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Deals to Degrees: Serial Entrepreneur Ashish Munjal’s journey from Crown It to Sunstone
105 Plays19 days ago
"Founders often wear a mask of 'irrational optimism' for their team; a necessary front when leading through uncertainty."
This insight from Ashish Munjal delves into the often unspoken psychological aspect of entrepreneurship, where maintaining a strong, positive exterior is crucial for team morale and navigating the startup journey's inherent challenges, even when founders internally grapple with difficulties.
Ashish Munjal is the Co-Founder & CEO of Sunstone, one of India's leading higher education service providers. Recognized in the Times 40 under 40 (2022), he is steering Sunstone to impact nearly 20,000 students across 14 cities and over 27 colleges, with projected gross sales of around ₹300 crore by the end of the year discussed in the podcast. His mission is to make quality, job-oriented higher education accessible, particularly for students in Tier II & III cities.
Key Insights from the Conversation:
👉Viral Growth & Engagement: How Crown It achieved massive user engagement (50% MTU/MAU) with near-zero paid marketing, relying heavily on organic referrals.
👉Bold Business Models: The strategic thinking behind Sunstone's initial "Pay After Placement" model to build trust and cut through market clutter.
👉The Power of Pivots: Lessons from Crown It's evolution (deals to data monetization, then enterprise) and Sunstone's strategic shifts (like removing pay-after-placement for UG courses) for long-term sustainability.
👉Offline-First in EdTech: How Sunstone's offline-centric approach proved resilient and attractive to investors, especially when the online EdTech wave faced scrutiny.
👉AI in Operations: Practical examples of how AI is already being used at Sunstone for lead qualification, CV automation, and even creating initial drafts of educational content.
Chapters:
00:00:00 - Introduction: The Entrepreneurial Itch
00:01:49 - The Crown It Journey: Building a Viral Deals App & Growth Hacks
00:15:35 - Challenges of Gamified Rewards & Why Crown It Pivoted
00:40:47 - The Shift to Education: Identifying the Core Problem for Sunstone
00:48:44 - Sunstone's Innovative Higher Education Model
00:56:19 - "Pay After Placement" & Navigating Sunstone's Early Challenges
01:06:56 - Sunstone's Unique Operations: The University Track vs. Sunstone Track
01:13:18 - Cracking Student Acquisition & The "Easier" Part: Placements
01:23:08 - Funding Journey: Navigating EdTech Investor Waves
01:27:48 - Lessons as a Two-Time Founder & Angel Investing Thesis
01:38:10 - Signalling Credibility to Investors: Early Stage vs. Series A
01:42:52 - AI in Action: Automating Operations & Replacing Resources
#FounderThesis #EdTechIndia #HigherEducation #StartupIndia #Entrepreneurship #IndianStartups #SerialEntrepreneur #StartupLessons #GrowthHacking #EdTechTrends #BusinessPivots #VentureCapital #AIinBusiness #Podcast #InnovationInEducation #leadershipjourney
Disclaimer: The views expressed are those of the speaker, not necessarily the channel.
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Transcript
Crownit's Bold Marketing Strategy
00:00:00
Speaker
We used to do zero paid marketing. I have never run a Facebook ad in Crownit or a Google ad. It was a very, very bold move at that point in time.
Education Industry Challenges
00:00:09
Speaker
If this problem has to be solved, this problem has to be solved for every single day a student is employed.
00:00:18
Speaker
They take the top, literally the cream of the country and then sort of they claim that we have made this child's life, his 1 crore-ropea job. This cheating. This is not right. That is the reason lot of education businesses fail.
Ashish Punjab's Entrepreneurial Journey
00:00:33
Speaker
About a decade back, there was something called as crowns which you could earn when you went to restaurants. And the man behind that is Ashish Punjab. He is a serial entrepreneur who is now running Sunstone, an edtech company.
00:00:46
Speaker
And this is a phenomenal story of serial entrepreneurship and gamification and consumer behavior. This is the Farmer Thesis podcast, and I'm your host, Akshay Dutt.
00:01:02
Speaker
So, Ashish, welcome to the Founder Thesis podcast. ah Why did you become an entrepreneur? Great. Thank you so much, Akshir, first of all, for having me. So, I have come from a very typical middle-income background, engineer, MBA. So, they were running in a race.
00:01:20
Speaker
And never thought that I had to parents, it was a disaster. And... ah but Side story, um when I got engaged and I got arranged married, when I got engaged, I was working in a company, earning well.
00:01:36
Speaker
And by the time I got married, I was doing a startup. So my in-laws were sort of very, very wary of how she started dating. But anyways, um So, yeah, start-up kka idea ah was more like I wanted to do something which I am passionate about. ah but so but um You feel very caged, obviously, in a very, very large organization.
00:02:03
Speaker
But even when you are working in a start-up, you always feel that you are living another dream. ge So, it always keeps an idea that I want to do something which I really feel passionate about.
00:02:17
Speaker
So that was the whole thesis of starting on my own, essentially.
Crownit's Business Model and Challenges
00:02:22
Speaker
And you ah started Grounded as your first venture. How did that happen?
00:02:29
Speaker
One of my colleagues, he moved out of Nolarity and he was really pushing me, let's start something together. And I had this at the back of my mind that I want to do something in the area of education because that's something I i really felt passionate about.
00:02:43
Speaker
But then I realized that, okay, if you are getting an opportunity to do something on your own and and I was always... sort of excited to do something in the consumer space. I love consumer. I love consumer internet.
00:02:58
Speaker
And that was a consumer internet startup. So I thought, okay, let me first do this. And obviously have a long life. I will eventually pick up education because that's something which is close to my heart. And whatever mistakes, whatever learnings I want to do of building a startup, let me do that at Crownit.
00:03:15
Speaker
So that's how the startup and the Crownit journey started. And did you guys have funds to start with? that Consumer internet is very broad, right? Yeah, so there was no money.
00:03:29
Speaker
And the consumer internet was very broad. as So the idea was to do something in the online to offline deal space. And the idea was there was there was a couple of companies in China who were doing which were doing really well.
00:03:42
Speaker
ah One of them was Metnuan, the other was Dianping. And they sort of disrupted the consumer internet. this And everybody in India, one or the other way was trying to build. Like the food delivery, there was one area where they were trying to do food delivery, then payment system, then deal space.
00:03:59
Speaker
Ultimately, the idea for all of us was to build a large consumer app, which is like app of the app or key app or master app, which is Everything happens in one app.
00:04:12
Speaker
Movie booking be wahi wahi wahi w
00:04:19
Speaker
so that was the idea everybody started to pick one area and build that up and then gradually add lot of other verticals other categories as well So Crownit was started as an online to offline deal.
00:04:33
Speaker
The idea was that because a deal is a very ah one of the frequent use cases and it helps you save money. So we have to reach the app and reach them to a habit and then we will gradually open up the other categories as well.
00:04:49
Speaker
Okay, interesting. And I think ah deals was the flavor of the season. as I just said today AI is the flavor of the season. I think Groupon proved that you can...
00:05:00
Speaker
raised a lot of money in the US mayor and then you have a snap deal was again on deals only originally before they pivoted into e-commerce. yeah yeah I think there a bunch of other companies around the same. There were a bunch of other companies. So what happens is that what you said something, that is very interesting.
00:05:16
Speaker
That it's flavor of the season. So at that time, the flavor of the season, and if you recall 2014-15, at that time, mobile was becoming prevalent.
00:05:27
Speaker
And hyper-local was the flavor of the season at that point in time. And literally, you won't believe, we used to feel so powerful at one point in time running a mobile internet company. We were a mobile-only company. There was no website, there was nothing. were only single mobile app. We probably were one of the first mobile-app-only companies in the country.
00:05:47
Speaker
And I used to feel so powerful that if, let's say, I can decide consumer today who will eat food from the restaurant. Because real time, may in a hyper-local region, I can change the discounts, I can change the cashback, I can change the deals.
00:06:04
Speaker
And let's say keep hypothetically, if a consumer is going to Rasta, and I can sort of quickly change the discount or deal at Sutra, and the consumer moves to Sutra. So you used to feel so powerful, used to say that in the 29th sector, tell you where to eat food.
00:06:19
Speaker
that That's used to be the... and it's It's addiction. You won't believe consumer internet that I sector, this will be decided to decide in a Huda City Center.
00:06:40
Speaker
Wow, amazing. but You were focused on restaurant deals. we see We started with the saloon, spa, restaurant. But restaurant ah the all all restaurant category, the QSR, the sit-outs, the pubs, all restaurant category used to contribute around 80% of our business.
00:06:59
Speaker
And it's a much more frequent use case as compared to any other deal. So we had hotels as well. We had saloon, spa. But restaurant, you're eating out behavior, including QSRs.
00:07:10
Speaker
You eat out at least thrice a week. At least. Because you're always leaving the office to get a burger for go you're going to go parents. So it's a much more frequent use case.
00:07:25
Speaker
Okay. And ah how did the product operate? Like what was like that was actually very, very interesting. So before I tell you that I'll tell you how did we reach where the product operated? So we had a very good app butana and we said that we will acquire consumers. They will come, they will see the deal. Like typically it happens, they will see the deal and then they will go to the restaurant.
00:07:48
Speaker
then we realized that no one comes from here. So we are sitting alone. For two months, we are sitting in office we are sitting in five consumers somewhere, somewhere somewhere. Then we realized that this consumer internet will become a real hack.
00:08:03
Speaker
So we need something like this to propel us. So that's when we came up with the idea. This was August of 2014. Then we came up with the idea that someone can eat food in the villages.
00:08:16
Speaker
Irrespective that Crownit is getting commission on the restaurants, that consumer should get something to And we may not have a deal with that outlet.
00:08:28
Speaker
So what we started doing is that we we started asking consumers that you are going anywhere. We will give you some rewards. And in fact, at that point in time, that we didn't have an app. The app was not live.
