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A masterclass on building a 500 cr business | Deepak Sahni @ Healthians
251 Plays4 months ago
Deepak Sahni shares his remarkable journey of building one of the largest diagnostics companies in the preventive space. Starting his entrepreneurial journey as a teenager, Deepak has consistently dared to dream bigger with each venture over the last two decades. In this episode, he reveals the secrets behind scaling Healthians to a revenue run rate of over 500 crores and raising 80 million dollars. This conversation is nothing short of a masterclass in entrepreneurship—perfect for anyone looking to take their big leap.
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Transcript
Introduction and Startup Journey
00:00:00
Speaker
Hi, this is Deepak Sani, founder and CEO of Eldians.
00:00:15
Speaker
How do you build a startup with an annual revenue run rate of more than 500 crores? It's very simple really. You start your first business when you are still a teenager and then you keep building one business after another, each time getting more ambitious, daring to dream bigger. And just keep doing this for 20 years. Not all that simple, is it?
Building Healthians and Business Strategy
00:00:36
Speaker
Deepak Sahani, the founder of Healdians, talks about his amazing path to success and takes us through his journey of dreaming bigger, daring to solve larger problems with each venture. And he freely shares his learnings along the journey, making this episode a masterclass in entrepreneurship.
00:00:51
Speaker
Healthians today is among the largest diagnostics companies in the preventive space and has raised $80 million till date, making it the envy of its peers. Stay tuned for this amazing conversation and don't forget to subscribe to the Foundathesis podcast on any audio streaming platform.
00:01:17
Speaker
Deepak, welcome to the founder thesis podcast. I believe you started your first venture when you were just 19 years old. Tell me what led up to that. Yeah. Sure. Thanks for having me here. Great to be talking to you.
00:01:33
Speaker
Um, actually since my childhood, I've been very, very curious about things and specifically everybody would have met me at that point of time, thought that I'll be an electrical engineer. Actually, I used to play with a lot of electrical things built in.
00:01:48
Speaker
uh, my own stuff, uh, by breaking things. I created a fan of my own, uh, running and taking it back to school when I was in fifth class. So electronics is all around me. I used to, I used to do a lot of play with that. Uh, and I was also known to destroy things too.
00:02:05
Speaker
And whenever I used to build anything new in the electronics, or to try it with, I used to always call somebody and say, you plug on switch on the plug, I will not. Because I was never sure that it will work or not. And so I blasted a lot of things too at that part of time. But and that was a learning and curiosity that I never stopped and kept on learning even after blasting a few things out. Which city did you grow up in? I i was born in Delhi and bought up in Delhi only. Yeah, that's ah that's a city I spend a lot of time.
00:02:36
Speaker
And then starting from there, now obviously when when I grew up in the age, with obviously being an average child, but obviously anything which is new, anything that comes up always was the ah those of so curious about learning that.
00:02:51
Speaker
And it happened to me that probably in the age when I was in middle of eighth, ninth of my standard and all the computers brought into the schools at that point of time. And it was very new sort of a concept. I got curious. I got a 486 at home, started using it. We used to have that old brand broadband, which students used to be like 15, 20 seconds before it gets connected and stuff like that. So an early user of that with all that curiosity of internet and all that stuff.
00:03:18
Speaker
And somehow from that electrical test, they moved a lot into computers and started up. I was used to be very average till 10th. And the first talk of my life, when I passed on 10th and went to my school and I asked that, okay, I want to take maths. They said, no, at this school, probably you should not take maths. You should all look at an alternate option. So I convinced them and they kept on saying, no, no, no, it basically spoils the school results if it doesn't help that way.
00:03:47
Speaker
And I finally decided to change the school and that changed everything. I stood done ah almost i stood number one in my class in 11th and almost in top five in 12th. So that was first confidence coming in when it comes to me, I can actually do it. And what I'm a very, very average guy, a challenge came to me and I took that challenge and did that.
00:04:10
Speaker
And then post to my 12th, somewhat I was almost decided because we come from a business family. My father was into the business and know he was running into success. He was into fabric, export and import. And he was into hospitality too. So both of our business was running fine till I was intent. My elder brother was just passing out and he wanted to join that business too.
00:04:32
Speaker
But somehow in 1999, 2000, last five passing years from the school, that business, both of them got drastically impacted. Big losses, the government policies is on a little bit of things on export drawing exchange, a lot of money got stuck and all that stuff. And we had to go through a very rough phase and we could see that it's a challenging phase coming across.
00:04:53
Speaker
And it finally, it comes down to bank, loan, properties, everything getting involved, and all sort of stuff that we've seen while I was just passing out. But still, my parents wanted to because they knew I was good at computer wanting me to continue. They asked me to join a full-time course, and I probably choose to be in the computers and join a bachelors of computer application.
00:05:13
Speaker
After doing that for a one year, I realized that you probably, no, I did it from Sikkim and Ipali University. I joined in the course, and but after just after one year, I dropped out. And the reason for dropping out is I could probably see that there's a difficulty in terms of me concentrating on that and them probably working for me and arranging that particular fee while I knew I can do something which is faster. And again, the second challenge in the life came onto to my face stating that you would decide what do you want to do and take this challenge and accept it. And I simply moved that particular course on a request to ah to a correspondence course and continued my BC there, but started learning computer hardwares. And the first thing that I learned in the next five months was how to build computers, right? And the whole hardware part of it. And I ah i was good at grasping it because it's, again, a passion in those times.
00:06:07
Speaker
And at the age of 19, I started my first venture, which was basically a computer hardware venture, supplying and repairing computers. And I remember the start of the business happened at a very, very, because there was no investment. So it is hardly started like using your own stuff and then building it up from there. And it is not directly started from selling computers, but started from, I've been going and probably giving leaflets at the nearby place to the newspapers and people used to call and I get 500, 600 rupees for repairing that. And I knew that a lot of people at that point of time, even their wire is loose, they will call somebody at home and not touch the computer being a,
00:06:45
Speaker
alien to them, right? And that was an advantage. And a lot of people used to only buy computers when they have a trust on somebody. So similarly, once I started building it up, so friends, friends and family and friends of friends, they got to know it. And I started building computers for them. I used to go to a new place, bring the stuff, assemble it myself and used to sell. And it was a great margin, all sorts of and stuff.
00:07:07
Speaker
I think for that one and a half years, I sold over 100 computers to make a living for myself and give something back to the family and realize that actually i can I can look at surviving, right? ah There was in between, I was also looking at ah what I can do next and stuff like that. And ah for a stability also, I went and gave two job interviews also both got selected, both had the hardware side of it. At that point of time, there were a lot of companies in India used to offer technical support.
00:07:34
Speaker
to international people on phone, right? Both the companies selected me, yeah, BPOs and KPOs. So both the companies selected me. One was a hardware support process and one was a, I think it was an HP or some process of some printer that I don't know, but that was a backend. But finally coming back home, the parents were happy that I could probably get a job, but I told them I don't want to continue home ah building something of my own.
00:07:59
Speaker
And they agreed because they knew that this is this is something that was not anticipated and simultaneously continued in my education. So somehow just after starting that for two years, ah the computer market, a lot of computer market got crashed, crashed in a way that all these big players like HVDL and everything started building computers, giving it at a very cheaper rate and stuff like that. The margins from 20,000 a computer and came down to just 4,000 a computer. And that too in 4,000, you have to service it for the whole year, right? and That's an annual maintenance you have to offer.
00:08:30
Speaker
So it was becoming unviable completely. And I had to decide that, okay, so I will continue to do this. This will end up into losses until you have a very big business. That is a time with this. I start, I had to start something off my own again into terms of something next. And ah again, with a very limited sort of a resources, I had only four or five computers, which I used to buy back at that point of time and somewhere in the somewhat the parts. So I assembled them and reached out to four, five computers.
00:08:58
Speaker
ah On a little that I could earn, I could go back. I went to Deutsche Bank and asked them for a loan and I got a 2 lakh rupees loan from them to start something off my own. And I went into software. You had like a partnership firm or something like
Transition to Software and Healthcare Tech
00:09:14
Speaker
that. Like you had a business. Yeah. So I had a proprietorship firm that I was running at the time of computing assembling, which had a little bit of a turnover and stuff. And based out you were eligible for the loan.
00:09:25
Speaker
Yeah. So based on that, the total eligibility, they said, we cannot go you will give you more than one lakh after a lot of effort. They agreed to give me two lakhs. Right. And with that particular loan coming in, and this particular computer and my father's old office, I sent it up my first web and the software business. And because I was learning and there was a lot of curiosity on the software side now, and this this industry was also going very, very heavily. So I decided This is a roughly 2003, right? ah Yeah. ah So almost touching in the 21 years of age at that point of time. And so end of 2003, I started this. ah It was a small business started with just two people.
00:10:10
Speaker
and They kept it like that for about a one, one and a half year to understand what the industry is, where do we want to go and stuff like that. And, uh, at the same time, uh, there was new softwares coming like flash came in, which was lately bought by Adobe. It was the first animation software.
