Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Building The On-demand Edtech Platform | Imbesat Ahmad @Filo
267 Plays2 years ago
Filo makes it possible for students to connect with teachers within 60 seconds for a live one-on-one learning session. Imbesat is a serial entrepreneur in the education space. He talks about building products that deliver real outcomes for students and how to scale mission-driven educational ventures.
Know about:-
- Helping students in Kashmir
- 2 parts of learning- data transfer and data processing
- Reviews to install ratio
- Pricing strategy
Recommended
Transcript
Educational Inequity vs. Tech Innovation
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey, this is Imbasath Ahmed over here. I'm founder and CEO of Filo.
00:00:16
Speaker
Today, the startup ecosystem has made it possible for you to order a product and get it delivered within 10 minutes. But in the education space, most people still wait for scheduled interactions with teachers in order to get their problems resolved. In this episode of the Founder Thesis Podcast, your host Akshay Dutt is talking with Imbesat Ahmed, the founder of the disruptive edtech startup, Filo.
00:00:38
Speaker
Philo is making it possible for students to connect with teachers within 60 seconds for a live, one-to-one learning session. Imbesat is a serial entrepreneur in the education space. And in this conversation, he talks about building products that deliver real outcomes for students and how to scale mission-driven educational ventures. Listen on, and if you like such insightful conversations with disruptive startup founders, then do subscribe to the Founder Thesis podcast on any audio streaming app.
Imbesat Ahmed's Educational Journey
00:01:14
Speaker
So, born and brought up in Patna, capital city of Dhatriyat Bihar. So, my father was a bank manager. So, when I was in school, by class 8 or by class 9, it was established by IT. So, IT was like the only option, just go achieve it, you can become something at least. So, the result was the first page of IT logo photo.
00:01:35
Speaker
So, did you come on the front page? Like what you corrected? Yes, I was. Tomare Kallnimek teacher. He was IIT Kanpur graduate. He was very well respected there. And my uncle was from NIT Patna. So, my grandfather wanted me, Nana wanted me to come to NIT. So, I did integrated MS in physics from IIT Kharagpur. To prepare for IIT, I first went to Super 13. That's right. This Super 13 is a movie movie.
00:02:03
Speaker
Yeah, just so that people move even here exactly. So all the talkers were in physics department. And I was the one who realized after getting into ITT, I don't want to continue with physics. And I was surrounded by all the physicists. I'm sure like more than 10 people in my department, they are aspiring to win Nobel physics prize.
00:02:20
Speaker
I can see on your LinkedIn that you had your own business while you were still in IIT, Altair Light Solutions. Yes. So that I started with my friends from Patnaali. He was my batchmate plus we were sharing the same hostel, same Bing.
00:02:35
Speaker
When I was in the second year of my college, so I did a project with Bihar government where we took out a trip to very deep areas of Bihar in some very underdeveloped districts. It basically bought an area with Jharkhand and pretty underdeveloped, you can say.
00:02:52
Speaker
So we made a team of around 20-25 people and I was leading that and I was fortunate enough to do this project with Bihar government where the idea was to aware the students about what's happening in the world and also to understand how people take education in an environment which is not just difficult, it's also very different in a lot of perspectives. So it was very insightful journey.
Early Ventures and Social Impact
00:03:14
Speaker
So after those 30 days, now we realized that there were like a list of problems and then we came back and we shared all those problems with the state.
00:03:21
Speaker
It struck us that lightning was a big problem. At the same time, Nitesh Kumar, the level chief minister of Bingar, has launched this project of distributing cycles. So we are going to have a club. We are going to have a cycle from school to home. We can charge a battery, plug it to a lamp, and it can give you, let's say, 90 minutes to 120 minutes.
00:03:48
Speaker
Power back up. So our entire lighting solution was wholly dependent on that. This will plug into the cycle and will cycling movement capture the battery chargers? Cycling movement will capture the battery chargers when the battery is charged. Normally, the cycle will be a little bit lighter. But in real-time, it will be a little bit lighter.
00:04:10
Speaker
Because a lot of people are complaining that we have to study in front of kerosene lamp and that's very hazardous, extremely hazardous. So we thought of building this, we created the prototype, we gave it also. Unfortunately, we could not scale it because in India, especially when you get into hardware products,
00:04:30
Speaker
We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market. We need to re-calibrate the market.
00:04:58
Speaker
The distribution of the government is the reason why the government will pay for it. So, the payment of the insurance will be the same. So, the price is important. Yeah, pricing is important. Plus, since we were in college, it was not possible for us to take multiple trips to China and get things rocketed. So, the price will continue. But it was a great experience.
00:05:37
Speaker
And what is this iTunes for youth? This is a nonprofit. It was a nonprofit. It was a simple notion that people who are going to top colleges in the country, they are pretty much more aware. So all they can do is just utilize their summer breaks of first year, second year of college, because post that people become very busy. So you can just utilize those for second year and disperse information, do counseling in your local town, village, city, from wherever you are.