00:08:41
Speaker
So we started asking, send us a photo on WhatsApp. And we started giving them some rewards. It was not a very high reward. But we started giving some rewards. And it just flew. we started getting thousands and thousands of bills.
00:08:55
Speaker
And in one week, we had to develop that feature in the app. And then we put all the restaurants of Gurgaon. So in three months time, I remember by the end of November, December, we were a craze in Gurgaon.
00:09:10
Speaker
Because consumers didn't have to do anything. They just have to click the picture of the bill. and send it to the app that he in the restaurant a higher and then gradually we build all the geo-fencing to actually ensure that consumers are inside the outlet.
00:09:25
Speaker
We put some kind of beacon as well, Bluetooth etc. And when we had partner restaurants, we obviously used to get much larger commissions. So you got 25-20% of your cashback. Here it was just some rewards.
00:09:39
Speaker
But because consumers had habit of getting a bill, they didn't have cashback. And if are going to a partner outlet, you obviously used to plan the deal before and you used to sort of get larger cashback.
00:09:51
Speaker
So this was the whole journey and like at one point in time we were thinking this is a crazy idea. yeah thehibidarapuka bag milkja But then we realized that okay this is a great hack for us. It's not a business model that will evolve but that was a great great hack for us.
00:10:07
Speaker
Okay customer acquisition strategy basically. Not only acquisition actually spiner the biggest thing was the engagement. at like if you look at consumer app there download to install and install to MAU and MAU to MTU so these are some terms that the consumer has downloaded after downloading they didn't register it and it was installed After installing it is active in the month or not. And if it is active, it didn't have transaction on your app.
00:10:38
Speaker
For any good app, MTU from install base is less than 10%. For any good app, like even the app which have great frequency and use cases like Paytm's and everything, this number would be in single digits.
00:10:51
Speaker
At one point in time, we had this at 50%. Like every other user who has installed is actually sending us the picture.
00:11:01
Speaker
I think ah maybe this particularly Delhiites will relate to because I also was using the app. I remember that behavior.
00:11:13
Speaker
And again, there was no, it was pure organic. by yeah i went out with my brother. he took out his phone bill and he took a photo of the bill and asked him, why are you doing this? Then he said, I will get crowns from this. Then he told me about the app concept and I'm sure it would have been like this, like completely word of mouth. The interesting part was that in user acquisition team, like the consumer internet, the user acquisition team is very large. You have your paid marketing team, you have your SEO, you have your app store optimization and everything.
00:11:46
Speaker
We had one single girl in the user acquisition team. and we used to do zero paid marketing i have never run a facebook ad in crown it a google ad our 91 percent user are coming from organic out of that 65 percent were direct reference like you mentioned your brother told you and if he refers you you be he also used to get some crowns you also used to get some crowns amazing so it's me want to fill in the blanks a little bit uh The essential way in which a restaurant deals app works is you need to first tell a restaurant that I will send you traffic. I will send you customers and you pay me a commission per customer or is it a retainer or like how does that work? Yeah. Basically, this is how it happens. So, our deals from the restaurant used to be in a range of 20 odd percent. So, we used to get 20 odd percent commission from the restaurants and we used to pass them around 15 odd percent to the consumers.
00:12:45
Speaker
5 percent was our take rate on the consumer side. And then there is a some take rate on the redemption side as well, wherein the consumer used to redeem the crowns. We used to get around 2-3 percent on the redemption side as well.
00:12:57
Speaker
ah Essentially, the idea was to build a 6-7 percent take rate platform. Okay, interesting. So redemption is not like actual cash, but it's like ah use this money to buy cinema tickets, etc.
00:13:11
Speaker
Yes, yes. So that was also one of the thesis. And view used to put lot of gamification theories in the app. If you give them direct cash, there is no engagement on the platform.
00:13:25
Speaker
But if you give them something which they can redeem or they can collect and then they can sort of redeem. Like a lot of people I speak to, ah they have ah they have associated Crownit with something.
00:13:37
Speaker
Like few of my friends say that we used to ensure that all of our movie bookings happens through Crownit. restaurants out da cash bag da da In my mind, um i will utilize my cash book for my movie bookings.
00:13:50
Speaker
Somebody will say that i am I am collecting crowns to buy that shoe. Some people like me or who couldn't afford a great credit card at that point in time used to use my crowns to for my air power airport lounge access.
00:14:04
Speaker
So everybody had some kind of association with crowns that I will use my crowns for this. Okay, okay. So, you know, there there was a time when CRED was also like viral like this because of the CRED coins, which today is not the case, really. ah Why doesn't this thesis of gamified ah ah points or gamified rewards ah scale?
00:14:35
Speaker
like I mean, it's not proven to be sustainable so far, right? Yeah. So there are two, three sides of it. One is that in case of cred, there is no real money or there is no real use case that why you should be earning money as consumer.
00:14:52
Speaker
In case of crown it, at least that part was clear because you are going to a restaurant which crown it has recommended. the partner will pay. Somebody has to fund that cash back, right?
00:15:04
Speaker
So in case of cred, there is nobody who is funding that cash back. In case of Crownit, that part was taken care of that there was lot of engagement on the platform to use those crowns.
00:15:17
Speaker
In case of Crownit, the problem was on the other side that a restaurant should really feel that, okay, Crownit has sent me this customer and I should pay 20%, 25%, 15% to Crownit for sending me this customer.
00:15:30
Speaker
too crown it for sending me this customer I'll tell you what we initially used to say tell consumers that you go and you'll get 20% cashback. Later we realized that restaurants are saying that consumers were my own, but after that, they checked in. guvi ah Then we added one more feature in the app and obviously that's how you learn. You react to a lot of things.
00:15:52
Speaker
So then we added one more feature in the app that if you are going to a crown it partner outlet, you have to avail that 20% cashback. You have to unlock a deal before 30 minutes, which is exactly what you do in Zomato and Dine Out these days.
00:16:08
Speaker
So consumers started doing that as well. And then we put one more gamification, that you would get a deal. It was a rule. So you played a game of a rule. It's like a single click. avo click cut to the uske basis for aka ah You decided on how much cashback you would get.
00:16:27
Speaker
So what we realized is that the first rule was free. But play a second third rule, that you would get a better deal, you would have to give crowns crown it.
00:16:38
Speaker
So what we realized that on an average consumer were at least trying three times. ah So we were also getting crowns from our redemption, our take rate was growing. And consumers were obviously enjoying this game. They were getting slightly better deals and everything.
00:16:54
Speaker
So we realized that qki would just said we were also able to inform ah restaurant as well in advance. So that was the whole ah sort of cycle how it was working.
00:17:05
Speaker
Very smart. Very, very smart. ah So this is like brilliant gamification. why is Crownnet not a thing today? So two, three reasons.
00:17:17
Speaker
So I'll tell you one more sort of story before I'll tell you what didn't go right. So ah the I told you that kamlo one we started giving cashback at all of the Gurgaon, Bombay, Bangalore outlets eventually. And we raised series A. We've raised around 6 million in series A. So we had money. So we didn't have money until we got.
00:17:36
Speaker
but yeah is so raised from excellent uh it was a sort of one of the good blue-eyed vcs who understand consumer at that point in time so we were also very happy they were also very happy at that point and oh so we realized that crown it can non-partner restaurant here i am giving less cashback but ultimately it's a direct expense for me So we replaced it and we started a weekly rush.
00:18:07
Speaker
It was a lottery. So what happened now? If you go to restaurants, you used to get crowns. If you are going to a restaurant which is not a partner restaurant Crownit, you used to get lottery tickets.
00:18:20
Speaker
And it is your job to collect as many number of lottery yeah ah the spha lottery tickets. scalate And every Friday, 4 PM, the weekly rush used to happen where the draw used to happen.
00:18:36
Speaker
And it was a massive success. I have friends in EY, GenPack who used to say you friday char with a company we i near da butja sawaja andktato rulelet altata ah vt shelter that used to be like, because it was probably a simple gamification.
00:18:55
Speaker
Let's say you have iPhone in it, the top price used to be iPhone. If you have won an iPhone or if you want some movie tickets, you have to claim it within 10 minutes.
00:19:08
Speaker
If you are not claiming it within 10 minutes, that price will be given to your friends who have weekly rush ticket in that week.
00:19:20
Speaker
okay So your friend can actually steal your price. and hu ah So if you haven't claimed your price at 4 o'clock, your friend can actually steal your price and that is the worst thing that you would want to do.
00:19:34
Speaker
That if you didn't get me, I wouldn't get my friend. yeah So that is the reason for 10 minutes we used to have, like every time our app used to sort of crash in those 10 minutes. Because every time used to see massive traffic coming on the app, but that obviously was a good problem to solve.
00:19:51
Speaker
So that's how we solved the problem that how we stopped giving cashback on the non-participating outlet, we used to call them. One thing is we... I don't understand the connection with non-participating. So you are doing a weekly rush lucky draw in which someone wins an iPhone. What is the connection with non-participating restaurants here?
00:20:11
Speaker
So what was happening earlier actually is that I was giving large cash back around 15-20% at the outlet which is participating or which is paying commission to Crownit. But the other outlets because I was paying some cash back to all the outlets. even if I'm paying 10-15 rupees at the outlet where there is no deal between Crownit and the restaurant, I was burning that money.
00:20:34
Speaker
I was burning that cash from my own pocket. And like and we were generating at, I think at the peak, we had around 10 lakh bill in a month. So it was a first like unfundable. That kind of, even at 10 rupees, that was that burn was unfundable for us.
00:20:53
Speaker
So what we did is that weekly rush expense was fixed for us. Let's say if I had to sort of give prices worth 4-5 lakh rupees a week, that's a fixed expense for me. So it's 20 lakh rupees in a month.
00:21:05
Speaker
Whereas earlier I was like, even if 10 lakh check-in, 10 lakh rupees, 10 rupees per bill, I was burning around 10, one crore. And that was also increasing with every sort of additional traffic. So we were also...