00:10:27
Speaker
And so sitting with some sort of a people and my employees, I started learning that and I became an expert in making something out there. So that became my USB because of which I started getting some sort of a business because that and software was very less used on unknown to India. And I could probably adopt it day and night. I used to work on it, learned it. And then I started creating that.
00:10:49
Speaker
And this was zoom hall with marketing websites. people who yeah It was like making website marketing it and also making small applications around it. And then lately it added on to provide a whole sort of solution around web software and all. So I continued that in Indian companies, yeah Indian clients, all Indian companies, all Indian clients and clients. Like I still remember I had a very, very big client called T series because which fortunately I got because I animated something for them and they really, really liked it.
00:11:17
Speaker
And they thought that, okay, why don't you just work for us? And it was like equivalent enough for my one year off dream project. So one project for a good for a year sort of a stuff. But then I realized that it's not enough because there's an employee salaries and other things coming in. And probably again, I had at the back of my mind to hits already in terms of stating loans may hit you back. So you can't take more loans.
00:11:41
Speaker
to grow. At the same time, business also, the industry keeps changing. And that's what's happening in the web also. At that point of time, a lot of nook and honor people are starting some sort of a web. So you had to create your USB out there. 2006, it happened to be that while doing this business, I met two doctors, both in Delhi. And they were coming largely from, they were Indians, but they came from abroad after studying and all that. And they wanted to do something in India. And that's what's my first encounter with healthcare care industry.
00:12:10
Speaker
And they discussed with me that they want to create something on the web and they want to do something special specialized there. But the problem is that the Indian system does not allow them to market themselves. So they can't do it on their own name, but I have to help them to build something and then do it. So we in a way, we joined venture and say that, okay, it will be on my name. I'll create something which is very, very common and something building out of this probably will have their name behind that.
00:12:37
Speaker
and that project took about 6-8 months but it ran very really successful and that was my entry into healthcare wherein just at the end of 2006 itself I decided that the whole business of web and everything I will just do healthcare and I will shut down everything else because it was very very competitive and I found my niche in here and the journey of growth started right from there.
00:13:02
Speaker
So that loan not paid off. The employee kept on strength, kept on going big from one office to another and office. And this was still like multiple healthcare clients or this was just with that multiple, but no no multiple healthcare clients. So once we entered in these particular doctors, the other doctors started to know. And actually what happened is one of the doctors starting go getting a lot of her doctors. dotcomms Yeah.
00:13:24
Speaker
I was creating dot coms for doctor like knee replacement India, bariatric surgery in India and all. And then the doctor, which was doing bariatric surgery, he started receiving 10, 12 inquiries a day, internationally too, or from people around India. So somehow he gave a times of interview in a times of India and it got printed that probably he's the guy who tried this and he's getting 10 to 12 inquiries, which used to be a very big thing at that point of time. And actually TUI did a report on that.
00:13:48
Speaker
So using that newspaper cutting, I was getting a lot of input or inbound interest, right? Or from a lot of healthcare people. And the business started to really, really expand from one doctor to another, to clinic, to hospitals to this. And this business kept on growing because I kept on increasing our team. and We became an expert into many technologies for healthcare. We we were the expert in content.
00:14:11
Speaker
writing for healthcare. We were expert in animation for healthcare. care We were expert in software and content management systems for healthcare. yeah And we were also like doing applications like online appointments, web nurseries, online payments. And as big as in few years, we started making hospital information systems also, which is a complete ERP for hospitals.
00:14:31
Speaker
With that kind of an expansion and the team expansion and growth, we had offices in India, I opened an office in US, I opened an office in Dubai, I opened an office in Thailand. And all these companies were actually doing only healthcare. So more than 360 hospital chains across the world is what we work with. 700 odd doctors, some thousand plus clinics.
00:14:50
Speaker
And almost doing, it was like a product to us, but it was a customized product as well because every customization have to happen. Language changes used to happen, but somewhere our expertise in back of it used to work very, very well. And we started to develop and grow this particular thing. During this journey, which is basically... Did you yeah have all these international offices?
00:15:13
Speaker
So 2006 is when I started getting into healthcare. By 2009 or 10, most of these hospital offices were established, wherein we had some sales representative locally. They were bringing these particular clients. We had five, five, seven, seven employees everywhere. I used to also travel, but it was a it was a business which is continuous continuously coming in that zone. And what kind of revenue were you doing by 2009-10?
00:15:38
Speaker
So this revenue at at a peak it touched about 16-17 crores a year ah at at one point of time. That that was a peak for that revenue. And while this journey, yeah, so headcount somewhat around 180 people in total. Wow. Okay. yeah but One more question before next. up What gave you the courage to invest in setting up offices outside India?
00:16:05
Speaker
because that is a certain amount of upfront investment yeah to lend the players, to give salary because when you hire someone, it'll take them three to six months before they start generating business for you. yeah and so Somehow, very early, in between 2006 and 2007, I understood that the healthcare and technology are two things apart.
00:16:24
Speaker
and they don't talk to each other. Somebody who knows both is basically not only required in India, but worldwide. And that gap I was starting to find. And it is not that someday I woke up and I realized that I should go abroad. It is actually connection to connection. So a lot of Indian doctors used to also service in UAE, right?
00:16:42
Speaker
And one of these guys actually went in there and joined as the head of the hospital in UAE. He said, why don't you just come over and do this? So I started one UAE and the same story happened. So other UAE hospital started coming and I had to finally put an office there. And okay ah by then any new hospital which was coming in was actually calling us because they knew that we are the only one who can probably do it.
00:17:03
Speaker
So similarly, the connections start to build in each of these cities where I could have at least one client remotely. And for using that one client, I actually opened an office there and then started to expand it one by one.
00:17:15
Speaker
i know And it was it was basically ah ah the trust and the confidence was coming in from the gap that we were finding and the niche that we have obtained for ourselves. And there was a lot of inbound inquiries that anybody probably in one point of time in India, if any hospital opens, it is not possible that they're not called us.
00:17:36
Speaker
We will be the part of the pitch and we have beaten a lot of big companies also at that point of time because the brands also got entered into in the pitch to win over them. Like the likes of McCann and all those JSW or some JW sort of ah brand agencies and all that stuff.
00:17:55
Speaker
okay Okay, so you were basically competing for marketing spend of the hospital budget, like they have a marketing budget, which they normally spend on digital presence and digital planning. So that is what you were competing for with these digital agencies.
00:18:10
Speaker
Yeah. So basically the, the sentiment that was going out is that a lot of people have started searching online for knowing which doctor, which hospital, what is the timing, what is the thing? And that is why they had to have a presence. So we were entering to give them a presence there.
00:18:27
Speaker
But they didn't knew what to be made, right? And they didn't know because if you go to a doctor at that point of time and ask him that, okay, I'm starting a neuro department and give me your content, he won't be able to give you for years. And there, there used to be a condition in this market where for years, the website does not use to go live because nobody knew how to make it live. And we were the ones who were making every three months.
00:18:50
Speaker
right? I still remember we did 40 hospitals of photos go live together in roughly around 120 days of development, right? And wrote 40 different sort of contents for 40 different hospital and specialties because we knew how to do it and we had an in-house team. So that was our photo at that part of time.
00:19:09
Speaker
While doing this and doing some work in US, another thing happened which sounded my entire base of thinking that something in the healthcare industry can be thought and built. right and That happened in 2007. When I was working with one of the US clients and there was a first medical tourism association getting formed in US by two gentlemen.
00:19:33
Speaker
And they, I was talking to them and told them, okay, you are doing something and I'm from a healthcare industry, this and that, but I went online and saw something about it. So you're trying to do something very, very big, but your website is just one page, right? So they wrote me and that type of time you have, used you should have Skype and Yahoo Messengers largely. So we had a talk on Skype and they told me on Skype that, see, we are a nonprofit organization and we can't afford because US is very expensive when it comes to building something like a software that we're talking about. So we it will take us time to build something like this.
00:20:02
Speaker
So I said to them that, what if I build the entire thing for you? Because I was looking at actually be my entry in the US. At the same time, I was getting one client. And I said, we can't pay more than $1,500 as max. And the project was very, very big. So I knew this will take my investment to that particular project for another $15,000 to $1,000 or $3,000 to build it. But I somehow agreed. And in water, what I told them is that you give me an exclusivity for this in India.
00:20:31
Speaker
Right. And at the same time, I would like to be your ah face for India, in the market when it comes to medical travel. And I bought a date, just a fluke because I didn't know how to go and will I turn up into losses or something. But that year I built everything for them. It got lost. I just want to ask something here. What you got in return was that?
00:20:55
Speaker
In India, obviously medical tourism is not outbound. It's inbound, right? nobody It was inbound, no. In India, at that time, medical tourism was a black box. There was no term called medical tourism um and nobody knew what would medical tourism be. So if I talk to somebody like you, I'm talking to you in a medical tourism, he said, are you stupid? We have cows on the road. We have hospitals like Savdarjang where we don't get admission for a normal guy. Why do you expect that international person will travel to India? That used to be the story.