00:05:44
Speaker
That was your first taste of entrepreneurship.
00:06:01
Speaker
So the whole model was that we were creating a team of smart people who were, it was named IITians, but it was not specifically only for IITians. It was people who are going to NIT, people are going to let's say law college, we're going to any tier one college. And we will create a platform where we were actually conducting workshops. So under IITians, we conducted workshops across different states and towns. And yeah, it was simply counseling awareness program for class eight to class 12 this runs. And this was like a volunteer kind of initiative.
00:06:31
Speaker
Yeah, completely voluntary, yes. Did you, when you graduated from IIT, did you sit for campus placements? Like, what happened then? Campus placement normally happens in December when you are going to start your pre-final year. So, campus placement at batnights, it's more like a festival. So, if you have a job, if you have a campus placement, you can do that.
00:06:51
Speaker
You are with your friends. Yes, definitely. I sat for it. I got placed. That was time for housing.com was very famous. It's very hot start-up. Yeah. Yeah. Very hot start-up. I think this development role was there. So that was basically just a checkbox. I told mom, and then mom was like,
00:07:10
Speaker
But you didn't join? No, I did not join. Actually, I joined the plan. Ideally, I should not have said, but I have joined the path to joy placement. So just then, December 1, it starts. So December 1, I was helping three of my friends do the case studies. And fortunately, the next day, I think two of them got through. And then housing.com came in. I was like, I also got through.
00:07:36
Speaker
Those two, obviously, they continued their job. Now, one of them is actually working with me at Filo. But I was mentally prepared. I don't want to continue with any job. I will continue with Rise. What is Rise? So, Rise basically took this stint of iTunes for youth when I was doing this, when I was in Bihar, when I was in Jharkhand.
00:08:00
Speaker
Why don't you go and explore there? Because there are students who really need a lot of aspirations, who really need a lot of support, motivation, guidance, whatever you call it. Why don't you go and explore it? I was like, fine, sure. So it was my summer break after second year. So my dad took us to Ladakh for a trip, for a family trip.
00:08:18
Speaker
And before that, I was in villages of Bihar. Then I looked into the map. I was like, okay, Kashmir looks very close to Lada. So then on the way back, I was at Delhi at 41. I just told my mom, I'm not coming to Patna. I'm going somewhere. I'm going to Kashmir. They were like, how, why, when this plan came into picture, I was like,
00:08:34
Speaker
I'll come back after four days. That was for sure.
00:08:51
Speaker
better to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission. Exactly, exactly. He's also a joining fellow, by the way, after a long time of pursuing him. So he was my friend. He's my friend from IIT Kan.
00:09:09
Speaker
When I got there, I got a chance to be a junior. It was a very interesting trip. I'll explain it to you. When I got there, I had a chance to be a junior. I had a chance to be a junior. I had a chance to be a junior. I had a chance to be a junior. I had a chance to be a junior. I had a chance to be a junior. I had a chance to be a junior. I had a chance to be a junior.
00:09:26
Speaker
We are going to Shmir tonight. Like what? I was like, I'm serious. We are going to Shmir tonight because something interesting is over there for
Educational Initiatives in Kashmir
00:09:39
Speaker
us. We can really help out a lot of people. So we can motivate them. So we have to keep going. We have to keep going. We have to keep going. We have to keep going.
00:09:47
Speaker
She was very afraid of this road trip. It's a very painful and very risky also. But she was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this road trip. She was very afraid of this
00:10:14
Speaker
Then I told them that, sir, we want to conduct awareness programs, similar type programs I've been conducting throughout different states. Your kids require actually more than students of other states. So then they really liked it. So they took it very lightly. They were like, someone is being frank.
00:10:32
Speaker
We did that event and actually that event gave me a lot of insight about students in Kashmir and that really opened my brain and heart. Not as talented students. They really had no one to guide them and had they have received right guidance at right time, then their career trajectory would have been something totally different.
00:11:05
Speaker
So fortunately, the same year, another gentleman, I didn't know him before, Mubeel, he's an IT Bombay graduate. So he was a Kashmiri. So he came back to start teaching kids. And he got to know about me through media articles. I got to know about him through media articles. And then we shook hands. So from there, I thought, now Kashmiri is a place where we can really make a long-term impact. So we co-founded Rice.
00:11:29
Speaker
And from there, this rise, then you started. So you co-founded it as a non-profit or what? Was it a business or was it just a social initiative? See, ultimately, the moment we step out of college, I mean, Sally Duleini, Mobin was already a graduate. Mobin graduated 2011 from IIT Bombay.
00:11:48
Speaker
So, Mubeen cannot do anything for free. And since it was, you can stay in Kashmir. So, you cannot do anything for free. So, if you are a modeler, you must be sustainable. Just make social impact. And see, sometimes money is not the only resource which you lack. So, there are underprivileged. You can even put them in underprivileged category. You cannot find the right teacher.