00:21:18
Speaker
The bill gives you lottery tickets. Was that the connection? Yeah, the bill gives you lottery tickets. One bill will give you one lottery ticket. ticket So it is now suddenly we started getting more bills because consumers were trying to maximize their chances of winning in a lottery and they were sending us more and more bills.
00:21:37
Speaker
Okay. Okay. ah Did this... ah I am imagining that I would eventually stop... bothering if I didn't win for ah five, six weeks.
00:21:52
Speaker
but If you don't win continuously five, six, and obviously, like i the winners would be like 0.01 percentage of people who are participating, some number but like that it would have been.
00:22:04
Speaker
so i mean, did it lead to like a loss of engagement? Yeah, so what, and obviously we realized this. So what we did is that there was, so it's it's like and again one of the gamification theories. When you are creating this kind of lottery, you have to ensure that there is one top layer, which is like an iPhone, but there has to be a massive bottom layer.
00:22:31
Speaker
So at least 5 to 6% of your consumer should be winning something, even if they are winning 10, 20 crowns. Because in that question, if I send a bill, I don't get 10-20 crowns. I will win 10-20 crowns. And one crown was one rupee.
00:22:46
Speaker
One crown was one rupee. So consumers, kuchna could it's the feeling of winning. It is irrespective of what you live and how much you live. It's the feeling of winning.
00:23:02
Speaker
and i'll tell you one more beautiful thing that we did is that and this is something we did lot of consumer research around it is that when you used to get crown in the app, when you check in you live in weekly rush, you would get crowns.
00:23:15
Speaker
so what happened was that notification from your phone that notification was that coins, when you get on the table, it gets a big noise. so that notification came from the big noise.
00:23:27
Speaker
Okay, now we have been researching a lot of consumer surveys but we realized that consumers were not even checking their app. When the came, how much of a crown came.
00:23:38
Speaker
That was the sound of getting money, something that people were excited about. That I won, I got money. So, we had a non-participating outlet that we had 50 rupees every check-in. Then we had 20, then we had 10.
00:23:52
Speaker
We didn't see any drop in engagement. Because consumers still had that feeling that I have got something. We talked to many consumers and they said that in a day, it will come out of or two times and it will be fine.
00:24:06
Speaker
Okay, amazing. amazing Okay. Okay. Got it. How... but ah How easy or hard was it to monetize restaurants?
00:24:16
Speaker
Like in terms of getting them to sign up? That is actually the interesting and the critical part as well. key So there are two parts to it. One is that there are there are outlets around sixty seventy percent of the outlets.
00:24:31
Speaker
If you are giving them business, they will continue to pay you. There is absolutely no doubt about it. But then there is a long tail of twenty thirty percent outlet. who will create enough ah problems in your life whether it's not paying on time whether it's debating every time that this check-in came from you or not so that is where ah the life becomes very very difficult and in a any consumer platform where as I mentioned we were operating on a take rate of like 6 to 7% even if let's say 10% guys are not paying me it is actually eroding the entire margin that I was planning to make so it's a platform business is a very very thin margin business so that's when we realized that we were able to collect like merchants but
00:25:31
Speaker
yahape collection cost was so heavy already because I had to continuously send my BD to collect and at one point time we realized that collection cost was more than the entire money that we have to collect from these merchants and that was hitting our gross margins really hard ah so eventually after I think 3 years 3, 3 and half years 3 years actually that's when we decided that it is it is very difficult to scale this business um Could this have been solved at scale? ah In a way, that the Zomato Gold program is an avatar of this only, right?
00:26:08
Speaker
Like, it's also for deal hunters. Yeah, you are right. So, there are two, three things. I mean, we have done PhD in this. But, one thing is, who are you monetizing from?
00:26:22
Speaker
So, let's say, if you say, man, whatever the deal that deal is directly between the merchant and the consumer. If you have 15% cashback, merchant will give that cashback directly to the consumer.
00:26:36
Speaker
I will not income between so that key I don't have any accountability because if I am a consumer, app consumer expects cashback from me. If the merchant has paid 10% of me, it hits me very very hard.
00:26:50
Speaker
So if you take your own business to the beach, the deal is between you two, I have shown here that merchant has said, so now you talk directly to the merchant. Okay, so this solves the problem of NPA, that you don't have non-performing. neo app But then how will you monetize?
00:27:06
Speaker
Then the monetization becomes from consumer. you Ultimately, if you see, you monetize with consumer. You were going to give 20% cashback, and cashback. So the next pivot is that you
00:27:22
Speaker
up escojo pivotized cover next we ya yaa book ash book but that is one way of building this up that to monetize from consumers the second thing is
00:27:34
Speaker
thejava pu deal milljai three butdaomaartunop yeah a good deal nahiil go ari back carddu but that is one way of building this up that to monetize from consumers ah second thing is been a yankee If you are monetizing from consumers, which I am saying, you are taking 20, 50, 100, and you are unlocking a deal, this has never globally scaled to become a very large, massive play.
00:28:03
Speaker
So, our thesis was that we want we want to but create a gamified platform where we monetize from restaurant and keep our take rate from there. This is exactly what has happened in China.
00:28:16
Speaker
Whereas the Groupon model has not scaled. That is also a lot of thesis. So, there a you think on the larger consumer side, when you are shallow discounting, when you discount 15-20% the consumer doesn't alter alternator So, let's say if I have to go to a route, I will not go to a Sutra for a 15% discount if my experience is altered.
00:28:46
Speaker
So I am going to give you a deep discount for eighty five percent percent pi a 85% discount. So I have to charge 85% of money anyway. But at the same time when you do a deep discounting.
00:28:58
Speaker
When I say I give you 40% discount. I will give you a 40% discount. Then consumer will do anything and everything that you want him to do. He will say that experience is not okay. I will compromise little bit.
00:29:08
Speaker
But I am getting a 40% off. In that case, may merchant will go out of the way and make consumer's life miserable. he will give them another cutlery and his menu card won't be good and that kind of deals become unsustainable for the merchant as well so this is the deal shark model so this shark model is okay with one or two deals that if I acquire a new consumer as a restaurant so that will work fine next time if the same consumer is coming I will not give him 40% off
00:29:44
Speaker
So this kind of a model, deep discounting model works well for new customer acquisition. Yellow discounting works well when you are doing like multiple visits to the same restaurant. But in that case, consumer will not take this.
00:29:59
Speaker
So boy but deals with that's also ah another ah sort of situation which but makes it difficult to scale se as well. And that was our thesis. We have gamification and lot of ah redemption, crowns, all of that put together. We'll create a platform so the consumer will be anyways on that platform.
00:30:24
Speaker
Okay. ah Let me interpret some of the things you said. ah So f from what I understand, For the restaurant, killier eventually that money which they will give to a crown net, they will start questioning the spend. okay but they send their customer to a me right If they're doing shallow discounting because as you said, the customer doesn't change the behavior, they
Sunstone's Mission and Educational Impact
00:30:46
Speaker
just take the discount. If they were to come in the restaurant, they would have discounted or not. So then the restaurant will start questioning that spend and then your...
00:30:54
Speaker
ah challenge of collecting money from restaurant goes up if it is shallow discount and ah deep discount is not sustainable. That is right.
00:31:07
Speaker
Got it. Okay. And I think Zomato Gold is also not such a large business anyway for them. In deals, we have We moved out of deal space in 2017.
00:31:21
Speaker
It is 2025. It's been eight years. And it's not that online to offline deal space is a small space. From the TAM perspective, it is a massively large TAM.
00:31:36
Speaker
But at the time today, there no unicorn in that space. So it's a very hard space to build a business in. Hmm. Right, right. I guess Magic Pen was also in this space. They've also pivoted from the original.
00:31:53
Speaker
Okay, interesting. So it must have been a like, was it a hard call to say, okay, this is not working? Because the one thing I've realized is that entrepreneurs' car DNA oa of irrational optimism.
00:32:08
Speaker
They always think, I will make it work. So I always wonder about entrepreneurs who have the maturity to say, no, this will not work. you know How did you reach that stage?
00:32:21
Speaker
Yeah, I think ah yeah know this is this is also to do with with every entrepreneur on its own.
00:32:32
Speaker
But I believe that ah ultimately everybody knows. irrational optimism is required is an external face because and then entrepreneur you are responsible 300 people who are working your company and entrepreneur they look up to you every single day okay if for today's date let's say if i am for any reason i am sad 10 people will walk into my room and ask me what happened all is okay
00:33:06
Speaker
So you have to keep that face on. It is not a, ma muja per like pala vi know I don't know about others. You keep that face on to motivate and tell everybody who is looking up to you that all is well.
00:33:21
Speaker
Within you, no entrepreneur who is building a good business is not ah smart enough to know it is not working. Right. Okay. ah What was that journey for you to reach that stage? It was journey that we were the last 20% of people.
00:33:39
Speaker
How to collect money from them? The good thing is that we had a very clear problem at our hand. That everything is going on. Traction is this we did like for almost 15 to 18 months we did multiple experiments, initiatives.
00:34:00
Speaker
How to collect money from them. We launched Crownit vouchers that you will prepared. If you have to use Crownit for the restaurant, Then we realized that the good merchants are also paid for the bill. Ultimately, we pay the bill at the end month or two months.
00:34:17
Speaker
ah app of a will bullet upload ah but na butgan eto upcon each like which credit they to them keith naked and it song then we realize we a chamber ten but we pre ultimately what a bill pay are they there month can mayor domin again they don't even have their wallet preload then we realized that they don't preload is standing current because all the ah restaurants have a working capital problem so working at cooko onitop naura samman grocery the rents sub palaceda or he do deal valap pei vote over chat major consumer adata be me but pal andi dualic because marketing right now
00:34:56
Speaker
So here we started At that time, the UPI So started
00:35:13
Speaker
you cannot pay agar grapu deal change in top restaurant and directly painting a sector so we launched a feature crowned pay waha baby we pushed very hard We reached up to 60-60% of the consumer paying through Crown Aid.