00:21:23
Speaker
specifically when you talk to somebody internationally or somebody sitting in India at that point of time. So, but I could see something coming up. yeah but These guys were building something which would do outbound for us, like us customers who can't, they guys were building it. They were just building a platform to connect world on a global friend form and let them decide which country is better and who wants to travel where. So they were not having any purpose of onboarding bond. It was just a platform.
00:21:52
Speaker
And the world was connecting first time regarding this particular thing because these people could think this could be a business, right? And that is why they made it. And along with them, I thought also that India could be a very good market for that because I was into healthcare. care So I thought my association with that will give me something.
00:22:07
Speaker
And it was, it was just hard blind for me, nothing else. And I built that platform for them. The moment I built that platform for them, they told me that, okay, for next three years, you are exclusive partner in India. If anybody becomes a member to this particular association from India has to come through you and you are the one who will brought them to this particular place. So next three years, I was spending, there was no one carry but there was no membership fees. That membership fee will be paid to them, not to me.
00:22:35
Speaker
yeah utter there was no and what i was no one of What I was earning from here was on the on the on the things there was no earning very clearly. What I was earning from here was network.
00:22:46
Speaker
Right. god Or, or entry into something which is going to be very, very new, because I started to understand the global market and I started to understand working in Dubai, Thailand, and this thing that there is something that can be created very big here. Right. And I want to be the part of it becoming just because it was an intuition. Like sometimes the entrepreneurship gives you a very clear intuition that nothing happens. If I lose everything also, I want to do it. So so yeah so I've been there.
00:23:17
Speaker
You're not a cost center for a hospital, but you're also a revenue center. Absolutely. And that's what happened. Once you understand how this function for me, it changed it very clearly.
00:23:28
Speaker
So when i when I went to this particular thing for so so next three years, six months in the US, s six months in India, when I first think happened, so they were doing a one big conference for the first time. And I went to some of my clients in Indian hospital and they were just coming up and it was like beautiful hospital, big spends happening in India. And this is coming up like this and they want to do everything. So I told them that it's something like this coming in and we should present India as destination. So it was very hard for me to tell them because everybody wants to know you take my presentation.
00:23:58
Speaker
You do only me. Give me an exclusivity. My CEO will only go. I used to tell them, no, it is India as a destination. You can't promote yourself. And that is the time when I started getting sponsorship for because I had to travel also, which was a very expensive thing. And the booth is something that I bought for India for free, but all of this has to integrate. So what I told them, there was an, but I made almost 30 hospitals in three years as a member. All three years I took all the big hospitals on that platform. We had a very big booth, which you should say India as a destination and people used to visit those booths.
00:24:32
Speaker
Presentations used to run for all the hospital buildings which were coming up in India. And the CEO of those particular hospital used to give a talk or a speech there of how we are creating India. One advantage India had very clearly was that world over people knew that every place you go, any hospital you go, the doctor will be an Indian, largely, or somehow few doctors will always be Indian. And that's why India did not had much of a difficulty in proving that at least the healthcare is good. Infrastructure was a problem.
00:25:00
Speaker
But these pictures went online and they presented their new hospital
Medical Tourism and Scaling Services
00:25:04
Speaker
plans and all. So people got to start to think that India is changing. India has become really be good data infrastructure and that's where the growth started to see. So three years we made a lot of network there.
00:25:16
Speaker
And the anticipation was this network would start paying very, very soon and stuff like that. I made a good network. I was talking to marketing heads still now. Now I started to talk to the owners. They are traveling with me, they are with me and they speak to me what you're trying to do and all. But it was my turn to tell them that now you can create business out of it. And it was a very difficult difficult moment. So I came back after the third year, I decided now we'll not go to that particular conference because making someone travel from US is not possible. Where is our market?
00:25:45
Speaker
And we built some connections in Africa, in Iraq, Iran, Nigeria, Congo, Kenya, and all those places where because people were visiting from there. And I started to use those particular connections, came back to India, also started small consulting business to provide medical tourism or international value travel business as a consulting option for them to open that.
00:26:07
Speaker
And I started working with that particular hospitals to build those, uh, in transportation units. So we first time had something called international patient services within the hospital, convincing them that you will have to have a hospitality desk. You will have to have collect the patient from the hospital.
00:26:22
Speaker
put it him into some guest house and all that stuff. The whole policy and everything else was a very difficult task, but everybody was trying to understand their own bit and working with them really, really made it possible. And we started seeing there is a flow of patients coming in from nearby countries. So SAAC became one region, Africa became another region, Iraq Iran became another region, Libya become another region and stuff like that and started to flow in.
00:26:47
Speaker
you and magic a service Like this was a services business or was it a revenue share? So initially it was just a consulting service business, but the web was getting benefit out of it because the only way to reach out these patients were actually internet.
00:27:03
Speaker
right right So the internet contracts were changing now from um from a retainership sort of a contract, it changed to um basically more of commission contracts, more of success fee contracts. So then because we became so confident, we said, no, we will only charge you from what you will earn.
00:27:23
Speaker
And that's how we will go internationally. We market you and everything. You will have patience and we'll take you take the charge based on what the patient is going to be built at. Right. And that actually gave us more business at the same time and a deeper connects because till that time, what was happening is.
00:27:40
Speaker
that there were a lot of companies mushrooming in and everybody used to feel maybe the new company will give us better, right? So there was no lock-in with anyone and anybody can throw you out after one year of contract and say, boss, you have done a very beautiful website, but I've got a new designer. He's saying something. I want to try them once, right? yeah And then it's a business now.
00:28:01
Speaker
Yeah. So I started to feel that, and this gave me another edge, our other stating that boss, you will give my web services, but you want to give me business. And that is how, uh, this guy will help me. And that made me go more deeper. Do you understand more deeper? And then it became like, uh, as ah more than a service provider, we became like a partner. And then we also consolidated into work with limited clients, but do it ah do it like you are completely, completely integrated because ah the the speed of losing the accounts in this industry depends upon if the person changes in the organization or the new person brings in the new agency. So it is still then only. And I was feeling that all over and the industry was becoming competitive. So this became my USB for that one time.
00:28:46
Speaker
till 2000 from 2009 and 10, I opened my own medical travel business and I started to refer the patient through my own medical tourism website also. Right. And both of this worked parallely till 2013.
00:28:59
Speaker
And, uh, very in the chain started to happen. So 2013 somehow I reached to a level where I thought that I've made something for myself, uh, in terms of stabilize. So both, but both businesses put together should be around 20, 25 prods annually. Okay. Right. And, uh, uh, so it was, it was looking like to be stabilized, but everything was moving back to the business stuff like that. It was not like I was taking the cash out.
00:29:29
Speaker
It was treadmill and that on that treadmill. Yeah. Yeah. So it was like, keep on running, keep on running. And you will say that the moment you will stop, there'll be an issue. And, uh, uh, at that point of time, the two things happened. Number one, I started to realize that, uh, this business, if I keep scaling, scaling, scaling, there is always the sort of a risk of losing out to someone, right? And.
00:29:54
Speaker
At the same time, I started to also realize that the business that I am doing, I am thinking I'm doing good, but my time was getting spent largely in the hospitals. And when I was sitting in the hospitals talking to patients and talking to the owner and talking to patients again and seeing international patients and all, I started to realize it's a lot of pain in this business and it is not the business for good because whatever best two I could do, people will not say, I want to go back to this company because it's a good service provider. Or if, if ever I got a chance, I will come back to this hospital only. Nobody wants to come back to hospital and nobody wants to come back to a healthcare care service provider like us because they're actually already very, very,
00:30:34
Speaker
in pain in terms of their monetary thing or in terms of their family thing and in terms of spending time here. So I started to feel that pain somehow and I started to realize that while it is a good business and we are making money over it, right? It is something which is not giving me a sort of a satisfaction, right? And there are times in life when probably the money is more important to you. So you don't look at these things. But when you come to a particular stature, you started to re realize that there's much beyond money, right? And that's the first time I started learning that it's not only about what you yeah are making and what you're getting, because it was a need of the hour you created this, it's fine. But it is not giving you what you want, and you're not happy about it. So that happiness factor was completely missing out of business, and when the happiness factor is not there, then you don't feel like actually doing 100% of yours. And I started to have that feeling at that particular time.
00:31:27
Speaker
And the kick for that is also the final kick for that was came coming in because I was talking to a hospital and I was telling them that we have made these all as commodities and all that stuff. Let's do something good for a patient. Let's do something which is preventive. Let's do something where we can become before cure. And that's what why learning in US s was coming in from that we have to be more trustful, trustworthy to a patient than anything else. I did a very beautiful program of marketing for them.