00:12:09
Speaker
So we started this, of course, a very noble, very social impact. But we wanted to have a decent salary for us. We started with 30,000 rupees per month salary. So that was the whole purpose of establishing this system. And that was the only major checkboxes that you wanted. How do you pay yourself this salary? Were you selling like paid workshops, paid seminars? So we started teaching.
00:12:39
Speaker
Like a career launcher and time and fit. Like a career launcher. Yes. Yeah. Like a career launcher and fit. Yes. So all of them we did for free. We did thousands of seminars in the last five years for free in different places of Kashmir. So these seminars were like for awareness building. What all can you do after 12th? Like careers after 12th, awareness building.
00:13:04
Speaker
One of them, one of them was awareness building. Couple of them were, we were even training the teachers. Couple of them, we used to go and take classes, let's say once in a week or once in a month, just teaching them important topics, important concepts. Like what, related to entrance exams? Yeah.
00:13:20
Speaker
related to their own school exam. See, so when I realized that people there, they will get like rote learning. I realized that class 10, the exam pass over here, Maths. Maths, she has got 100 marks in board exam. But if you will ask a very simple question of Maths.
00:13:38
Speaker
So we started working on telling them that don't getting hundred marks on your marksheet is not going to help you the rest of your life. If you claim that you know maths, you should be able to add two numbers correctly, especially if those two numbers are fraction or they have decimals. So 2.3 plus 3.6 is the... and that is the problem. And that is the problem. You are never ever able to grasp higher concept. You have to do math at the end of the day.
00:14:06
Speaker
The homologony coffee energy of the invest key letting people know when you are in class 8, 9 or 10 how should you study physics and how should you study maths? So people were studying physics the same way they were studying history. So we need to invest a lot of time and energy and telling them key.
00:14:21
Speaker
budgets and history are two different things. So essentially then you were, there were like two pillars of RISE. One was helping students in Kashmir through workshops and the goal was to prepare them for higher education, teach them how to study, teach them fundamentals and give them awareness of career options. And the second was a paid service, which was like a career launcher or a FIDG where you would have batches who would be preparing for the entrance exam. So it was only IT and
00:14:50
Speaker
So what were you offering? Yeah, so initially it was the IT interest. Recently, we have started need as well. But initially it was the IT interest. So first we have to let people aware there is this college. And second, when we expected them to invest 8 hours, 10 hours per day, they were like, dude, this is the planet's planet. But then we created, once we create relatively role models in the society,
00:15:20
Speaker
So we invested in that, we created the Relatable Role Models. Absolutely. I have seen that live.
00:15:36
Speaker
Suprathati was like a pure NGO kind of initiative. What was that? Just give me a little bit of a background, Suprathati. Yeah, Suprathati is totally NGO kind of initiative. So, Mahabhar basically, there are two gentlemen in Bihar. One is Mr. Anand Kumar and another one is Mr. Abhyanand. So, Anand Kumar is a maths teacher and Abhyanand is a super cop. So, he was basically, at that time, he was director general of police.
00:15:58
Speaker
But a physics class, a gold medalist. So I had a very keen insight in physics and very sharp brain. So together they started this. Then they started, you can say, parallel centers. So I was studying with Mr. Abihannan. So I'm more close to him. And they would do an intense exam and that would be like a scholarship exam. Yeah, one of the most sought after exam.
00:16:33
Speaker
Your residential program? It was a residential program. Were you doing something similar, like residential or what were you doing at RISE? I was doing residential and I didn't know what to do. I was doing residential and I didn't know what to do. I was doing residential and I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what to do. I was doing some extreme weather. I was doing some extreme cold power. I didn't know what to do. But especially extreme weather.
00:16:43
Speaker
And people who score well get like a full scholarship. They only take people on complete scholarship only.
00:17:15
Speaker
We were just a handful of 3-4 people, very difficult to run a hostel.
00:17:19
Speaker
And how much money were you making from this? Because you were doing it as a paid program. Was it sufficient enough to have some profit at the end of it? Or was it just breaking you in? So it was breaking you in only. So we could not make any substantial money in terms of we can say as a profit as founders. But after two to three years, we had a decent salary competitive with what our friends were making in Bombay or Delhi. So that was like good enough. So as far as I had enough money to tell my mom that I had enough money,
00:17:48
Speaker
It was very difficult for her not to explain things. So I invested in my students for foreign university exams through SAT. Some of my students got into Pennsylvania, got into Princeton. Today, a couple of them are in Cambridge, NYU. So many of them are going to have a photo of me.
00:18:16
Speaker
The newspaper article has always been very kind with our work in appreciation because media has played a very important role in letting people aware because we don't have distribution channels. So letting people aware using these people as real models. A lot of things changed. So then what changed? Like, why aren't you just still running RISE only? RISE is the next step.