00:35:27
Speaker
But another 40% was attacked there, who directly gave the merchant money. And generally, the merchant where our collection didn't get paid, and the merchant where there was a lot of overlap, because they were small merchants. But they were frequent use cases.
00:35:45
Speaker
So that's what we did. Then we launched a voucher product on the consumer side. Prabhdi did lot of such things and all of these things were like you are running a great setup where you are moving like 8-10 million dollars of GMB every month and have to change these things. So it took us some time.
00:36:07
Speaker
ah At the same time that we started experimenting with multiple other things. So we realized that the data that we are generating from these bills actually is a very, very good and gold mine for the large consumer companies.
00:36:20
Speaker
So we realized that why don't we start monetizing from this large consumer companies like FMCG and your large food chains and all of those things, then ah monetizing from the merchants.
00:36:36
Speaker
What data are you getting from the bills? It's just like I bought a burger from McDonald's. How is that? You bought a burger and I had a lot of information on you anyways. That know your redemption pattern. path ibu j aki friends but ibuja akis company may conquer and to whooppa diamond so I So now I can create a consumer persona.
00:36:55
Speaker
Let's say simple example. We researched a lot of consumer personas. So we realized that the person who shops from Zara his ah or the other way around the person who drinks coffee in a cafe instead of drinking chai in a chai outlet his probability of buying a Zara is let's say two or three times higher than somebody who is drinking a chai.
00:37:23
Speaker
So Zara this is a very critical information. So we have a we study on a beer on how India drinks.
00:37:35
Speaker
So, what is the in Delhi? Bombay, Bangalore? What time is it? People start drinking like at 3 in the afternoon. oh banlo may People start drinking at 8. It wraps up by 12.
00:37:50
Speaker
Bombay people start drinking very late. They start at 9 or 10, but they start at 2 days. and but to as granular level as that in Bombay, what is the best in Delhi? So, did a lot of such... so Because you had data, so you can do lot of these ah interesting consumer studies.
00:38:09
Speaker
And then you can obviously sell these insights and outcomes ah to the large FMCG, durables, QSR chains and everything. I think there is a piece missing of actually delivering the ad.
00:38:25
Speaker
end of the day, you are helping a Zara to optimize their marketing funnel. k up kico target guro cashhe target guro So probably if you also start displaying Zara ads, that will like close the loop and allow you to monetize better.
00:38:38
Speaker
that That will but generally what happens is that need a platform where almost all the consumers are there. We at that point in time were very focused on three cities Delhi, Bombay and Bangalore.
00:38:54
Speaker
And similarly on those three cities also we had the very typical tier 1 consumers. So we were like a very um like a homogeneous app that is white collar.
00:39:09
Speaker
log hair um look i ah It there was a homogeneous app of those people. Okay, the views would not have been large enough for Zara to take you seriously.
00:39:20
Speaker
Like they would have asked you if if we advertise, how many views we will get? And that number would have been much smaller than Facebook, Google, which have mass... Not comparable, but not at all comparable. okay okay okay Okay, interesting.
00:39:33
Speaker
and just So then what? like Did you wind it down or did you pivot?
Crownit's Strategic Pivot and Sale
00:39:40
Speaker
So 2018, I think beginning of 2018 is when and I, so Samir and I started this organization and Piyush, who is my batchmate, he joined very early, like before the series, before any funding sort of happened.
00:39:54
Speaker
So early 2018 is when Piyush and I decided that we will eventually would want to move out. Primarily because it is mal and this was the right for the business and we sort of did that change also. key We pivoted to become an enterprise business than a consumer business.
00:40:10
Speaker
And obviously when ah we came together in 2014, the hypothesis was that we want to do consumer business. So 2018 beginning is when we took the decision that we want to move out. We discussed it with Samir. Samir said, I want to continue. I want to see it through.
00:40:26
Speaker
So Samir continued. 2018, both Yush and I moved out in a staggered manner. I moved out July, Yush moved out October. october And Samir continued with Crownit. And just to sort of finish the Crownit journey, eventually 2023, end of 2023, we sold Crownit to one of the largest consumer research company globally, to Ipsos.
00:40:52
Speaker
And Samir and other few critical team members are now working with Ipsos. Okay. Okay. Okay. Interesting. Okay. So,
00:41:03
Speaker
What was your next move then? twenty eighteen 2018, you moved out. twenty eighteen 2018. Yes, July 2018. So I think this time I was now fairly clear that I have done one sort of gig. Now I want to do something in the area of education.
00:41:18
Speaker
So I started doing my own research. I met, I met obviously everyone. The good thing is that you have done one startup. So you have access to the startup network of the country. You can sort of ping anybody and generally people respond. That's the good thing.
00:41:32
Speaker
So I met lot of people and then I realized that I want to build something in the area of higher education primarily because in higher education, uppo real impact create cur atu to visible which do outcome ka group be visible the that you have given to a child.
00:41:54
Speaker
So that's a real visible outcome that you have created. And then came the hard part of making a decision, which segment you have to build. gun knife The easy part would have been that you high input quality li ah and you would have created a very glamorous and a sexy product and you build it for that segment so just to sort of uh it's a level can you checkgava cheli
00:42:25
Speaker
and you would have given them a very high quality product uh and you sort of uh unlova gliberante It's not that this segment or product is not good. But our view is that there are enough opportunities for these kids. You can create delta improvement for them. Let's go, MDI will not go, IMT will not go, MDI will not go, cages will go. All of that are good colleges.
00:42:51
Speaker
You will create a core product. bannado game Obviously, you will create ah far better product. You create a good product. with But in their lives, you have done anything like that. yalo cuo has problem mut they would have done something or the other with their life.
00:43:06
Speaker
They are capable people. So then we realized actually and it was also, you were also thinking about many thoughts. Then we realized that ultimately if you take a good input quality with all of the great institutions that we think about, they take the top, literally the cream of the country and then sort of they claim that we have made this child's life, this a crore-ropea job. I thought that this is cheating, this is not right.
00:43:35
Speaker
Because it was good, what did do with it? then we Then we decided that we will take the child who doesn't get a good education in the right way. Otherwise, he would not have bought a good quality high quality education product and we will work with that student.
00:43:52
Speaker
So, many things have changed in the past 7 years. In our business, our thought process, our execution strategy. One thing we are still with, from 2018 to 2018, is this thing.
00:44:08
Speaker
That we continue to work with the segment of students, who don't get quality education, if it doesn't get sunstone.
00:44:19
Speaker
Why not start at school level? that I mean if you even go about more. This is a very good question. And with this question, least I will go for 4 months.
00:44:31
Speaker
So I will tell you my story. I left it in July in 2018. From July and October,
00:44:39
Speaker
I have visited lot of schools. I have gone lot of schools, a lot of integral education, alternative education, Jindu Krishnamurti's school, I have been doing a school in Chaligadha. So, in schooling, and I am personally more interested in K-12 space, like job kaenicia something that is more closer to your heart.
00:45:01
Speaker
It may not be a venturable business, that you do something in schooling. mekaro So, I think that schooling in your own, real, tangible outcome create students for you is not possible.
00:45:20
Speaker
So, it's true on the other side. I'm not saying that schooling is not a chance to be fixed today. I feel that K-12 is still a massive, massive opportunity. So, on the other side, we are still a massive opportunity.
00:45:32
Speaker
the other side, are still a massive opportunity. I have a child that doesn't work in school. ah school school make our name school but school ma communityity jo um my aka around but jacob pervo um school monitor and But, the fear is that, let's say, hypothetically, if we could have started in K-12, then higher education of children will not get a job, then it will go out.
00:45:57
Speaker
So, at least, whatever it is, maybe it has to be for me for 3 years, but in those 3 years, I have to study class 6. but Maths, English, Quant, but I have to take it to 3 years, which will change his life.
00:46:14
Speaker
So it's a harder work, but a pig at least we are creating some impact. What do you mean that outcome can't happen in school? is not designed in school. You can't do a job after school. You have higher education after school.
00:46:34
Speaker
okay okay got it but the the job is not because ultimately life outcome is a job because from the segment that comes from 4-5-6 lakh rupees family income if the student is not earning my ah the average family income that we have in sunstone is in this range five six seven lakh rupees Now typically a Sunstone graduate ends up getting around five, six lakh of average salary.
00:47:00
Speaker
So essentially the family income doubles. It's actually a social upliftment. for a It's a start up.
00:47:10
Speaker
And around 60, 65% of our students are the first one in their entire family tree to ever work in a corporate. okay well You are actually working on democratization and there is a contribution polarization in Bhairat. This is as good as it as it can get.
00:47:33
Speaker
Okay. Okay. Got it. So I had interviewed Rajul on the podcast previously where he had mentioned about Sunstone also in that interview.
00:47:44
Speaker
So how did you get involved? What was that journey? Tell me that story. Yeah, so as I told you kiedo that in 2018, I was meeting everyone. So as a part of that sort of meeting and reaching out to any and every education founder or investor, and reached out to Rajul as well.
00:48:01
Speaker
And then Rajul told me about this Sunstone model, which he started in 2011, wherein he was doing online product management school. And then in 2015, he decided that this will not be online.
00:48:13
Speaker
Education, higher ed will be offline. But I think Rajul got 4 years. So Rajul decided that I will not do it myself. But Rajul's thesis was clear at that point in time.
00:48:25
Speaker
So Rajul brought in a couple of academicians to run this. So they tied up with one of the offline colleges here in Greater Noida. And Rajul brought in couple of academicians to run it.
00:48:37
Speaker
So in 2016-17 they were running In when i met them. I realized there good people who can do good work in a college but they are like typical academicians that they can't think beyond one college.
00:48:48
Speaker
So I went to Rajul. It was a very interesting conversation. So I went to Rajul and I said, Rajul, this model is very interesting but like you are playing, it won't work. This just can't work.