00:31:54
Speaker
created everything. It was a big budget project, our one crore. And they agreed that we will do everything that you've been saying. It's an amazing project. And at the end of the day, when it was getting finalized in the board meeting, the the CEO of the hospital says, okay, we will first choose cancer screening in the neighborhood and it's going to be all about breast cancer screening and we will target 150 surgeries.
00:32:17
Speaker
So I said in my entire plan, we never talked about anything called surgeries. We have talked about screening people. They said no, but ultimately it has to have some objective. The objective and the target for the entire campaign has to be 160 surgeries.
00:32:32
Speaker
And that's where my trigger started. And I said, see, I am out of it because my plan and projection and everything is being there, but I built it for you. You carry on this particular plan, but I don't think so because it is basically going in the direction where in, rather than patient thinking that you are a very trustworthy sort of an association, they will feel like ultimately you did all to gain something out of it.
00:32:54
Speaker
And every lens that person will go there, every lens that the doctor will play on this particular person will always be finding a surgical case and not helping him come out of disease. And that's what my trigger was. And I started to think that I'm in wrong place.
00:33:10
Speaker
and 2013, one in January and one in October, I sold both my businesses and it was never to be like, I want a best of the valuation and I will go into market and all. I just found Connect and all the connects I told, I'm trying to exit this business, do I want to buy, right? And whatever best offer within that particular thing came out, I just gave it.
00:33:32
Speaker
Right. So the web and software business, which was doing all that and everything went to a company in us, which was building ah the entire ah yeah hospital information system largely. And the medical travel business went to one of my friend who used to always do medical travel as a, he can, he's a friend on a competition too. And I told him, you run it because you want to do it. And both of them paid me the money and I exited the business in 2013.
00:33:58
Speaker
Okay. wasn there but yeah next ah How it you earned from these two sales? Not much. ballpar Everything put together, I got less than five plots. Okay. I wanted to understand one thing. You know, most entrepreneurs in services businesses end up getting sucked into operations. There is some escalation from a client or there is something else. And therefore,
00:34:27
Speaker
they are unable to scale as much as you did. um how did you learn to ah How did you learn to scale? like you know but Because you kept home so looking for opportunities. Your focus was very clearly on getting business, which meant that delivery of business was something that you had managed to build some sort of a way in which delivery was not sucking you in. You were not constantly getting called for escalations and things like that. So yeah how did you build that delivery mechanism that you did not get sucked into it?
00:35:02
Speaker
ah not Sure. So when I look back and see the one thing that probably made it happen was the right sort of a team, right? So for me, always has been that ah whenever I have built the team, it is almost like a family. So most of the people worked it like it is their own business. And while it was a medical travel business, or it was the web business, most of the people that I'm talking about probably stayed with me for about seven, eight, nine years. And you want to You won't trust right now that there are still some people who are still working with me it might from that line. Right. And I brought them into this business also. And so it is people I trusted and people thought, which is their business, they continuously got what they wanted from the company. And I continuously got what I wanted from them.
00:35:52
Speaker
right? So you somehow had to ah manage that thing very well, because sometimes you feel they have been unreasonable in demanding, but they have their own ways, right? And they, they expect something much more bigger to you. So you have to give your share of the ocean to them if you want that thing to be happening out there. So one side, they had an only environment. Another side, they had a complete success and the growth coming in. And they were always given the priority over what I will take home versus what they can take home. And that built in a team which took care of most of the things. At the same time, I always believed in automating things rather than developing everything. So at one point of time, we said that 20% customization, 80% will use the product that we have.
00:36:38
Speaker
Right. Because the customization in this space was the pain and everything that we were building, we were putting time while building rather than putting time after building. And that's basically was a success formula. So if somebody comes to us, I used to make everything in three months. And that is because I knew everything, what will be a plug and play in that. So we used to give a presentation to guys and say, this is how it is. Even the best of the marketing and the CEO could not imagine that we have more tools.
00:37:03
Speaker
and more ways to tell him how he can grow the business than he could think. So he used to leave it to us and we used to build that tool, use 80% of what we have already done and 20% customized for him and then home and niche. If I decided to use it and I had a client like travel plus education, plus healthcare, plus services, plus this, plus that, I would have failed in my business because creating and doing it again and again, the same job perfectly also helped to scale.
00:37:30
Speaker
So these are few things that I realized actually helped them. If you would have asked me in 20, probably 2009, 10. ah I would have not had this answer, right? Today, when I go back, I realize that what worked, right? And it is very hard to say at that point of time that what is working for you. But I realize these are few things that actually stayed with me. And somehow, while you are a person who are developing coming out of school, drummed out, building a business, ah no formal trainings and stuff like that, you're just learning, right?
00:38:03
Speaker
And ah when you look at back to your success, you start to realize that there is, there's something that you read, right? Right. And, and you should know it because you should stick to it. Right. So when I look back, then I realize, okay, this is, this is your personality. This is your persona. A lot of people come back to you and say, no, you are a soft guy.
00:38:23
Speaker
And you should not talk to the people so softly this and that, but actually if you go back, your success is completely driven by that. So you should not change it. And that's how everybody reflects back. And I reflect back today and see it.
00:38:35
Speaker
So, I understand niche, ah like you focus and you say no to irrelevant clients, choose your clients wisely. I understand what you said in terms of automation, like have a modular approach, build things in modules and then you can pick and choose the modules to create a customized solution. On the people front,
00:38:56
Speaker
Do you have some more suggestions in terms of how did you select that person who was an asset to you? Because not every person will respond to the family environment. You know, the the family environment alone may not be the answer here. yeah so you So I would dig a little deeper there. Short, short, short. So I would probably say rather than selecting people, I built people.
00:39:19
Speaker
and And most of these times I have not selected people who were already built. I actually selected people and built them. I still remember there was one marketing guy that I hired for sales. And the day he joined, we gave him the laptop, right? And you used to have an IBM laptop. We used to have a lock in the front, right? So that guy is sad. I gave him the laptop and I said, this is what we do. And you will do the marketing and all. And he was looking here and there. And after five, seven minutes, I realized he doesn't know how to open that lock and open that laptop.
00:39:48
Speaker
yeah check okay and Right. And that guy stayed with me for 11 years. Right. The reason being because he understood that this guy knew me day one, that I don't even know the laptop and I'm coming in a web company to sell a web product or a software product. But he teased me from how this mouse is used to how to sell websites or softwares. Right. So a lot of people that continued with me were built in house.
00:40:15
Speaker
who are learning with me. And I was also learning with them, right? Sometimes I go to use to sit with them and say, how do you use this software? I want to learn it. I want to also make, and then go build something and show them next day. This is what I've done. So it was like that sort of a learning environment. But at the same time, I think the the the reason for that is when you try to make people homely, it was not like, um it was not like there is ah there is no gap between you and them, right? You try to bridge that up, but at the same time, when it is on work, it is completely professional. When it is outside work, it's a friendly environment. But at the same time, the other guy is thinking that I am actually growing with this particular person and he's giving me that particular time. And that growth probably led people to stick, right? So that is, that is more important.
00:41:06
Speaker
ah Because lot where I have seen people in coming in from a lot of toxic environments. They say this company is doing great, but the boss is really toxic or the environment is really toxic. And sometimes he's very soft and sometimes he just speaks like in the front of 10 people and make me feel like why I'm working in this company. But this is his style of working.
00:41:26
Speaker
I adopted my style of working sitting that day one, i because it is a very humble beginning and very small start. Day one, I realized that everybody is actually starting like me. And at the same time, one day he would also like to be ah what I am doing. And a lot of people took me for inspiration because I never,
00:41:43
Speaker
ah I never shied away talking to them, even if my journey in 2009, 10 stating that where I'm coming from, right? And how we started. And there used to be a loss also for that because a lot of people used to come for a smaller time user using, saying if this guy can build, I can also build. So there was an offshoot companies, right? So every person used to leave. And next day I used to hear that he's starting the similar sort of a company because he started to believe that if he can do, because he's explaining, he started from two lakh, I have four lakhs. I can also start. So this used to happen.
00:42:13
Speaker
But I was happier for them and they used to do it and come back and say, oh, we can't win because we realize that something that we need to learn more. Right. So I think that's where the crux of this lies. Was your bet on people random or was it a system to how you selected people? So you're saying you selected people who were not trained and you trained them for the role. You helped them grow into the role. The yeah way of selecting what was that?
00:42:41
Speaker
So the the way of selecting was clear. One is the, I always used to look at hunger, right? I could do it because I had an hunger. If my dad's business was running perfectly fine, I would not have been what I am today, right? I would have been maybe another spoiled kid or probably somebody who's been an average and probably working on a wealth of the parents that has given in.
00:43:02
Speaker
So I always first thing that I look in the person is that hunger and why does it, that hunger exists, right? Does he has a loan on his head? Does he has something that he wants to support his family? Does he wants to really, really prove his point to somebody? Uh, and that's basically my trigger points.