00:18:44
Speaker
I was working in Rice since 2013 when I was in college. In 2015, I graduated. How many students were you teaching in a year? Somewhere around 1500. So you had a pretty big set. Like one single set till 1500.
00:19:07
Speaker
Yeah, so pretty pixeled. It's a nice, if you google you'll find it, it's a nice 7 storey tower which we had taken on rent. So it's a very beautiful state of the art building. Basically, you have to have a campus. Like you had your own campus. I could have a campus with around 20-25 IITNs as faculty member there. We were catering to around 1500 strollers. And your turnover would have been a couple of crores. Yeah, a couple of crores, yeah. So, we were aware of the factory here in 1500 and say, we have been here in 1500.
00:19:34
Speaker
Yeah, Kashmir market will not have such a large... Or plus, the way how coaching industry works or for how any institute works... That scale is simply not possible.
00:19:53
Speaker
So we made a pact among ourselves between me, Mobin and Selmaan. So Mobin and Selmaan are my co-founders. But just for certain few more crores, we are not going to compromise the quality. So last year also despite it was COVID, but I think we had around 16 selections in IIT, which is a major thing. It's a great achievement.
00:20:19
Speaker
So we held our nerves even during COVID, and we got the success. So we knew that we had a big scale and maintained operations. We knew that operations were a level of innovation. We knew that there were local issues, but somehow we were fine with that. So now I realized what I'm
Scalable Solutions for Education
00:20:41
Speaker
doing.
00:20:41
Speaker
So then I thought in India there are somewhere around 250 million students and I have been teaching for almost 10 years.
00:20:56
Speaker
I thought, inside I developed Kain here while teaching. Now it's time for tech product to scale. Not just in India, but also beyond India. Now it's time for silent parts to rise. Now I think I should focus my personal time in building a tech product which is more scalable.
00:21:19
Speaker
200-250 million Australians in India. So I've been following all these tech innovations in India. So I thought it's time to implement them. What did you see as the gap between the tech companies? So learning is part of that.
00:21:45
Speaker
When is the data transfer part? That is the data processing part. School data transfer, coaching data transfer. All of them were doing data transfer only.
00:22:00
Speaker
Digital board create. Yeah, video audio. Yeah, video audio. Pre-recorded. Great. Nice use of tech and nice use of hardware solutions. But all of them, again, simply doing the same thing, which was being done in a normal average classroom.
00:22:17
Speaker
Just of course, in a more fancy way, in a more, you can say in a better explanatory way, you can go and listen to it again and again, of course. But at the end of the day, it was again data transfer. So there was this massive white space left in the data processing part, which you can in simple words, say the learning part. So Filo we built as a learning solution. So Filo is.
00:22:39
Speaker
supposed to be in hands of historians or anyone who wants to learn anything at any point in life. So this was the gap which we identified and then we started working on it. Within 15 minutes, let's say it gets stuck at something.
00:23:08
Speaker
Usi time for poor Delhi, poor Bangalore, poor Bombay, hundreds of thousands of students who are going to sit for self-study will get stuck at one or the other thing after every 15, 20, 25 minutes. Because that time we are processing things which was taught to you in your class maybe the same day or maybe a month before or maybe a year before.
00:23:25
Speaker
Lot of time these class 12 students, they need to revise what was taught in class 11 because IIT and need is going to ask both
Filo's On-Demand Learning Model
00:23:31
Speaker
the years. So at that time you're doing this data processing. So at that time, you're totally left alone. Education model here that is pretty linear. Basic expectation here.
00:23:45
Speaker
Unfortunately, it works only with top 2-3% of the class. For the rest of the people, it doesn't work. For example, let's say if you pick class 12. First chapter is electro stats. I am one of the most looked after teacher in the country. Let's say I left a magnetic induction.
00:24:06
Speaker
I was like, tell me how it's going. Did you practice this question? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like, why? I was like
00:24:51
Speaker
And very few of you have heard of it.
00:25:15
Speaker
They end up doing numericals.
00:25:15
Speaker
Ultimately, you can see that there is a lot of speed, which is very different. So, I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur. I was integrated in MS Physics IIT Kharagpur.
00:25:36
Speaker
I think MIT is going to be able to do a lot of things in the next few days. Too much coverage. The top 1% teacher is the top 1% teacher in the country. I think the average teacher is going to have a lot of pressure, and the syllabus is going to be great. I don't know how many times I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where I've been in a class where
00:26:03
Speaker
If you like to hear stories of founders, then we have tons of great stories from entrepreneurs who have built billion dollar businesses. Just search for the founder thesis podcast on any audio streaming app like Spotify, Ghana, Apple Podcasts and subscribe to the show.