00:49:00
Speaker
And Rajul very clearly said that I am aware of this. I know. So then I told him that I don't want you to feel bad because I've spent good time with Sunstorm. I had spent 8-10 days in college and I met teachers, students and other things.
00:49:16
Speaker
So I told Rajul that I'll start a similar company. in this model itself because this is something which is really appealing to me because you are with students so i will tell model then will tell you what happened so the thesis of us before we started sunstone as well Higher Edmina, the problem of higher education is not finishing school. So, there are many coding boot camps, English speaking, personality training that you have finished your 3-4 years of education and you will finish your job.
00:49:52
Speaker
My problem is that you will not have a job in school or college. You will do it in 6 months. Again, the work that is for 6 months, is also for those who were good in the study. But there is a little miss in the job. It doesn't have to be for masses. So then, that's when we realized that if this problem has to be solved, this problem has to be solved for every single day a student is in college for years.
00:50:21
Speaker
you can't solve this problem otherwise. Because you have to teach him English to maths, to quants, to sort of domain knowledge, to programming, to everything. So which is what Sunstone was doing at that point in time, that Sunstone was partnering with college and from day one they were teaching students.
00:50:40
Speaker
And they were doing their own admission. It was like not college kids. They themselves and they had to do their job. So it was like a cloud college. And it is, it is painfully difficult in India to set up your own college.
00:50:58
Speaker
You have a lot of real estate regulation. You have lot of other regulation, not for profit and all of those things. So this was like Sunstone was doing all of it. Sunstone was working, almost working like a college, but without having to set up its own campus, without having to invest in real estate and all of those things. So this is what sort of excited me.
00:51:17
Speaker
yeah I can, because The problem of higher education can be solved in higher education, cannot be solved outside higher education. And you cannot build a higher education company because of regulation and real estate.
00:51:30
Speaker
So Sunstone sort of created a very interesting creative model around it, where they were working like a college without having to set up the campuses. So that is when I went with to Raju Kiyari model was interesting and I will do this model.
00:51:43
Speaker
i was This is like say, hotels like say Marriott. Absolutely. If you go to a Marriott, there not real estate Marriott. There is a...
00:51:55
Speaker
ah It's basically a franchisee. like It's a Raheja group owning some real estate, the hotel being run by Four Seasons or Marriott. It is exactly like that. The only caveat is that there are regulations and not-for-profit in hotels. You have to be careful that you don't flirt with regulation.
00:52:14
Speaker
You have to be on the right side of the regulation. there are many things like that. Faculty should not be on your payroll. You should not... look franchising you don't have to do your own brand namecar so all of those things you can take care of this apart from that that is the creativity that is something that they figured out that they can do it got it so that's when we realized that our model is very interesting it it's a very very sexy model So went back to Rajul.
00:52:44
Speaker
So Rajul was actually very pragmatic with this. I would say. He said that, okay, can do it. In fact, if you need any help from me, please do let me know. And then he said, ka agar me if you are okay, you can also sort of buy this out. I am okay if you want to buy this out.
00:53:02
Speaker
And we can figure out the commercial
Sunstone's Innovative Educational Approach
00:53:04
Speaker
structures and everything. And because it takes time to build a brand in education, it will take you some time. So it can give you some head start. So that's when we started to have those conversations.
00:53:14
Speaker
The good part was that ah we acquired the company, I think, end of 2018 or January One is that we didn't acquire the legal entity.
00:53:27
Speaker
And other interesting thing, the most creative thing that Rajul created the model is that we didn't pay for anything. So the payment were tied to us, the new entity raising money and then paying back.
00:53:42
Speaker
So there was no sort of liability which were created on our books on day one. So we were free to execute. We got Sunstone, the brand, the business and everything without any liabilities.
00:53:54
Speaker
And Rajul decided to be on the equity side of the capital. The others decided to cash out, which we over a period of next, I think six to seven quarters, we paid the cash for them.
00:54:05
Speaker
Okay. Okay. Okay. And when did you do your first raise then? Pulse raise was done before the company was incorporated. ah Okay. is it From whom?
00:54:16
Speaker
And how much did raise? Yeah. So we've raised around 2 crore at that point in time. Again, that was ah one of the great things of being a second-time founder.
00:54:27
Speaker
That you had your network, people trusted you. So when I reached out to a few of the people in the founder community and told them that I'm starting a second venture, people sort of bagged it without even knowing what I'm doing, without knowing that there's no company.
00:54:43
Speaker
And we got the checks. We took a check in December took a check After that, we put it in the check bank. So that's that's actually the perk of being a second-time founder, I would say.
00:54:55
Speaker
Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. So you said you've been through a journey of multiple pivots on the business model. Take me through that journey. Like the first model, from what I understand, is your faculty was deployed at a college in Greater Noradar.
00:55:12
Speaker
That was the original model. So i'll I'll take you through all the sort of major milestones. So first we started with a pay after placement model. It was ah very, very bold move at that point in time. What we wanted to tell students is that don't worry about the quality of education because we are taking responsibility of your jobs.
00:55:35
Speaker
So why don't you come and study with us and you pay us after you get a job? So that was the first ah bold move. And obviously, even it became easier for us to attract students on that model.
00:55:49
Speaker
And this is called income sharing. um um low income jerry me yeahta ah So income in a loan to the child.
00:56:01
Speaker
Because we had a degree. So we know that students will pay and pay. So we did a simple pay after the basement model. That you pay me after you get a job. If you pay a bank loan or not, but you need a NBFC loan, we will arrange a NBFC loan. We partnered with a couple of NBFCs. So that was sort of easily manageable for us.
00:56:22
Speaker
So that was the first thing. But in 2020, COVID hit. Because in pay after placement, made we were running a very big working capital gap in the business. So when COVID hit, it became a very difficult... How were you funding that with just 2 crore?
00:56:37
Speaker
So, man, until then, I mean, the idea was that we'll do next fund raise. Okay, okay. but I will, I can give you a story, but the truth was that we'll be going to fund raise.
00:56:51
Speaker
Got it. Okay. Okay. ah So, luckily, that happened. In January, we had this angel In July, we raised our first institutional round of funding, where Prime came in with ah with a $1.5 million dollars check.
00:57:09
Speaker
So, we knew that in will be able to study. Their life will be set. and then the plan was actually key basis 2020 initial enrollments signal on February, March. On that basis, maybe we will do a larger series. We will do 5-6 million series and then we will be set for next two years.
00:57:34
Speaker
And then COVID hit. Then actually the problem or a situation of bother for us was not 2019, it was 2020. Because in 2019 initially when we started interacting with investors, we had a very good sense that this fundraiser will be It's $1 million or $3 million, but it will happen. We had a lot of good conversation going on. And in fact, we closed our round before students hit the classroom. in July, classes start.
00:58:04
Speaker
Our batch started in July. I still remember. And when our first college orientation was first time, we got the term sheet from Prime. So, timing-wise, we never came back and were kids and we didn't have money in the bank.
00:58:20
Speaker
Luckily, that never happened. But 2020 is that state of bother happened. to Because in 2020, we were actually going very aggressive. We said, now we're still coming, we're still coming, we're still studying, we're still looking at our job.
00:58:36
Speaker
So let's go aggressive in 2020. And we've started going very aggressive. the first two, three months, we went very aggressive. There were enough student traction. Single, personally. no, we didn't go to single campus in the first year. In the first year maybe we had three campuses, next year we were in six campuses.
00:58:52
Speaker
The idea was to go deep in these three campuses. So, Salman had 300 kids in the first year. 90, 90 and a number, this to 1000 plus.
00:59:04
Speaker
and idea was to do this take this to thousand in six campuses. So increase the number of students in your existing campus and add more campuses.
00:59:17
Speaker
So February-March was very good for No, not March actually. up Until February was very good for us. Both in terms of investor traction. Actually we had ah had an offer from investor.
00:59:28
Speaker
Like the offer is still on my mailbox. There was no formal term sheet but the offer was discussed. yeah de of ferroga but th is a ti for very go a That And um largely mil as a founder, you always negotiate on valuation.
00:59:42
Speaker
That's low valuation and you always want to get a better valuation. So, we were doing it. And then meanwhile, this COVID with sort of hit us.
00:59:54
Speaker
And at that time, we also got kids, investors also got kids. And then we were in a state of bother. March was difficult. So 22nd or 23rd of March, we decided that we will launch a new a fee module or a payment module for students where they can pay upfront fee.
01:00:17
Speaker
The entire fee they can pay upfront and we'll leave something on the table for students.
01:00:30
Speaker
ah Interestingly for us, around 40% of the students paid upfront. ah which was a massive shot in the product is running more than payment and everything. come Even in second year, when there was placement in first batch, it was a good thing for children. Basis the feedback, basis the education quality and all of those things.
01:00:53
Speaker
So I think more than funding or bank balance, it was at least a situation where we doing good work. So that happened and then luckily May we got the townsheet. So we didn't have to wait for too long.
01:01:07
Speaker
So May came in with around 3, 3.5 million was the total round size. And then we sort of 20 happened, 21 happened. And then 22 is when we sort of again was thinking that now up till 21, we were only doing and MBA program, which was a two-year program.
01:01:27
Speaker
So it was easy for us to sustain pay-after placement. If a child has a 2-year program, a job is getting a job in 15-16 months, then we start getting our fee. 22 is when we wanted to launch UG programs which are longer duration program, 3-4 year program.
01:01:45
Speaker
So that is when we took that harder a call that we want to get away with pay after-pacement because now we can't sustain 3-4 years working capital after-pacement. And up anyways paying the entire fee upfront.
01:02:01
Speaker
around sixty sixty five percent of the student were anyway paying the entire fee of So that also gave us the confidence to completely remove pay-after placement, which was again a very, very big strategic move because we, again, as we do consumer research on our students, people used to remember the pay-after placement whilea college from Sunstone. That they had to go to pay-after placement. while i call itja so And the association of Sunstone with pay after placement was like this.