00:43:19
Speaker
Until unless I see these, probably my selection does not happen because there are a lot of people who used to come to us and say, Oh, I've done an MBA from so-and-so college. My dad has given me this. He has a very great business, but still I want to do something of my own. And next day used to say, no, no, I think I could join my dad. christmas what again yeah so it So, so that was very important because I just copied on what I learned from my own story stating that if you really have a need behind you, you get focused, you don't see things around and you get to work, right? And you know something or you don't know something is a secondary for me. But if you have that, you would probably figure out a way.
00:43:59
Speaker
And I used to always say entrepreneurship but ra for me is the entrepreneurs jump off the cliff and assemble the plane in between to land safely. our fashion yeah so That's the case. So I used to hire people on the basis of their hunger and then used to see if I can train and make them. And that's what I've done all my life. So, and, uh, and in between that, I've got people who have also also talked taught me, right?
00:44:24
Speaker
And they have some of the other good skills that I will learn them from. Right. So that worked for me. take Let's come back to 2013. So you exited, you sold what those businesses, yeah you had some money in the bank from those sales. What did you want? Yeah. Yeah.
Healthians Growth and Funding Challenges
00:44:40
Speaker
So, uh, usually when I, when I had this money in the bank, obviously when your money is churning out and everything, first I have to settle down everything, the data is greater taxes, this, that, and all sorted out everything out there. And the back of the mind mentality was very clear that.
00:44:55
Speaker
Like I have built and thought about medical travel, there's something that I can rebuild into a healthcare industry still. And I don't want to go out of the industry. And my skills still remains with me, which is a combination of a taken understanding of healthcare. care And now another trigger at the back of my mind that I don't want to get into a curative treatment business. This is something that I want to do something else. So the first thing that I did is I hired a market to research company and I told them that I need some research.
00:45:24
Speaker
And I want to work on certain things and I want to understand how does it works at the back of my mind. I said, if this is the biggest problem. ah that I could see and the patient would be feeling, and that's what is relating to me. Then the only thing that I want to do is to save people from landing into hospitals. And that became a really opposite of a purpose of what I was doing, because that is the only trigger I had at that point in time. So I just went in with that kind of a breeze. And I said, boss, I just wanted to understand why do people land into hospitals? At what age?
00:45:58
Speaker
And why do they are not prepared for why they are landing into hospitals? At the same time, if the answer for that is that they have some underlying disease because of that disease, they have to get into a hospital. So is there a way that underlying disease can be identified when at least our triggers ah could be moved and all that stuff? so That's how the basic brief is. They did some research, they came back with the first level of things. And then I realized, okay, there's something called screening of people, which we can do. And that screening can help them detect much early in life. And then detection would be the one. So I said, rather than screening, can I do something which is a tech based solution? Right. So I decided that, okay, let's do something which is tech based. Right. And at that point of time, there was
00:46:49
Speaker
a generation which was coming for Groupon, Snapdeal, and all those stuff very heavily, internationally and locally and all. So one seven day, my wife told me that there is everything for a deal deal deal, where you can go experience something, you can get something, why don't you make something like that for healthcare? I told him, I told her that, see, in the life we have made so many things for so many people, the products and everything, but we know only only one or 2% of the people were able to successfully sell the product. Right. And we had some examples like India Mart, or maybe shabby.com and all those stuff in the backend. And then some more portals working like Snapdeal and all those stuff. So it is a very less chance of anything running in on the portal side, but she insisted. So I created something called health check deals. Right.
00:47:39
Speaker
and And this was launched in the end of 2013 with the simple thing because I had a connection in the hospital. So I went to, I sent an email to everyone. You give me your packages. I want to post those packages online. People will come. You give me some discount. They will download the voucher, land into a hospital or a clinic, get a test done. And you give me the report.
00:48:01
Speaker
The idea behind that is I will connect all the reports and I will do some analytics over it. And I will just help them to say, boss, you're going on a wrong track. You need this, this, this, this space and stuff like that. And that was the first thing. So my developers, a couple of them, my designer, and some of my people shifted to this particular company. And we started to build something like this. And a health check team came in last end of 2013, right?
00:48:26
Speaker
Once we launched it, people were coming in, people were taking vouchers. When they used to go to the hospital, you say, and no, no, we don't recognize it because for intent, people were something else, backend people were something else and stuff like that. And we started to realize that ultimately people are actually coming online and people are using it because they value some discount everywhere and it's a discount sort of a market.
00:48:48
Speaker
But at the same time, the experience landing in there needs to be better and better. And sometimes because we are not a big player for them, the hospital does not takes a pain of educating everyone sitting at the counter. And that's why the experience goes bad.
00:49:02
Speaker
and like The combers are not redeemed. The are not redeemed and stuff like that. While I was doing that, it is somewhat in February and March of 2014 when I was meeting with people, talking to my friends, doctors and everything else. and and and And within those talks, it very clearly came out with all those research coming in by that time also.
00:49:23
Speaker
Uh, it k can be clearly came out that probably when it comes to healthcare, sometimes the name deal does not help. Right. And.
00:49:35
Speaker
And it is not giving any purpose to anyone. They were just saying that actually I'm coming to you because you give something more cheaper. But who's looking at cheaper solutions when it comes to their own health, right? Somebody who could not afford it, right? And at the same time, still, if somebody could not afford, they find the cheap solution. But at the back of the mind, they find that, oh, if have I taken on something which is really, really discounted? And that is why they're not serviced well in the hospitals.
00:50:01
Speaker
So that month we went back to the drawing board and said, no, this won't work. We have to probably do something else and we can't use this particular name. And we moved to say that rather than this, we would now move and take away all the hospitals and we'll only do diagnostics.
00:50:17
Speaker
and the labs, the smaller, bigger labs and everything else in that aggregation model. And the purpose to go through my consultant and everything start to believe in terms of they're saying, okay, you want to you want to help people not land into hospitals. This is what you want to do. And basically you want people to be healthy. And that is where healthy Indians came together and the healthians got formed.
00:50:39
Speaker
And out of 300, 400 names, we searched at that point of time. This came out to be a very, very startling name to us stating that this basically defines what we mean to say. So there are sim civilians, they're Americans, there are people who are healthy and they're healthy Indians, which are called healthy ends. And that's where the name got born in April of 2014. And we said on 7th April, 2014, we will launch this new name with a new website, which was called World has Health Day.
00:51:06
Speaker
And that's where the first time Helgians came to light. And so this was the start of how we thought it. But at the same time, it was still that there was a different sort of a lab. People will come onto the platform and people will probably search and people will go to a particular lab or the lab will come to them. And probably the reports will come to us because we at the end of the day wanted to be a tech enabled platform so that we can use these reports and give solutions around that.
00:51:35
Speaker
So we continued like that like ah discovery, like a justile or not largely discovery platform and where you can, you can actually make the payment offline, but you can actually book online stuff like that.
00:51:49
Speaker
So we continued with that and ah started to get business also and started to get business to the different sort of a labs as well. And so there was a lab in Mumbai, which was probably the third fourth largest chain in India. And we were giving them sort of a hundred, 200 orders a day also at some point of time and by end of 2014. But they were the similar problem came in that they were also collecting only 55% of that.
00:52:13
Speaker
right And I had to actually, when I was looking at it, I was saying, I'm spending the money. and The guys are also coming in, but I could only retain in this sort of a people. Why is this happening? And also I flew and met the CEO of the company. And when I spoke to him, he said, see,
00:52:29
Speaker
I have so many years of experience in this space, but logistic is a problem for me, right? Because I don't go, the other guy goes and sometimes he just does not listen and does not reaches on time and does not does it properly. So because it is not own testing, we can do anytime, but logistic is always a problem. And your problem is that you give me our lead and I have to go and collect and that's the issue.
00:52:52
Speaker
So I realize that the fourth largest person in the entire industry has logistic as an issue. Then it is, it is not going to serve a purpose because people will write feedbacks on our website for somebody who's not been able to do and that's their service.
00:53:06
Speaker
And that's where we wanted to do our first prevent because this is the time when I started to think that should I continue this model or should I close down? And it was like the, some of my hard money money money was continuously going in a good slow here because the development was happening. People were on CDL and this and that and everything. And I started to realize that we were making a revenue.
00:53:28
Speaker
Yeah, we were making revenue, but that revenue was not sufficed enough to take off salaries and everything else. obviously And I was losing every month. I was putting money every month. So I created my mindset and said, okay, let's do one thing. I will just try this for another three months and put this, my lacks into it. If doesn't work, then probably I have to think something else.
00:53:48
Speaker
and and And we started to work on something different this time. And this particular visit of mine gave me a lot of education in terms of, and while I was in flight all two hours, three hours, I was just thinking, thinking, thinking. I realized that people, you have done technology, you have done services in terms of providing web application technology services, would say but you have never done healthcare care services in your sense. You have never been a service guy, right?