00:26:23
Speaker
You wanted to build a learning assistant, basically, Joe, while the students are doing sales study, if they get stuck, if they have a doubt, then there should be a product which gives them the answer or helps them get unstuck instantly. That was the goal. Yeah. So we created, first time in education industry, we created
00:26:42
Speaker
Then we put up education as a service. For example, Zomato gives you a service. Uber gives you a service. Even before Uber, there were drivers, there were gaps, but it was not as a service. You will make a phone call to a friend and he will call someone. Nothing of that sort existed in education industry. So we created education as a service.
00:27:17
Speaker
So we first time we brought this service.
00:27:22
Speaker
concept in education. You wanted to break like a Uber kind of an approach where you aggregate teachers all over the country, make them available live on demand. They say, we have on-demand taxi here, we have on-demand teachers. That was the idea. To be frank, initially, we are Uber for education. But we are more of an Amazon for education. But when we thought
00:27:52
Speaker
Food delivery was the last minute. Grocery delivery was the last minute. But teaching delivery was roughly more than an hour. And more than an hour, we had to teach the teacher a solution. It questioned all of us. We had to solve it. Yeah, but I think Doubtnet was doing something like this. One player, one player, US TV player, who is interested in this, who is interested in this, who can't snap ass.
00:28:20
Speaker
What is the solution? What is the solution? What is the solution? What is the solution? What is the solution? What is the solution? What is the solution? What is the solution? What is the solution?
00:28:44
Speaker
So that's why human intervention was required. So we brought in a human layer who takes the responsibility of making the restaurant learn or understand something at that point of time. I want to hear the journey. You had this idea.
00:28:59
Speaker
that only want teachers access to help you understand instant life tutoring we call it yes instant life tutoring you must have had version one and then you would have realized i would love to hear that whole evolution of what worked what did not work so i was
00:29:23
Speaker
Brainstorming.
00:29:41
Speaker
In IT, the first day of the restaurant, the second day of the restaurant, the rice cake, the topper, and the alumnus. This is also the strategy of the restaurant. This is the complete mistake of the flight. In my flight, I am Dilly. Dilly is my friend and brother, Shadman Anwar. Shadman was my senior from Super 30 time, also my school senior. He also went to IT Dilly. He also did engineering physics, but a pure computer geek and an engineer in true sense. I think that 50% of the students are 50%.
00:30:09
Speaker
Yeah, that's okay. Okay. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic. So, he was working at Magic.
00:30:35
Speaker
Jogtronik is the only one who has this idea. So, I don't know what the idea is. So, let's see what's going on here.
00:30:44
Speaker
He digested it and he processed it and he was like, let's do it. He was convinced enough to let's just do it in one meeting. He was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one meeting. So he was like, let's do it in one
00:31:11
Speaker
So, Rosie and Ratko have been working on a product called Stringalie, and Rose have been working on it. And I think that almost all of them have been working on it. I think that they have been working on it for 36 years. I think that they have been working on it for 36 years now. I think that they have been working on it for 36 years now. I think that they have been working on it for 36 years now.
00:31:44
Speaker
So the first set of tutors, where basically my
Building the Filo Platform
00:31:55
Speaker
students who were studying in IITs and in IITs. So my meeting is coming up. IITs are in third year of the college right now. We will just handpick four or five of them or a basic stipend meeting. So they were like super happy. So it all started, you can say, from Rice family initially.
00:32:23
Speaker
a calendar-share career. So I'll tell you, I have been a little ambitious. I'm a little aggressive. Rana is somewhere a part of how I operate. That's like 10 pm to 10 am? Yeah, 10 am to 10 pm. By the way, if you're a grocery publisher and you have a lot of money, if you're an ex-truncher, if you're mostly an I.I.T. by the way, you have to have a lot of money.
00:32:52
Speaker
When rice comes to life, the students of Bihar are not listening to me. If they are not listening to me, they don't know how to do it. They don't know how to do it. How many teachers are there? How many teachers are there? It's time to give them a call and say hi to them. If they don't know how to do it, they can do it. If they don't know how to do it, they can do it. If they don't know how to do it, they can do it. If they don't know how to do it, they can do it. If they don't know how to do it, they can do it.
00:33:21
Speaker
50% of the teachers don't know how many students are there, and they don't know how many students there are. And this was free. You were not monetizing. No, it was free. It was free. It was free. But it was free. Then Minister of Education got to know about this.
00:33:38
Speaker
and Minister of Education and then Minister of HRD, Mr. Okriyal Sahib. He also tweeted this from his personal account and then Minister also tweeted it. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he had a number of expired sessions. So Chanaq said that he
00:34:01
Speaker
It's almost sad because it's so sad because it's still online. So it's not online. It's not online. It's not online. It's not the same. It's not the same. It's the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same. It's almost the same.
00:34:27
Speaker
But the investors are not going to be able to fill out the important things. I think it's important to remember that you can help out people. It's time for you to become the hero of the country because COVID-19 is a school for teachers and guidance. You just come online. We have created this beautiful product and give some time. And it really worked well. I hope you enjoyed it.