01:02:33
Speaker
late Like, really, it was a top of the mind recall for student. that was a big decision in 22 when we took the decision that we want to remove pay after placement.
01:02:45
Speaker
And then the other big thing that we did was that we moved away from single fee point. So, as a consumer brand, ah there are like, as a brand, there are certain things that you do.
01:02:58
Speaker
Being at one single fee point is one of the brand association. How much sunstone fee is? Sunstone fee is the same. 2022, we also took that decision that we will move away from one single fee point because let's say in a city like Pune or Bangalore, I cannot price my program at the same price point to what I can do it and in Aligarh or Poembatool.
01:03:23
Speaker
My partners were asking larger sort of ref share and larger sort of pie. So another thing that we did in 2022 is moved away from one single price point. And obviously all of these decisions when you make, they're all sort of internally debated, fighted, and then you sort of take a leap of faith and move on with the decision, hoping that nothing will go wrong.
01:03:49
Speaker
The good or bad part in our business is that, that are running the crown it or consumer internet, which we are running, is exactly opposite to business. You do something in Crown It, and you get to know something new. I have launched a new discount or a new feature.
01:04:07
Speaker
Within one day or one week, you know that the consumer is coming. You get to know that at least one year, later that because education is a yearly cycle. So this year, my student has behaved on it, how much traction has come. That you only get one chance every single year in education business.
01:04:25
Speaker
And that is the reason lot of education businesses fail. Because in other business, you have a every day. You 350 chances in the year. I get 7 chances here, to change. So why every change is like, the ah you don't know what you're shooting at.
01:04:44
Speaker
You're shooting in blind. ah Okay. Okay, interesting, interesting. um i want to zoom in on a couple of things. ah You said that there were some regulations and you could not advertise your brand. or is Is somebody joining Sunstone program or are they joining ah whatever college you are doing the program with? Yeah, yeah.
01:05:09
Speaker
So ah regulation in education exists around the degree programs. Let's say BTEK, BCA, BBA, MBA, MCA. So as Sunstone, I don't have the license to give any BBA or BCA. So I cannot say that it's Sunstone's BCA.
01:05:28
Speaker
I will have to say that you are, it's GD going up b BCA, which is being powered by Sunstone or your employability program is powered by Sunstone. Your career readiness program is powered by Sunstone or your, this certification, that certification will be powered by Sunstone.
01:05:44
Speaker
So when you are a consumer, cojava market curru then you have to be very careful of what you are marketing.
01:05:52
Speaker
And, uh, How does this, do you also do credit course only or you do the full degree course? So see, when we are enrolling student, let's say in a GD Goinka MBA program, then student will come and study in GD Goinka MBA.
01:06:10
Speaker
Now he will study the curriculum of the GD Goinka University. We will help them create that curriculum. We will help them sort of, and I'm talking about right now only the university part.
01:06:24
Speaker
So there are two tracks that work. There is a university track. There is a Sunstone track. On the university track, I will help them hire faculties. I will do the faculty development training. I will help them finalize curriculum. I will create curriculum and give it to the university.
01:06:37
Speaker
All of those things will happen. And, but this is for the university track. Now comes the Sunstone track. Sunstone track is all about, but so there's a term ELQD, which is English, logic, quantum domain.
01:06:53
Speaker
So any education program that you are enrolled in, it can be your BBA, a management program or a B-Tech, which is a tech program. ah Ultimately, it's this ELQD which will get you a job.
01:07:06
Speaker
So I need 3 to 4 hours of student every single day which is almost like 50% of the college overall day time. he is in college 8 hours, then 4 hours I need him. 4 hours I will not teach him university track.
01:07:22
Speaker
University track is covered in the first half. I will teach him sunstone track. Now sunstone track is created from day 1 to help you reach, become employable and get to a job.
01:07:35
Speaker
Now, if you are a study English. Logic, Quant and Programming will be a little more study. If you a management teacher, you will learn English and your domain. Logic and Quant will be a little less study.
01:07:49
Speaker
So, all of those things sort of change depending on what program you are If you are a BBA student, you will get a lot training English and Soft Skills. The domain will also be a little less study. Because no one, employer don't care about domain with BBA students.
01:08:04
Speaker
They care that what they can be in a presentable format in a suit, put, and seated in morning. And this is again a big part of our training, the mindset training.
01:08:16
Speaker
That it's 10-10 hours of office. po Primarily happened more with UG student, but that's also a big part of the training. Okay. Okay. ah Who owns the course finally? Like,
01:08:31
Speaker
So, degree comes from the university. And then there is a certificate which comes from Sunstone.
01:08:39
Speaker
You... Okay. I want to understand it. Let's compare with, say, Oyo Rooms. Oyo Rooms has some hotels where it will book some of the rooms ah through Oyo Rooms and the hotel will sell on its own also, where Oyo is like sales and marketing partner. And whereas there will be Oyo Townhouse where It is managing the entire property.
01:09:03
Speaker
um What is the way to understand it here? Like, do you own one complete course or one complete batch or one section? yeah like how does Exactly same.
01:09:14
Speaker
oh For us also, we have two types of colleges. One college is where we are partnering at a program level. Let's say if we have enrolled 60 students in JD Goinka MBA a program, those students will sit in a separate classroom, will study separately and all of those things.
01:09:31
Speaker
So that section you own. That section we own. Their outcomes we own. They are sort of sunstone powered students.
01:09:41
Speaker
Now, oh that is like one section in a larger university. At the same time, there is a OYO townhouse kind of a model as well.
01:09:52
Speaker
Whereas, wherein all the students will be Sunstone admitted or Sunstone powered students. There is no other student on the campus apart from Sunstone students. Where in the entire college, I manage the whole college, I manage the house keeping, guard, infra, everything I manage in that college.
01:10:09
Speaker
Okay. Okay. Understood. And what is the revenue arrangement between you and the college?
01:10:17
Speaker
Typically it is ref share. Like what is the split like roughly? The split depends on what model we have with the college. It ranges between 20% to 50%. For which party? For the colleges.
01:10:37
Speaker
Okay. Because you will... put faculty, etc. so People will be on your payroll. So faculties will not be on our payroll. Faculties by regulation cannot be on my payroll. our Housekeeping admin management. Housekeeping admin can be outsourced from it can be part of my ref share which can again be outsourced.
01:10:58
Speaker
So typically ah like if we involve everything, it will be more closer to 40-42% share to the Okay.
01:11:09
Speaker
Okay. Okay. And I'm assuming placements would be totally run by you because that is the outcome you want to control. maximum Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. okay Okay. Okay. Okay.
01:11:20
Speaker
And even the admissions would be totally run by you because that's your value add to the college that will handle admissions for you. Yeah. That's right. So between these two, but both of these are like sales processes. One is selling to students for enrollment. Second is selling to companies to get them placed. Which one is harder?
01:11:40
Speaker
So selling to companies is we considered is not even a sales. It's not hard at all. Because companies hire children. And on capas employable students who can give jobs don't get much of the time.
01:12:02
Speaker
So if you have done a good work good job at giving these skills to students then hiring is not a problem at all. Whereas on the other side there is lot of clutter.
01:12:14
Speaker
On the admission side there is lot of clutter because there are 50,000 colleges in our country. Now ah nobody stops these colleges from saying that we have not 100% placement record. date So as you all city, many colleges are they are saying that we have 100% placement record and then they do all sort of because these are local businessmen. So they do all sort of marketing gimmicks to drive students.
01:12:41
Speaker
So that is where ah to cut through the clutter becomes very, very difficult. And that's also one of the theses at the first point when we started with pay-after placement. Once you say pay-after placement, you don't have to fight from college. You say, if you're a child, you can give pay-after placement, then talk about it.
01:12:58
Speaker
Otherwise, you have to do it. but By doing that, it became very easy for us. But now, obviously, when we are UG program, and it's been seven years, our outcomes are there. Like we are one of the only, ah i would say education institution organization in our segment who gets our placement report audited.
01:13:17
Speaker
So our placement reports are audited by the same company which audit placement report of IMF Dabat. So we have that level of transparency and confidence in our processes and our placements.
01:13:29
Speaker
Okay. How does your marketing and enrollment function operate? Like, is it centrally run or does each college have a marketing team or like, how do you?
01:13:41
Speaker
It is not on the college level but on the city level. So for us, if I am present in the city, it is immaterial that it is a college A or B because both of them are my colleges, both have education standards, both have placement same. It doesn't happen that these companies have come to college not have come to college.
01:13:56
Speaker
So for us, all the colleges are same. It's just a price point which may differ. Let's say if I have if i am in Jaipur, I have two college partners. So one maybe be MBA, where you can get 5 lakhs or 3 lakhs.
01:14:07
Speaker
So students can make their own choices. But it's not that if they don't get 5 lakhs in 5 lakhs, we don't do that. So ah from our perspective, we do everything in marketing that, that like we can think of, we have a, we have a, uh, like four to five of our own YouTube channels, uh, where we counsel student, we have our own college admission company, college search, which we acquired.
01:14:36
Speaker
We have around 2500 local teachers who are associated with us, who sort of drive admission in Sunstone. and a We do lot of local outreach to schools, School Connect program, events.
01:14:52
Speaker
We are partnered with like larger online affiliates like College Day Khot Duniya, Siksha. So anything and everything that you can think of, we do we do that. Okay, I want to understand these channels a little better. What is this affiliate channel?
01:15:11
Speaker
So there are two types of affiliates. one are the large online affiliates and then there is local affiliates. So ah the reason that we a do a lot of heavy sort of reliance or heavy partnership with affiliates is that most of these affiliate works on cost per admission model.
01:15:32
Speaker
Whereas any other marketing channel will work on cost per lead model. So in case of cost per admission, one is that i don't have i only have to pay somebody once they deliver admission to me.