00:54:18
Speaker
And this is the time now you want to think that you want to get into services or you want to remain in technology. And if you remain in technology, this is going to not work for you. So you better find out something else or you service it yourself. And that too over made me somehow give me a confidence of saying that it's logistic is the guy, well logistic is the issue in this industry. I have to get myself into service. And that's the first time healthy has decided that it will become an end-to-end diagnostic business than being an aggregator or a tech business.
00:54:47
Speaker
And that was our first pivot. I did that ship in February from immediately 20 cities of service. I came down to only one, which is going well from so many orders, we came down to zero. And we started to build our thing where we hired our own flavors. We said, we will collect the sample and we'll take this sample. For for people who don't know flavor is the flavor of is who comes in, connects your blood, who can draw blood for that.
00:55:14
Speaker
Yeah. So he's, he's a sample collector and he's a trained guy and he comes at home and collects the sample. We saw that anyways, people are ordering for it and we were giving it to somebody else. And that way I was not able to pick. So let me pick myself and then decide who will test. And then lately I will also decide where to test, but let's solve one problem first.
00:55:33
Speaker
And that's the whole idea of using tech, using healthcare and again, going into an automated process so that you don't have to build again, vent in there. It took six months for us to crack down entire phlebotomy or entire collection ah processes.
00:55:49
Speaker
including building the back for them, including how they will look, how they will go, how they will speak, how the tech will work and stuff like that. And good eight months is probably day and night of work to just sort this piece out. But the initial route shoots are very, very clear because my guy was going, so I was confident. I was like almost with him on phone. Have you reached? Okay. Have you paid? So, you know, every service is like, okay.
00:56:12
Speaker
And at the same time, the consumer at the other end has never expected that this kind of a service can happen because healthcare always thought that patients need that. Right. And then never been treated as a customer, but they're always been treated as patients. And that is the change that I wanted to bring because that actually led me to come in from, uh, coming out of that particular industry, like treat them as to be somebody who's a customer and you need them and then they need you. And that's when the service angle started to build in and people started to appreciate about this guy who's coming in and we were evolving. We were just giving him a lot of training.
00:56:48
Speaker
We used to give him a grooming kits. This is how you should look. This is how you should smell. This is how you should open your shoes. When you get inside your socks would be new stuff like that because every small integral details actually was about making that person feel that this guy is never been experienced like that earlier. yeah And behind that there was a tech to probably build it and know that this guy is going home. So first we sorted that puzzle. Once that puzzle was sorted. One or two questions here on how you sorted that puzzle. ah Did you hire them on payroll or was it per pick up? ah Every time we hired till now on payroll. And okay while um while I have a largest team in India, we bought this in sample collectors today and they're all on payroll.
00:57:31
Speaker
Okay. But isn't this a industry where there is a concentration? Most, most of the times I get a test done. It needs to be done in the morning because you have like some fasting that you do overnight. Absolutely. So I'm sure morning would be like super peak and then rest of the day there wouldn't be much work for them. Yeah. Yeah. So absolutely. So this industry works from 6am to 1pm sort of a stuff and we used to repurpose them after 1pm and that part of time.
00:58:00
Speaker
So they, they used to be at a client's house or a customer's house by 6am. The first pickups used to start and usually by 10, 30, most of the pickups used to end and they have to come back to the lab, deposit the sample and everything. And then we used to repurpose them after one. So they used to sit in the lab, scan samples. Some used to comment, step on the report. Some used to print the report. Some used to put it into an envelope. So all of them were repurposed after 1pm.
00:58:28
Speaker
Oh, right. good you' very interesting But I was very, very clear that I need to hire them because till that time, this industry was, I met a FLEBO who was 10 year experienced. He said, I joined at 9,000 rupees. I am still at 10,500 rupees in nine years.
00:58:43
Speaker
and and it is totally dependent upon my variability of how many samples I get. So this guy was not growing in his life and I knew most of them and I knew thousands of them for myself. So I had to probably plan their career well and that was only can be done when he's sure of that this much money is coming into his bank every month fixed. And that is why I had to hire him.
00:59:04
Speaker
And that is why he was, he was committed to going on time. That is why he was committed to deliver what I wanted to deliver. And, uh, so we sorted that piece out, uh, completely in the first six, seven months. And we knew that it is coming on track and now we can do scale. Uh, you probably had to build an app for the flavors because they want to build like tracking, yeah which belongs to which they share. So this entire thing was this level, which is a human touch technology, which was an app and tools, which are like this kit, this kit was GPS enabled. This kit had a temperature control. Okay. This kit has a entire picky. Okay. Technology, which I learned from Japan.
00:59:45
Speaker
Uh, which means sorry, it is called, yeah, it is called Peki. Okay. It is used by, it is actually created by Honda, which basically means that the same task has to be repeated every time in a similar fashion without missing a step. So it is stepwise manner. It goes and stepwise manner comes back because we are opening a bag in the consumer house. There is a big possibility that we leave one thing in the consumer house in the second consumer house. We'll not be able to find it third consumer house. Something will happen.
01:00:12
Speaker
So you have to build a technology and a process where in the kit bags open, whatever has to be used first has to be kept first. Whatever has to be used last has to be recapped and it has to be developed in that particular fashion. So you don't miss anything.
01:00:26
Speaker
and and And so if he has to use a trolley kit or something that he has to pull first, that's on the top pocket. He goes from top to bottom to bottom to end of the bag and reverse packing happens. So he starts to put the bio waste in the end of the bag and then he comes back, back, back. And by the time he's at a last step, he knows everything is covered. So he doesn't miss the step. And that's how we built it.
01:00:49
Speaker
Like probably the gloves would be right on top because that's the first thing he needs. to Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Okay. Absolutely. So even, uh, even after closing the bag, the top pocket used to be the billing and everything because after collecting the sample, it used to happen that way. Right. So, uh, it is like, uh,
01:01:07
Speaker
20-30 iteration of the bag has happened before we finalize this particular thing. And we even applied for a patent and in India, getting a patent and for such thing was very, very difficult because we knew everybody will copy it in some point of time. So, but they said it's just the bag. So how can you patent it? Right. Until less, you probably and do the fabric yourself or everything else you yourself, which we were not doing. We were actually using a manifest to do that.
01:01:30
Speaker
but But we still built that and that became overnight success for us in terms of people. We do did not use to tell to people how we have built it, but people used to realize there's something which is good in about it because the service is happening the same way every time. So once that piece was sorted, we knew there is another big challenge in this phase, which is accuracy.
01:01:52
Speaker
right We are getting into industry and we are trying to do the service and we are a very newbie. And this is a credible industry of credibility and trust. And until unless you have a credibility and trust, nobody will probably come back to you. And as the as the model basically talks about, as I said, it was always on the preventive side of it. So when you are on a preventive side of it, the model was completely developed direct to consumer.
01:02:17
Speaker
which means it was actually eliminating the all the middle layers. And that eliminating middle layers means anybody who's referring, even including the doctors, somewhere were not interfering in between how the patient has decided to take a test and we've been collecting that. And we knew that this is gonna be a bigger challenge. And from from start of the model till early 2015, I faced almost 12 rejections, only on one thing. And we were trying to build a diagnostic business. We understand that.
01:02:45
Speaker
your model is okay, but you are trying to build a diagnostic business without including doctor in between is something that we don't think can be built in India. And you will probably lose the business and you will not be able to build this business. So better, we will not fund.
01:03:01
Speaker
And that kept on happening one after another, one after another. And I kept on thinking, stating that I came from that place. They are my friends. And I understand how that industry works. If I have to go back to that place, then why did in first place I came to this? And that did not let me, even after 12 rejections, to go back and think that I have to build a business with them, right? Or same business, because it was, again, then you are in an environment. And then that environment, the mistrust is too high, right? And I didn't want it to build that way.
01:03:30
Speaker
So I kept on with a lot of perseverance, up and downs, doubts in my own mind, but kept on building that. And with this green shoots of labor, going home, people deciding up and everything else, I started to build in. And I knew that probably there will be a time where people would say, okay, this is fine because you've done it. But the report when it comes to the doctor, and the doctor probably says,
01:03:54
Speaker
but classicpi This is not the report that I want to look at. Then everything was for us. Right. And that was a very, very big challenge because you need to be first assured of your own quality. So I had to create something very internally. So we internally internalize the process. We said, we need to reach to a stage where I can but really test my own family and family members.
01:04:19
Speaker
at heens lab That's the day we should say we have made it. And if I don't have that confidence, because my family member will take a decision on that diagnosis till that time, we have not done it. And while we were working with partners during that particular time, we'll take a sample. take it to a lab, that lab used to give a report in Healdian's format and Healdian's name. Nobody used to know which tab is this. But at the same time, we knew this guy at the backend is trying to make money. Sometimes he can cut corners, he can do something wrong. He will not look at quality as a parameter and my name is stuck to it. So I have to anyways build that arm also. So it took our next one year to sort that piece out of slowly knowing and understanding from zero knowledge about labs, machine and machinery in diagnostics to start to build that.