00:34:50
Speaker
But then, of course, it was not sustainable. It's very difficult. If they're not earning the work, then what's the type of thing?
00:35:14
Speaker
But anyway, it really worked. And I'll always be in debt to everyone who supported us in that initiative in those early days. When they hear about Philo, when they hear about how we are now helping millions and millions of us run, it was so amazing. So it was feels great. But then Philo said that we have to pay for our runs. So we have to pay for our tutors.
Filo's Growth and Challenges
00:35:41
Speaker
It was a problem that we had to fix it in the last month. But it was an actual request. It was an actual pick-up for the game. It was a fix-up for the game. Exactly. We had to fix it in the last couple of days. It was a number of session requests. But it was a very late-night nightmare.
00:35:57
Speaker
So, I was like, boss, I don't know. I'm going to go to school for a minute. So, quickly, Shadman did the, you can say, created a model. Jafar, I did the math, he created the model and then he was like, he's going to build a building. I was like, boss, where are all my friends who are sitting in V6 circle?
00:36:18
Speaker
COVID-19 was a big surprise. Because we were holding cash for our employees. We had to pay our debt. We had to pay our debt. We had to pay our debt. We had to pay our debt. We had to pay our debt. We had to pay our debt. We had to pay our debt. I was like, now we have to take some help. So I made a couple of phone calls very quickly. Within three days, I think, I got connected to Babub. Babub don kunwaro, better capital. And I had a discussion, one hour discussion with him and he was like,
00:36:47
Speaker
Let's do it. But anyway, I started pulling off all my little savings, whatever I had. So then there's a guy who was working with Shatman. So as an engineer, we took him in the team and then for March, I took him. So the number was, I took him to the IT team to explore.
00:37:15
Speaker
I was in the 90s. In the 90s, I was in the EU, Delhi was in the UK, Bangalore was in the UK, Bombay was in the UK. I was a premium college student. I had a premium college student. And with all, with just zero cash, I had tutors onboard. So that was a very fake motivation. I was not spending a single money on acquiring tutors. And when I started to acquire tutors, it was all organic, which was a great push to start with. Where did you monetize students? Make it paid. So we started Paywall.
00:37:45
Speaker
somewhere in February 2021. And where is free then? Which is a great catch we have in our product. We have created a new industry trained in terms of NPS. It's one of the best in the industry. How many installed users left a review?
00:38:08
Speaker
So, the year issue is basically how many downloads you have and then how many reviews you have. So, how many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have? How many reviews do you have?
00:38:29
Speaker
What is the journey for a student? Like when he signs up, then what does he do? Is there a drop down to select? How does the matching happen?
00:38:47
Speaker
Few questions which are just important for our students just to improve the matching. We asked these important things.
00:39:08
Speaker
And then if a student lets us know about language and the curriculum, post that we simply say, dude, just ask your question. And so then he puts in a question field, question, English language, like any language, any language, because we are currently operating on 10 plus languages. And then we say that, okay, just let us know concept subject or concept topic. That's it. And just hit the magic button of connect to a tutor. Tutor.
00:39:37
Speaker
that it goes to four, five drivers and one of them can pick up. So again, in our model also, it goes to some three, four tutors. I may be good at explaining things which are more number-wise. Someone else may be good at explaining things which are more concept-wise.
00:40:01
Speaker
I may not be great at the entire physics. I may be just good at one topic of physics. Someone else is good at another topic of physics. R. Mordy finds out who is going to be the most apt tutor for this kid and then it makes a priority order of around three to six tutors and then it pushes and then one of them pick it up.
00:40:21
Speaker
How does your algorithm know who is good at what? So every session is monitored, recorded. And after every session, both the tutor and the strength get the opportunity to give a feedback about each other. So it's very, you can say very close to accurate because it's not one person who is judging a tutor. A tutor is being assessed by hundreds and hundreds of students.
00:40:47
Speaker
And on the basis of their feedback and on the basis of their background, we believe that, okay, which kind of tutors fit in or match with which kind of students. Because those students who are writing feedback for a particular tutor are also getting feedback from other tutors as well.
00:41:02
Speaker
So that gives us immense power to dive very deep and write our algorithm on the basis of these nuances and improve our matching. The more estuarant you will utilize as a platform, the better will be the matching automatically. Yeah, because that ratings data is getting richer. So you'll be able to do better matching because of that. Okay. Okay. Okay. Got it.
00:41:22
Speaker
And what is the pricing for a student? So definitely we are like over-subsidized in terms of pricing and also one of the daring ones to add pricing in edtech because India may, apart from the unicorns, nobody's able to actually add pricing in edtech. But the more we did that, a BMRA pricing is like for 750 rupees, you get unlimited number of sessions in a month. Which makes it like a frictionless
00:41:52
Speaker
And what do you pay your tutors? That must be a tiered payment. Some top tutors must be getting paid more. Yeah, that has got different pants. It moves in the bulb of around 200 rupees per hour. And these tutors are mostly like the students in college.