01:15:43
Speaker
That's actually like as good as pay for performance as it can. The other thing is that... Affiliate basically like commission agents. They are responsible for student recruitment and they will get paid only if the student actually takes admission.
01:15:58
Speaker
Yeah, it it works both ways. they can do Generally, they give us the lead. We don't leave the... Because ultimately, what that if they gave the lead and they are doing the same admission, then we don't know what they have sent.
01:16:13
Speaker
So um we take the leads from them, we do our nurturing, we tell students and we have a very strong MITC like what is the terms and conditions, minimum terms and conditions or most important terms conditions, we tell those two students.
01:16:26
Speaker
Even when we are sending the offer letter to the student, we have a one page on MITC. yeah butana So that you don't have any expectation mismatch with us. That you have me that I will get a job here.
01:16:42
Speaker
Don't be. Because ultimately, I am not here to just admit the student and then sort of don't deliver on those promises. And these are again very, very hard learning. Every year we learn that if we didn't know what we did in the first year, then we started get this and get this.
01:16:58
Speaker
So then we started we are not responsible for that. So, uh, these are online affiliates like your, uh, college dunya, Siksha, college deco, and then they are offline affiliate, which can be a local coaching Institute, uh, school teacher, uh, some local influencer in your neighborhood.
01:17:25
Speaker
All of these sort of drive admissions for us. Like they give us lead and we drive admissions. Yeah. Okay. What percentage of admissions come from affiliates? average would be 40 to 45 percent okay so they have a large role these are like influencers in a way and they have these are large these are influencers yeah yeah okay okay okay and ah the other channels what are like good channels there like youtube there way to measure like yeah yeah yeah youtube so we also have one product uh now which is ah which is what we are doing purely youtube
01:18:04
Speaker
So baha but there is no other channel apart from YouTube. So it's an experiment that we are doing internally right now. And like one is that we are not doing anything apart from YouTube. So whatever you are on YouTube, you are directly, indirectly, whatever is coming.
01:18:18
Speaker
But what product is that? So there a new brand under name of Vedum. It's a tech school, school of technology, where we are purely doing only a tech program under that school.
01:18:29
Speaker
Like a bootcamp. not a bootcamp it's an engineering again a partner with engineering it's b-tech again partnered with the university so maha direct affiliation with youtube channels around 40 45 percent traffic is directly attributed to youtube around 30 40 percent is coming organically but again we are not doing anything apart from youtube so organic youtube Right, right. Okay.
01:18:58
Speaker
Okay. How did you scale YouTube? What is the reach you have through YouTube now? Like how many eyeballs in a month? YouTube, pay i think last of month, I'll check. But within Sunstone ecosystem, we had, I think, ah three to four million views last month.
01:19:19
Speaker
Wow. and How did you reach this skill? What are some So we have five channels, so actually six channels now on YouTube, ah which are specifically created ah with one program. Like we have B.Tech funda by Sunstone, we have B.C.A. fundas by Sunstone, B.B.A. fundas by Sunstone.
01:19:36
Speaker
So our five programs have their channel. Then there is a channel for College Search, which is our company. And then there is a channel for Sunstone. Okay. So somebody who's seeing the BBA Funda channel would already be ah admitted in BBA, right? or These are also people who want to. These are typically class 12th student, class 11th or 12th student. So BBA Funda by Sunstone is basically for someone who is looking to do BBA.
01:20:04
Speaker
So like even if you go to YouTube, we review college reviews, we tell what can be in BBA, what all can you expect, what kind of jobs can come. So all, again, but it's a very program specific thing.
01:20:16
Speaker
So I understood your how the enrollment happens. um what is the ah You had ah like ah fairly large amount of fundraisers, I think 28 million, 35 million.
01:20:30
Speaker
so what was the conviction that got built to enable such big rounds? And this also happened like not in the 35 million round happened when EdTech was kind of cooling down.
01:20:45
Speaker
You know, in 22, it happened. It was not like the COVID funding bubble when it happened. So what was the conviction which got built? How did that happen? So I think the 21 round was obviously it was a round which when education and tech was on high.
01:21:04
Speaker
22, you rightly mentioned it was not ah it was in fact a round which sort of happened against the tide at that point in time. And, one thing which worked in our favor and more in 21, actually, then in 22, 22 was sort of the time where we should have raised, uh, it's counterintuitive to, uh, think it like that.
01:21:28
Speaker
But I'll tell you the reason we have never been an online education company. The wave that we saw in 2021 was for the online education.
01:21:40
Speaker
It was drastically hard for us to go and raise in 2021 vis-a-vis 2022 because offline 2021. In 2021, people ask questions that the college will be ah case me hame shawa no pugentei call the burda There will be nobody who will be going to college.
01:22:00
Speaker
Students will not be going to college. Why are you building this offline? Everybody will study online. It will only be five star properties or IIT IMs or like Ashoka's who will, who will remain there.
01:22:12
Speaker
buta po And this is not like one single investor. It was the theme. it was incredibly hard for us to raise in 21. Then for us to raise in 22, in fact 22, we had three term sheets.
01:22:28
Speaker
Because that time, that was wave of offline education. After that, I think it has been, ah like the life has been easy, God has been kind.
01:22:39
Speaker
That one, obviously the our burn has been low and we have been scaling offline and luckily now everybody feels that education will be built offline. Like the larger education market will be offline.
01:22:52
Speaker
One thing which has continuously worked for us
01:22:57
Speaker
is that the market that we are so serving Akshay is very large. And but like I don't know whether we will be able to really change the way education happen in our country or not. But obviously we are working very hard towards it.
01:23:14
Speaker
But if that happens, then obviously this will not be a billion dollar company. It doesn't matter you how like valuation guy company, but this will literally change the way every Indian studies higher education.
01:23:27
Speaker
So that's the larger thesis or a larger than life goal, which I think has been continuously sort of helping us that at least these guys are really working in the in the right direction.
01:23:43
Speaker
And you reach direction, or you stay a little lower, I think
Entrepreneurial Insights and Future Strategies
01:23:46
Speaker
time will tell. And the other thing, think... and dori When you're building offline, it is not a three year or a five year play.
01:23:56
Speaker
It is at least 10 to 15 year play. So if you move you move a little bit slow. In the long term, when you look back, it's all okay.
01:24:08
Speaker
True, true, true. So true. oh What is the scale today of Sunstone? How many cities, how many students, what is your ARR? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So year 2025, we'll be, uh, 14 cities and we will be almost in 27, 27 colleges, 27 28 colleges where will be. Uh, are already 25, so we have add another two, two, three more.
01:24:31
Speaker
colleges twenty seven or twenty eight colleges there we will be we are already twenty five so we have to add another two three more and terms of my gross in terms of number of students we will be closer to 20,000 we already have 15 or thousand we'll be adding around 5,000 more so again even if you now see the numbers I'm not that we will do 25, 50, 15, 15, 15, it's showing that you will make it's not a small it's not a very small business anyways so 15, 20, 20 in terms of gross sales banana gi butri and it's sort of small it's sort of very small business anyway
01:25:05
Speaker
panraga but b able with ji thing in terms of gro sales We will be somewhere closer to 300 crore by the end of the year. Wow. Amazing. Amazing.
01:25:16
Speaker
Okay, let me end with this question. ah Now, you are a two-time founder. If you were to do a third startup, what would you do differently? What are those lessons you've learned in these two ventures which you will ah implement in the next venture?
01:25:35
Speaker
Life is in waves. okay so you always think that I will change something this time when sort of rubber hits the ground when you don't have anything you do everything so I think the only strategy that works is approach strategy that don't die first of all the most critical thing is don't die yeah secondly there are many things that you have to oh
01:26:08
Speaker
In the beginning, let's say there is and and I'm now speaking as a third time founder. i will not tell this to the first time founder. If I am doing the first company, I'll not do this.
01:26:19
Speaker
I'll tell you why also. That I am doing the third company, I will go very slow in the beginning rather than going very fast in the beginning. And the reason is very simple. yeah Now I have a network who has trust in me. That I will it.
01:26:38
Speaker
When you're doing your first startup, then nobody has trust in you. Your number has to speak for you. In the third startup, now I will go slow because people will have trust in me. He has the ability to scale the business.
01:26:51
Speaker
I don't have to prove it in the year one with my numbers. Whereas in my first startup, it was my numbers which were speaking. People didn't trust me. Now people know that it has made a 300 crore business, so it will scale. to calga Now I can be very very thorough in year one.
01:27:09
Speaker
And obviously I can raise slightly larger check as my first check. So I will dilute less, I will be thorough, and then maybe I will take one year, two years before pushing the pedal on growth.
01:27:22
Speaker
So always, a startup is a child. So when your baby is newly born, your most important job is to ensure that key one it should not die obviously dora the baby should not be malnutritioned because if the or years then that defect or that problem will remain for the entire lifetime So these are the few things if you have money or if you have capability to raise raise money, work on the fundamental foundationally building a strong business and then push the pedal on growth.
01:28:03
Speaker
Okay. Okay. um You know, I noticed the pattern ah for both Crownit and Sunstone. The early days, the way of acquiring customer was through discounting them.
01:28:18
Speaker
Indirectly. Yeah. In Sandstone, the pay after placement was like an indirect discounting. Same for Crownit also. Would you still use that approach to acquire customers? Do you still believe in that approach?
01:28:30
Speaker
So, um the answer to that question is a definite yes. A definite yes. Because when you... the hope When I do a third startup, I have a network who trusts in me.
01:28:47
Speaker
That network is can be of investor. That network can be of my founder friends. So it will be easy for me to raise capital. So I have an advantage in that sense.
01:28:58
Speaker
But when I'm hitting the market and going to a consumer market, consumer doesn't care about who you are. He is a third time founder and he is selling his product. really there yeah That's not how the market works. right right so aka as a As a founder, your job is to get that early adopters for you.
01:29:19
Speaker
ah ah Early adopters can also come as you can take 3-4 years and take early adopters. Early adopters can also come you can initially discount some creative way so that you get your early adopters who can experience your product.