01:05:04
Speaker
And we were single good online yeah, we were still in Gurgaon and then we started to spread Delhi NCR slowly, like South Delhi first, not Delhi first, and then still this thing. But at the same time, we had only two, three, four labs in, uh, with a tie up, which is a backend lab. We were giving samples to them and they were giving reports in our name. And we knew that we have to somehow, uh,
01:05:26
Speaker
developed First, it was like a very, you can say, a partner sort of contract relationship. Then it got deeper relationship because they got dependent upon us. Then it even went to a stage where my guys started sitting in their labs to monitor it of the quality. And then it even went to a stage where my guys was running the sample in their own lab, in their lab, right? So one by one, we was taking control of their over them because we wanted to assure off and our business was increasing. So we were a majority stakeholder in a way in terms of their portion of business.
01:05:56
Speaker
But at the same time, I was still not satisfied because it is not me. It is somebody else tomorrow. We can probably go to another player, third player, or even cut corners. Or after I leave the lab, what her disease does in the entire lab, I don't know. So that's where we started to the lab would have probably given you credibility. And why I'm saying this is because the first time I used held hands. Uh, I received some update that your sample has reached Apollo and just seeing that my sample has reached Apollo gave me confidence that, because I didn't know what is healthier. This was before all the massive amount of fundraise and all, but that confidence came in because that message reached me that your sample has reached Apollo. yeah yeah So that must have helped.
01:06:42
Speaker
No. So I think but the and when you really look at what happens is when a consumer gets to know, because he could be a different consumer who had that sort of a confidence, but the consumer gets to know that I'm actually connecting Helions and the guy comes and takes a sample and finally it goes to a polo, right? So why not call a polo directly? Because maybe they we are making margin in between.
01:07:02
Speaker
anger And we knew that the moment that is being there, the call goes next to the Apollo. right So actually on your cost and your effort, you're building businesses for others. And that used to be the thing. And you are not becoming a brand. ah You are also being considered only a logistic player who will pick the sample and deliver. So we never wanted to be a logistic player. We wanted to be a diagnostic player because the purpose and the back of the mind was still the same.
Market Expansion and Competitive Strategy
01:07:26
Speaker
That we will help people to test screen and then monitor and then use our tech to improve, right? Which will in hand help them to not land into hospitals. That's where the the whole scenario was going on. And until as we do the complete cycle of the service, it was the purpose was not getting achieved, right? On a third party's dependency.
01:07:48
Speaker
So, and we knew that these labs and everybody else, the more I was getting deeper, I saw this to be much more um unorganized, much more ah deeper of what I don't know about it. And much more, you would say, ah cutting corners and in in a lot of senses, even at the bigger level or a smaller level and stuff, which relies on me that there is a big space that I could achieve and I can actually ah deliver some quality results out.
01:08:15
Speaker
and And I still remember we created online at that point of time, Kukibath accuracy. So, heldians basically used to say Kukibath accuracy. At the end of the day, I used to always internally say, if we cannot deliver accurate results, then we should not be in this business. And we could deliver, we can do some other business because this is the minimum hygiene of this business.
01:08:37
Speaker
While it is not understood for many people, because there was a lot of this thing, there used to be sync tests. There used to be people not testing most of the tests and stuff like that. And there was no transparency in the space also. Somebody is starting. So sync tests used to be a term wherein people used to take a blood sample, put it into a sink and used to give you a report. Okay. Okay. Okay.
01:09:01
Speaker
Okay. And then there was, a there was some other organized lab. There was some players who used to do that. Right. Which is like the sample did not reach the machine itself. So there was this space had a lot of transparency issue. This space has a lot of cutting corners and this page has a lot of scope for doing anything wrong. Right.
01:09:21
Speaker
So within that space, the idea was to create something which is much more transparent control in the patient's hand and the trustworthiness that comes in with it. Right. And that is why the every solution that you see today has been built for that only.
01:09:35
Speaker
Things like you giving the sample, knowing where it is going, knowing the temperature of the sample, when does it reach the lab, who's the guy coming to you, getting a report, knowing at which machine it got tested, what was the value of the machine, getting a machine data if you needed and stuff like that. But initially, today it looks like simple, but that time to convince somebody to take our report to a doctor and make a decision on it was a very difficult task.
01:09:59
Speaker
Right. So a preventive guy who has nothing, probably just testing some of the things is okay. But the guy who has to take a decision on it, he would probably think 10 times because that's a new company. So we had things like taglines like Kukibati accuracy here. At one point of time, till today we had money back guarantee on accuracy because I wanted to be sure. The moment, the day I built my own labs within one month, we launched money back guarantee on accuracy because I know that I have a best of machines. I will do everything possible to make the results accurate. And I will not cut corners even if I lose money.
01:10:32
Speaker
I can assure people. And if somebody says, now your report is wrong, I am going 100% money back. So I said, you go to any other player, compare. If there is a difference, results, you take 100% money back. When did you launch your own lab, the first lab? So the first one came in 2017 after three years. stop and By the time you had raised the round also, right? Like I think you raised about 4 million.
01:10:57
Speaker
Yeah. So I did first round came in 2015 when I was changing the model and pivoting the model. So it happened with you. We can. So you've watched definitely was the first one who break that zing soft well rejection stating that boss, I understand that the preventive healthcare in India is largely required. And if you can save lives, that's nothing better than that. And let's do it. You have me, you have my soul, you have my money.
01:11:21
Speaker
and let's build it together. And this was like hardly six hours of meeting. And he decided that I will do this. He gave you like his celebrity endorsement also in addition to money. Absolutely. Yeah. Amazing. So he said, you have me, you have my endorsement, you have my money also. um So I will be with you whichever way you want to. And he never said that why, or there has to be a contract in which you will define what I will do and what I will not do. And he was a star at that point of time. He was like, uh,
01:11:49
Speaker
It was an iconic start at that first time. right true so But he did not because he was attached to the entire fashion because he he came out of cancer and he knew early screening, early detection, how can it save lives and nothing better than that. And it's one way of giving back also. And he saw somewhat my experience and my passion. So we immediately shake hands and in a few months we could sign up the deal, the money came in.
01:12:13
Speaker
and post that we did pre-series A one year later, then we did a series A in 2016 and there has been chances in between 2017-18 wherein there was times where we were ending up with the money because we were building something continuously and looking at quality, looking at things, expansion and all other stuff. And the prices that we wanted to enter the market was very, very honest sort of a price. We didn't want to market up too high. We were almost 40-50% lesser than what the market was charging at that point of time. Reason being, we knew there's a lot of middlemen commissions that goes in. So we wanted to really eliminate that. And that is why it was not like we were making too much money and it was a profitable business in some sort of this thing.
01:12:57
Speaker
And we needed continuous money to build something which is very, very large and scale it very, very large. But otherwise, a lot of people won't afford, or the moment like the preventive test becomes expensive, people will start avoiding it, is what we knew from our research time, right? it So it it ah had had to be very clearly convenient, it had to be very clearly affordable, it had to be very clearly transparent, and it had to be very clearly reliable for them. If this is not there, then people will not take preventive tests. People will rather wait for a de disease to happen, or a symptom to happen, and then only will go back.
01:13:27
Speaker
And so that we could not leave on and could not increase those prices also. But we continuously raised. There was a time in 1718 before in between our series A and B wherein we were left with a very small, sort of a few months runway, two, three months.
01:13:42
Speaker
but But everything moved on in a right direction because we knew we are doing the things right and we at a very large stage, probably we could hit on another round. And I think post that this is like 2017, 2018 and today 23, 4, 5 years, sufficiently funded and never had to look back from there. But this is what early stage is where in your building people are just saying, will you track on to something?
01:14:05
Speaker
um Something that your build will it scale it that way into a very, very competitive sort of a market was the issues, and the questions being asked to us ah in a model, which is different than the model people have built. So by the time you raised series B, what was your ARR?
01:14:23
Speaker
By the time we raised series B, we were closer to, I think, 76 crores. Okay. And I guess that revenue itself is proof enough that this model works. like Like the initial questions you were facing about does this model work and you need to monetize through doctor but consultation. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. See for me, there's a thing that I had to learning again. It wasn't i when I told you that at time of medical travel also, there was something which was giving me very clear directions in terms of this law while there was no market that existed today. It's a $5 billion dollar market for India.
01:15:03
Speaker
Similarly, I knew that there is a space for people choosing their own test. There's a space where chronic and preventive patients will first go directly to the lab. There's a space, and even a prescription, we go directly to the lab and that is something that we can create. It was also coming in from a lot of experience that I had that this industry in terms of where the whole market is targeting was a B2B dominant industry.
01:15:29
Speaker
Right? 50 years in India, you look at any lab, the one who are more than two decades have created a large business. The one who have come in last one decades, they're not been able to really create a business which is more than a hundred hundred fifty crores. The one who have come in the last five, seven years and not been able to scale even more than 10 crores. The reason it is a large B2B space.