00:42:09
Speaker
journey for the student.
00:42:40
Speaker
So then we started onboarding professional tutors.
00:42:46
Speaker
who are good may not be great at the whole subject, but definitely very amazing even at one topic. So that's why we say that we have got India's best tutors because... So that's why we say that we have got India's best tutors because... So that's why we say that we have got India's best tutors because... So that's why we say that we have got India's best tutors because... So that's why we say that we have got India's best tutors because... So that's why we say that we have got India's best tutors because... So that's why we say that we have got India's best tutors because...
00:43:13
Speaker
I think 70% tutors are precisely professional tutors. We have got grads from top colleges, post-grads, even PhDs. So people who are pursuing PhD, they are normally in a way sincere to their job. So I love people who are pursuing PhD because they're very deep in their subject. They're very professional.
00:43:30
Speaker
And plus, they have a sense of empathy. What does a session look like? It's just a video call. Is the tutor able to write something? It looks like exactly how we are talking. Yeah. Plus, there's also a green board. There's also a green board. A digital board. Or can be writing let's say on a notebook and hold the camera from the other hand.
00:43:51
Speaker
The tutors use mobile phones. Most of the tutors use mobile phones. Some of them use tablet or some of them use laptops. And digital board, much more phone screen, they can like with their fingers write what they want to write. With their finger or if they are a stylist. And what is the session donation? Session donation can move like from 2 minutes to even up to 20 minutes. Majority of our sessions are somewhere around 5 minutes.
00:44:18
Speaker
Okay. It's on mutual consent, like whatever the student and teacher feel they can. Normally it's driven by what the students feel because if they understood in five minutes, four minutes, they're like, fine, move on. Tell me about the numbers, what kind of revenue are you currently doing and how many sessions happen or how many students do you have? How many paying students do you have? Like how that has evolved since you started?
00:44:41
Speaker
So in terms of number of sessions, so somewhere around December, we're doing 30,000 sessions. And today we are doing 60,000 sessions a day. So that's the trajectory we are at. I'll tell you like this. So last to last week, we increased our subscription price by almost 50%. And normally people would expect that there would be a drop in the number of sales or the number of daily subscribers or numbers of daily subscribers.
00:45:08
Speaker
Of course, our premium users that rose up by a hundred percent. So currently, frankly, we have not actually gotten into a complete monetization race or you can say a complete, you can say a complete business law of monetizing things. We are doing these little experiments just to understand how much customer love we have, how much product love to be. So these parameters are really important for us. And maybe like in four to five months, once we mature the product even further, we may have to even further increase our subscription
00:45:38
Speaker
Like one student, when he pays that $7.50 for a month, how many sessions does he take in a month on an average? What is the consumption rate? It depends on the student. There are people who literally sleep with us, who are probably doing 10 to 15 sessions a day. And then there are students who may require us 10 to 15 times a month. And then there are students who may require us maybe just right before the exam, right before their test. So it's a very wide spectrum.
00:46:07
Speaker
How many minutes does it take for a session to become available for a student? Is it like within a minute or like what is that average time like once I put it down? Around 80% of our sessions get connected in less than 10 seconds, 10 to 15 seconds. But we just to be on the safe side, we say that, okay, we are a 60 second platform. We connect you in 60 seconds because most of the time it happens like very fast.
00:46:28
Speaker
And so I'm guessing that the way to grow here, you need to the supply side, which is the tutor would be like a key thing for growing, right? Because maintaining that 10 second thing means you need to have a lot of very good quality supply on the platform.
00:46:45
Speaker
because you're getting organic sales, which means that the demand is there. If you create good quality supply, then the growth will continue to happen, right? Absolutely. We are the only ad tech without a sales stream in the country right now. So all our focus, all our attention is with tutors. So I have been a tutor all my life. So obviously, I'll always be biased towards tutors.
00:47:07
Speaker
So I have top line managers and analysts and even Rohit for that matter is totally bullish on ensuring that our tutors are happy and plus they ensure that students who talk to them, they feel happy. So of course tutor for us is everything. If you maintain the quality, automatically students will come. So obviously we are a strength centric company, but to be a strength centric company, we have to have a very strong focus on our tutors.
00:47:33
Speaker
And so tell me about your expansion. Are you looking to go to Dubai also or are you going outside India? Yeah, we have already started expanding in the Middle East. Yeah. And Dubai is basically on the Middle East regional headquarters. So we are building a team here and we are getting an amazing response from this front. People are literally going, I'm like, how is the magic here? You're tapping the Indian tutors population only or you're like on voting tutors from Dubai.