01:29:34
Speaker
So I think personally for me, the journey of the initial 3-4 years, I need a good feedback.
01:29:46
Speaker
yeah Whether my product is working or not. It is not about discounting, it is about getting consumer to try your product and use your product and experience it.
01:29:57
Speaker
If you By whatever means, if you have consumers, if you have users who are experiencing your product and living your product, you know what to fix.
01:30:10
Speaker
So that is the reason of doing ah discounting at the early stages. Okay. Okay. Understood. ah Do you do angel investments? Yeah, we do.
01:30:22
Speaker
We do that. So what do you look at? What kind of businesses? what What is your thesis of investing? So, yeah, look, we don't understand SaaS because we are not SaaS founders.
01:30:33
Speaker
So hamme generally, we are more consumer founders. Or then if someone has done D2C in consumer, we have done something in fintech as well, do typical consumers as well.
01:30:49
Speaker
Largely on the consumer side, we have done one or two ah deep tech as well. But that again is, I would say there are more FOMO investments. Yeah, okay.
01:31:01
Speaker
But hu consumer is something that we, but ah ah we have done 12 so far. So, barra is it thus consumer i yeah what do you mean we, like you and Piyush? We, Piyush, Ankur, who is our third co-founder. So, like, we do it to you it me not ah we west together. together.
01:31:19
Speaker
So, what is your way to filter? Do you look at founder? Do you look at market size? like So, TAM and founder. Okay. TAM and founder, with love that is the hard sort of... Generally, we are more... Like TAM, if it's small, then it doesn't look at it. doesn't look at it. If TAM is the first qualifier, like a TAM is big, then we would meet the founders.
01:31:46
Speaker
There is this counter-thesis that ah founders make their own TAM. You know, like... ah ah Flipkart started as a bookseller, right?
01:31:58
Speaker
Amazon started as a bookseller. the books cut it tight times and the books selller So, I also give Sunstone for example. they um Sunstone started as an MBA company. like We were only doing MBA program.
01:32:11
Speaker
How much time so time is not that TAM is that Sunstone is operating in higher education. Higher education in India is $2,000,000 crore.
01:32:29
Speaker
That is capability to but dola corro rubbeca that that is the time now does these founders have the capability to target the time but that is where the founder of it that is where the founder fit or the founder sort of credibility or the founder capability you evaluate
01:33:01
Speaker
But TAM for me was the e-commerce in Flipkart, was not the books. If books crack, same is the thesis with Crownit as well.
01:33:17
Speaker
If deals crack, then why don't they do cabs, why don't they do food delivery, why don't they do payment, subcon and i would love it would have done everything. So and when you are starting a company, it is very critical for you to be focused.
01:33:33
Speaker
If you start Sunstone and then MBA won't be there. You have to win your first market and then expand other markets.
01:33:45
Speaker
Okay. Which also is a lesson for founders that when they are approaching an investor, they should be smart in defining the time. Like in terms of being able to define it as a large TAM that smartness needs to be there.
01:33:59
Speaker
And you have to like help investor visualize. That my TAM is such a big TAM. It's a 1,000,000,000,000. But I'm not even cracking this 1,000,000,000. And that's why I need money at the early stage. I'm going to crack this 1,000,000,000,000. I'm going to crack this 1,000,000,000,000. And I'm going to crack this 1,000,000,000. And then I'm going to prove it.
01:34:21
Speaker
I also have 5,000 crore market. will give you a example of Sunstone. When we started in Sunstone, there was 2,000 crore time. We broke this. You can take market from 10,000,000,000,000 and 2,000,000,000. You can take the rest the country and then 3,000,000. mr butla cup perwala markettatado dola cana liketa do it daslaka ume ea pakistani sheha aadowa t jeher but Bombay, Delhi NCR, Indor and Banlore.
01:34:44
Speaker
You have a
01:34:54
Speaker
Delhi NCR also will be further pocketed Greater Noida. Now at one point in time we had 40% market share of Greater Noida NBA. Now if that is possible,
01:35:06
Speaker
Then, a venture company. Because if you don't make a a playbook. Then you will say that I will generate 10 crore revenue, and I will spend 50,000,000,000 rupees to go house.
01:35:28
Speaker
And then you will grow 20-30% every year. But if you're saying that I want to build a 10,000 crore revenue company, then you have to tell me what are your playbooks. How will that happen?
01:35:40
Speaker
Right. Okay. what What is the way for a founder to signal to investors about his credibility to execute? How can a founder show to an investor that I can execute?
01:35:53
Speaker
yeahtowe Of course, serial founders but like you are a serial founder second time around. already There was proof already. But if you are not a serial founder, if you are a first time founder, then? It depends on what stage you are. If you are in an angel or seed stage be versus up series stage. If you are in an angel or series stage, what matters is that you have your market and product category. How much you understand.
01:36:21
Speaker
If you understand your market, key let's say, Samson, I don't have a TG in MBA. I'm to Greater Nevada College, call back but Delhi is not my TG.
01:36:32
Speaker
Because Delhi doesn't buy 3,000,000,000, Delhi doesn't buy a 6,000,000,000, I don't have a here and here. This is how I'm going to execute.
01:36:44
Speaker
So, at the early stage when you're building a venture business, you have to be razor sharp focused. your a lot of your execution will come from your hypothesis and your thesis.
01:36:57
Speaker
If you have a razor sharp thesis then execution of that thesis is not supremely difficult. It is very difficult but it is not something which is impossible. but But if you think in your mind that I will do 25 things then irrespective how good you can it the execution you can do If you think that you have to do
01:37:20
Speaker
Now, you can execute them again. So this articulation of your clear focus and some on-ground execution sign.
01:37:32
Speaker
It's not just made in the book, but on-ground execution is not anything. So both the things are very very critical. yeah theyrefore my ye canna a also greatertanoday manyretan nor I in a from Gazebaz region which was my target pool. There is so much. At the early stage.
01:38:00
Speaker
good Okay, okay, okay. And at series A, what? Series A k time pay because have been running something until you have been running 1-1,5-2 years. At that point in time, your product delivery, your customer satisfaction, your NPS and ki aka operations miss scalability What happens? When we are in the early stage, it is how it should be.
01:38:29
Speaker
We are doing everything from hands. We do things which are unscalable. But from seed to series A, you have to put processes which are scalable.
01:38:42
Speaker
At least, if you have one college, it go on five colleges. Because when you are doing something at the seed stage, so as a founder you are doing it.
01:38:56
Speaker
You are physically present. present You can physically do things. You up you are the process at the seed stage.
01:39:07
Speaker
series a A you have to take a back seat and the process has to run the process. You should use this. The person who is talking about the pamphlet, he is not passionate.
01:39:19
Speaker
but abne bomb may be called yeah da up goga campaign gi the goga top q ah template played we could but we go to um koihakne ko li the um mi ofniva keja up but um a pamlet barterop to she that ke out some harnessance samju to say this could be something how to yeah you should use this <unk> banda pe butra won nahi out napa So then you have to solve it as a process.
01:39:45
Speaker
So they come to the series, they come to the series, at a very small scale, do but the process should be taking over. say that when the After 3 months, placenta immunity takes over. the process whenjada the min So that's it.
01:40:08
Speaker
the process should take over. One last question i want to slip
AI's Role in Business Efficiency
01:40:12
Speaker
in. ah Something I'm asking all founders I'm meeting these days. Are AI agents replacing people resources in companies?
01:40:22
Speaker
Yeah, they are. Give me some examples. They should. so map book with that i just luca costfi but com with hejaham lead qualification guide we get like las and lacks of lead peaceless al would be slightly nineteen um logo caro be slack lead with a qualified con see actually eligible hair relevant hair shahel me programed tryme mepa college class twelve is sixty percent i had andia yes arera need qualification panel manual quality
01:40:54
Speaker
Now part of these lead qualification is now done by automated AI calling. Gradually over a period of next one year, all of these lead qualification will be done by automated AI calling.
01:41:06
Speaker
Take care. Secondly, when my child made my CV, one of the faculty used to check and verify that English is good, everything is good, everything written in this CV. 100% of that CV or is being automated to AI.
01:41:22
Speaker
Not a single faculty is checking any CV now. yeah Even making the CV would be AI, right? Making the CV is also AI now. The student gives me a link to write this, and the student goes ahead and says this is okay. The CV is ready. In fact, now we are creating multiple CVs. Job description is made by the CV.
01:41:43
Speaker
Secondly, there is lot of content that we create for
01:41:54
Speaker
that ah recruiters sea schedule a kick out sco is relevantle de cri but
01:42:01
Speaker
secondly the thirdly there is lot of content that we create for our students So, if we are BBA, BBA will study some 30 classes in one semester, in one subject. Total 6 subjects will study. So, we will study 180 classes for one BBA. Now, we create a class for one class, which is a teacher's notes, a repeat, a assignment, a class, and class.
01:42:31
Speaker
So for 180 classes, there will be like 1000 odd assets. Similarly, for 5 programs, so we end up creating like a lakh plus asset every semester for students.
01:42:43
Speaker
Now we are working on automating all of this. Now we are working on SLMs. So this doesn't work on LLM. If you say general chat GPT or cloud that you will make a curriculum that doesn't work.
01:42:57
Speaker
So what we are saying is that let's say university university has 5 books and 4 reference materials. So books and reference materials we have to take SLM to study and you can study and make content. And then the content team was created.
01:43:16
Speaker
They have become a content verification team now. So they verify the content. If there are some changes, they do those changes or they add AI to do those changes. And that content is sort of rolled out to students.
01:43:30
Speaker
and This includes ah text or also video or like what all? We are working on Until now, there are PPT or not and notes. Case studies, PPTs. yeah Videos is something that we will take next.
01:43:45
Speaker
ah PDF, PPT, case studies, all of those things.
01:43:51
Speaker
Thank you so much for your time, Ashish. Super fun chat.