differently. Uh how they're creating an unfair advantage. Uh what is let's say a mode to someone's business. um ho how did a certain entrepreneur identify a certain problem statement and then go about selling uh solving it. So um the channel I think is is doing phenomenally well over the last 8 9 months. We've like you mentioned like um

on Instagram we've crossed 300,000 followers. On YouTube we've crossed uh one lakh subscribers. Um and this is all through short form content. Uh we intend to do long- form content sometime later but we just thought that let's start with short form content. um these one minute videos don't uh need a lot of skin in the game from the viewer. So it's just bite-sized information. Um, and you know if you have a compelling hook that is triggering a certain emotion as soon uh as like I come to your video and within the first 5 seconds if I'm able if the video is able

to trigger an emotion within me of fear or hope or you know a fact that I want to share with someone you know and it's caught my attention. I think it's super like um and then how do you basically solidify that hook by saying that okay you've made a claim then you actually land facts that support your claim and then you move towards a call to action which speaks about how do you um you know how do you basically manage to execute what we just said. So, here's something we know. Here's why it's true. Here's how you can do it, too. And and these these small videos um like I keep

saying on multiple podcasts that time is the currency on social media. True. So, you and if if one if by giving one minute time I'm learning something new uh which I can share with my friends or in it inspires me to start something up. Worth it. Awesome. So guys in the audience who listening to this uh if you want to grow quick follow Grow quick. It's amazing content. I can attest to that and the other 300,000 people as well. So thank you so much. You've also been a fashionistaster. I I followed your fashion sensibilities and they're fantastic. I know a lot of

people who talk about that. What's the secret behind that? Look, some some people like us don't have green eyes like you, so we have to put an extra effort to look good, but um my wife does a lot of my shopping. Um and I love shopping from D2C brands, smaller brands that people don't hear about. I don't know if if the camera can look at my shoe. It's a handstitch shoe. It's not very expensive. It's a Bombay based brand called Canvas and it's a very quirky nice shoe, right? So, uh, yeah, I mean I like you need to a have the confidence to pull anything off and

it's okay. There are times where people are like, "This looks absolutely ridiculous on you." And it's okay. Like I said, I have never been scared of criticism and it's and in fashion, it's okay for things to, you know, uh, not go right. I mean, you wear 10 attires, two may not go your way. But the other eight, if they're able to, you know, hook someone's attention, worth it. And I actually became a little more fashion conscious since I started um, you know, creating content. And like when I go to the studio and these are all like 20, 21 year old Jenz's and boomers and I don't

even understand the language. For the first two times they said, "Oh, Vara, uh, the drip needs to be better. The drip needs to be better." I couldn't even understand what the does a drip mean. And then someone explained it to me, "No, your clothes need to be better." I was like, "Oh, okay." And then I started putting some effort into, you know, what I wear the trip. So, yeah, I think I think the it's it's the call of the hour. Um, you you probably it's it's so much like this is an attention economy. we are in right now. Um, you need to look good. You need

to present yourself. If yes, if you're a billionaire and you wear the same t-shirt every day to office, good for you. I mean, nobody's complaining. But for someone who's not been uh wants to get there, but doesn't often get that deserved attention. Wearing good, looking good, it doesn't doesn't just add to your confidence. It also, you know, helps people take a second glance at you. makes a lot of sense. Thank you so much for the fashion pointers. I'm hoping that you do give me some of those brand names too so that I can also shop around them. But

brilliant. Thank you so much for that. Thank you. U last segment of the conversation. We're going to call it the rapid fire because we're very original. Sure. So, I'm going to ask you a bunch of questions. We want very quick answers to those. Uh favorite apparel brand. I'm sorry. Favorite apparel brand. Favorite apparel brand. Okay. Uh I like Fred Perry and I like Calvin Klein. Both of them are a little premium but I really like uh you know both these uh brands. My wife buys a lot from Suta. So that's a great D2C brand uh that my my wife uh

buys from. Uh very recently I started wearing clothes from uh this this D2C brand called Sensus. Uh you know they they've got these polo t-shirts. So they are they're a good brand too. Amazing. Uh so I'm I'm happy I'm wearing a CK right now. So So it it is it is attested by VUB the fashionista himself. Thank you. Uh one word to describe yourself as a leader. Resilient. Brilliant. Tea or coffee? Coffee. Bangalore or Delhi or Bangalore by a mile? I do not like Delhi much. Top influencer of choice. Done my butt. Brilliant. What's

your favorite app other than Shopify and Wix? That's it. I this my my wife and I just went through a pregnancy and I really like this app called Flow which was to track the pregnancy and you know I could you know they have a partner app as well. So uh as her husband you know it used to give me notifications oh today your wife's mood may be like this because or your baby is developing nails uh today and it was a phenomenal app. So, uh, that's that's that's game changer. Yeah. I I mean, it made my pregnancy

experience better with my wife. That's amazing. Uh, the last book or podcast that really inspired you, Shane Parish, Knowledge Project. Um, I I like his podcast. Fantastic. Uh, one thing people misunderstand about, uh, e-commerce. Um, that it's easy to make millions of dollars through e-commerce. E-commerce is an easy business to start. Mhm. difficult one to sustain and even more difficult one to scale. Makes a lot of sense. Yep. Fantastic. Uh hidden talent no one knows about you. I dance decently well. Yeah. Awesome.

We're going to hopefully get to see some of those moves. If you had unlimited resources for one day, what problem would you solve? Health. I think I think the the health infrastructure in our country needs needs help and uh with with AI coming in I just hope that we are able to make health uh infrastructure like whether it's uh access to good doctors access to good uh you know machines and biomedical facilities. I just hope we are able to make more of that accessible to the poor. Uh that's that's a cause that I

would relate to. Great. Thank you so much Vara for being on the show. These were fantastic answers and I think there were a lot of very insightful pointers that I think for me personally I could uh you know go back home with thinking about this and you know double clicking on some of those pointers and coming back to you with more questions. Thank you sir. But I'm sure the audience today I mean the people who going to be listening to this conversation they're going to be amazed by some of the pointers that you've shared very practical very knowledgeable and

brilliant. Thank you so much for coming here and joining us. But on that note I do want to give you a gift. I have a hamper for you and I'm going to give you that. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Uh Vab, this is for you. This is by Copic Design who works on personalized stationary and gifting, corporate gifting. So they have this is handcrafted for you. Copic cu P I K. Copic design. Very cool. Very good. And it's there's a lot of stuff inside that is highly personalized for you. So you're going to check it out and let us know. Yeah. Thank you so much again for

coming in. Lovely hosting you. It was great being here. Thank you. Thank you so much. Just thank you. Cheers. Uh folks uh listening to us, this was Vara. Brilliant insights. If you like the content, please do comment, provide us your feedback, like and subscribe. Thank [Music] you. Feel free to share your perspectives through comments. Subscribe to the channel and do send us some suggestions as well. Thank you.