00:48:00
Speaker
Currently Indian tutors, currently Indian tutors, but we are looking to onboard even tutors outside India as well. But there your pricing would have to be different because then the tutor in Dubai would not come at the same price as a tutor in India. Yes, yes.
International Expansion
00:48:14
Speaker
So why did you decide to go into rational so soon? Like it's pretty early in your journey, man. So why is it so soon?
00:48:22
Speaker
Within a year, we are doing 60,000 sessions a day. So as soon as I told you, as a founder, I'm a little aggressive. When I was writing first few pages of the product, the whole target was that it is going to solve learning problems across the globe.
00:48:44
Speaker
That's why last week, even Consulate General His Excellency, he illustrated us, our team in Dubai. And we are really looking forward to create this opportunity for our restaurants in India, for our tutors in India, so they can teach restaurants in Middle East. And by that virtue, we will start exploring other countries as well.
00:49:04
Speaker
And so tell me about the funding journey that you've had so far. So you raised that one seed round from Better Capital. Then again, Better Capital again said, first time Better Capital moved out of its comfort space and said, so then they did a seed round with us. And then very quickly we did our series A from Anthos Capital.
00:49:26
Speaker
The CDJ was, I think, $23 million, which is a pretty massive round. How did you achieve this? Was it on the basis of the traction, the growth in number itself? Of course, growth and numbers were one parameter of it.
00:49:42
Speaker
disruption in multiple parameters. We did a disruption in NPS. We did a disruption in retention. We did a disruption in Australian product love and the reviews. And plus we have the ability to scale very fast. So I can go and open a country in like one week. All these we can say factored in has been some crucial pillars of our growth journey.
00:50:01
Speaker
And correctly, what do you do marketing spend for getting students or is it all organic or like what is the ratio, which is organic? We all organic. So it is somewhere around, you can say 50 to 60 percent, 50 to 60 percent is organic. The rest is we have to do some marketing on YouTube and the other conventional channels.
00:50:22
Speaker
Typically, your approach would be if someone is typing a question like, what is Newton's law? And then you would. Then, ideally we should be there. But there are a lot of big players who are very deep-pocketed. But it's okay. We are working on our own way to crack the SEO. And yeah, let's see how it goes.
00:50:48
Speaker
What is the retention rate like? Normally students pay 1 ton worth or do they pay annual package? And how many, like what is the churn that you see? For example, our month, month 7 retention is somewhere around 67%. So that's why I told you like we are breaking barriers in terms of these data.
00:51:08
Speaker
The most sold and sold after a subscription was our monthly subscription. Now, our 3 month subscription has become the most audited. Slowly the target is that automatically, or you start organically over. And especially you can imagine that India in a, it was very cluttered, very chaotic.
00:51:26
Speaker
market where a lot of big whales are sitting with too much of information around them and their behalf for an early stage player like us to survive. It's pretty challenging, pretty scary also in a way. But if you look at that perspective, then I think we are doing phenomenal. Currently, there is no direct competition you have, right? There's nobody who's doing this like on demand. Yeah, we have no competition. We have no competition.
00:51:51
Speaker
Amazing. Amazing. Okay. Okay. So what's the roadmap? What are the key challenges you want to solve over the next one or two years? See, in India, one is definitely we want to go _____. The prime challenges which we really want to impact and solve is that normally students are afraid of going to classes because they feel _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____
00:52:19
Speaker
go to classes with full confidence. We want to keep on pumping our tutors to reduce and minimize that gap as much as possible. And then we will just become a household name. Secondly, you can say the other part of the table is our tutors. So we really want to solve this
00:52:42
Speaker
problem that if someone wants to become a teacher, if someone has sufficient knowledge, then how we can give that one person an opportunity to teach. And secondly, how we can increase his or her output in the least possible amount of time and make him a competent teacher and then put him in front of
00:53:09
Speaker
rights of the students who fit with his capabilities. Basically, you want to create a process flow through which somebody who has the basic knowledge about the subject can come in and then become an expert teacher after going through your onboarding program and start learning.
00:53:28
Speaker
So it becomes a way for people to unlock earning, like somebody sitting in a tier two, tier three location where they don't have access to other jobs. This can be a way for them to start earning. For the tier two, tier three, someone who is sitting in tier one.
00:53:43
Speaker
You cannot go and take a walk and think, what is the problem? So it's more than a geographic problem. But more than that, it's a problem of a skill. So we are investing in those parameters. Let's say if someone wants 50 parameters.
00:54:12
Speaker
So we are creating that as a science. And that brings us to the end of this conversation. I want to ask you for a favor now. Did you like listening to this show? I'd love to hear your feedback about it. Do you have your own startup ideas? I'd love to hear them.
00:54:30
Speaker
them. Do you have questions for any of the guests that you heard about in this show? I'd love to get your questions and pass them on to the guests. Write to me at adatthepodium.in. That's adatthepodium.in.