01:15:47
Speaker
wherein people are only dependent on prescriptions to be written by those doctors and come to them and they will that's the only channel they want to build. And that channel is actually saturating. We don't have too many doctors coming in India every year. We have a very less people writing prescriptions. We don't have people who are becoming older and symptomatic. Our population is very, very young, under 30-50%.
01:16:07
Speaker
This, all the scenarios are very, very clearly defining that if you go after a curative market, you will just beat the bushes. You will not get anything in your hand because somebody has already acquired that account and that acquired account is already integrated with them, has a much more credibility and trust. You have to do something new if you want to enter this space. And that is why I knew that is a recipe to failure.
01:16:29
Speaker
and i But then again, when the industry looks at it, any new model or fresh model has to have beer its own pains. It always will be questioned. It always will have its issues. It always will be compared. and But if you know your model is correct or you know that you can build it and you your sixth sense, your intuition is behind that.
01:16:49
Speaker
I think finally you win the game and that's where we, 2017, 18, we were able to establish the IC. This is how it is building and it is scaling much faster till today than any other player. If the industry grows at five, 10%, we grow at 50%. Right. So there's, there's a close to 500 pros now. Wow. Okay. Yeah.
01:17:12
Speaker
And tell me about that, Delhi and share to multi-city, how did you navigate that journey? When did you decide that we are now mature enough to go to second city? Yeah. So 2017 is when we thought that the model in Delhi NCR is clear. We have learned it. It's something not can be skipped. So we only launched one city, which was Mumbai first. And then after an year in 2018, we launched a city called Bangalore, right? So if you really look at from our journey from 2014, 2018, and even start of 19, it was hardly three, four cities, right? And in the last four years, we've added 210.
01:17:50
Speaker
so So, it went in like boosting scales in terms of every week, there's a city launch happening because the playbook was written. We know how to get to that particular customer. And we also never wanted to be a North-centric lab. We always wanted to be a Pan-India up player because in India today, our diagnostic is still considered to be geographical specific. The guy was strong and not in North and North, one is South and South, West is West. We wanted to break that barrier also.
01:18:14
Speaker
Somehow it was always there in mind that whatever has not been done in this space lets do everything and then create a new space for it. And that is why rather than choosing to be another city in North, we first went to West and then we went to South and then we started expanding North in everything to make that division and seeing that if we can run the business in the most competitive market and within that North market also where one player has 70% stake and he's the largest player in India.
01:18:41
Speaker
We get into a competitive competition with him and build a business which can run in Delhi and we can do it anywhere in India. But the nuances of every city would be different and we'll be able to scale that. So we sorted, created the playbook.
01:18:56
Speaker
um this copy motor code title care The target is a bit small, right? So number one now player today, that time, obviously North dominated players, Dr. Lal. And they are the largest in space. They are the largest in space. And 70% of their almost 1500 crop business, at that time it used to be 1000 crop business. 70% of that business comes from North only.
01:19:22
Speaker
Okay. So they were so well placed. And they're in a preventive or curative? They're completely the same. B2B model. That's a complete token curative model. so So they would have some sort of incentivization plan with a doctor to ah generate prescriptions for the tests.
01:19:42
Speaker
ah See, for some players who have been really, really there in that particular space, I can't comment if they had the model or the same, but obviously they had created an inroads wherein a doctor would probably say, okay, you want to get test done, go to this lab. And that is more than a recommendation, right? Is it because of, it could be because of the trust and credibility they have created over the years. It could be because of any sort of, uh, incentivization.
01:20:07
Speaker
But that's something that was working for them. And that is why being more older actually was helping in this space. New player will never be able to do that, right? but That is why the older player is growing, growing, growing. The new player was not growing in this space. And I could see it from outside, but still having said that in 2024, people still build labs and people still do B2B. And people still say that we will create a 200 provinces.
01:20:32
Speaker
Right. They could not see from the lens where I could see it from. And that is the reason I don't see any company coming over that bar. In fact, anybody who's been scaling up there and ah is not growing 1-2%. And finally they're consolidated and they're selling their businesses to large players because for me that business will not grow. Interesting. So who is competing with you in preventive like at scale? ah Redcliffe?
01:20:58
Speaker
See, I would say if you really look at at when we came in 2015 and raise our first round with you, we can almost 10 companies came. so okay By that time, the news media used to cover us as aggregator, right? right And it is said that whenever in India, somebody raises the money, 20 people started the same business. yes So people started it.
01:21:21
Speaker
And they, rather than knowing what we do, they just saw what we were named in the media. We were saved as an aggregator of labs. Everybody started aggregation. We by that time already moved to end-to-end and nobody was knowing that and we were actually building end-to-end. And that is why out of those 10 companies that came, it got closed.
01:21:43
Speaker
So some came to us to do that and some dismantled because they were not able to raise money and they had their own issues and they were not from healthcare care largely. So they could not understand how to fine tune their model too. And that is why they closed. Then the another thing over the time came in when it was 16, 17, 18 sort of a stuff, right? Wherein the players who were doing something else said, we will also want to do diagnostics.
01:22:08
Speaker
Right. So it is like pharma getting into diagnostics. If pharmacist is getting into diagnostics, it's a good business. It's a very, this thing can be done online. Same customer will buy it and stuff like that. So they came and created a lot of pressure. Finally, because they already had one leading business, they could not have another. And it's like focusing on two business and we were focused in one. So a lot of investor came to us also that you start pharmacy if they can start diagnostics.
01:22:33
Speaker
I said, sorry, it is one business that I can do and it has to be a focus business, healthcare. care It's not e-commerce. It is not something selling a t-shirt. It's like, you have to be very, very focused on to an effort. And that's where they all tried, but they could not scale. Some did well, some reached to a certain stage, but they studied. Some are still doing it, but that's not their primary business. It's always about giving something else to their existing customers. Then the new layer came in, in COVID time.
Adapting During COVID-19
01:23:00
Speaker
because the market was really what people know. COVID has diagnostics and stuff like that. And we raised our largest round. Yeah. And we also raised the largest round and we were scaling like anything. So it is like, uh, those sort of an year, if I stopped up my journey, we were hitting from 76 crore to directly 167 crore to 234 crore sort of a number. but And COVID was not the part of it, right? We were not selling COVID tests. It was our main business, protein test, which was actually growing.
01:23:29
Speaker
People tried to make money through COVID, introduced COVID and made COVID money. We never focused on COVID. We focused on our core thing because we knew it is a short-lived layer. You will win so much infrastructure. Why did you yeah grow so much during COVID years then? Like what was the reason? So one is that people were at home.
01:23:47
Speaker
And we were the largest company that can collect from home. Number one, number two, the essential test that you knew that the most risk that you play is going into a hospital or a lab this time, because it's a COVID. So for anything that you need, you needed our service. okay And another catch situation, catch 22 situation here is if my flippers also start doing COVID, then people will think that the same guy is coming, my home used to go to a COVID house.
01:24:13
Speaker
and they will not call me. So I had to specifically market them clearly that my people does not go and do COVID tests. like And that is why my routine business obviously went. People appreciated this particular service the most and the people who are still going to the labs, going to the collection centers, actually at this point of time, they shifted.
01:24:33
Speaker
to go online and they said, no, I want a person to come home. And then they never went to back to the lab after COVID because they realized this particular service is much better than I've never experienced. and I'm getting it at home. Why do I have to go out?
01:24:46
Speaker
And that is a change of behavior, which also helped to jump on that sort of a revenue. Okay. So, so I was telling that during this particular time, yeah, there's this particular time because a lot of funding was going to be made the largest round. There's another two, three companies that came in, right? And obviously it's, it's still that particular time going on. Some are still playing and figuring out ah this thing, but we always had a lower advantage.
01:25:10
Speaker
We've been, when we came into this space, we had nothing to learn from, right? But unfortunately, nobody has also innovated astronauts. So what I see going back in most of the things, because I also want to learn from people who are doing wood, but I could not go back and see anything differently happening in the space or somebody is trying to relook at it. There are two reasons. One, there are very less people who got into this space comes from a healthcare care industry.
01:25:36
Speaker
right? The one who comes from the healthcare industry goes to the B2B angle of building labs and then that B2C angle is being done by people, but they don't come with that healthcare rate. So they take it as e-commerce, put a lot of money, advertise one and then go ahead that direction.
01:25:51
Speaker
So most of it is a follow on of how do my guy goes, my website books, my package come in. I brought in 9.99 sort of a prize into this industry. Today, the whole industry says 9.99 full body checkups. The whole prevention came in there.
01:26:07
Speaker
whatever you keep on innovating from Phebose to offers to the way we service, the way we provide services and stuff like that, from Instagram ads to everything else, you would probably now see a flooded industry oh working on that direction, right? Less innovations probably. But because we did it and we were ahead of the curve, we were continuously innovating.
01:26:30
Speaker
First one to launch a smart report in this industry. First one to launch smart report version two, three, four. First one to launch. what is ah the barter but oil So smart reports is a 40 page report, which basically gets over and above your 15, 20 page whole body checkup report, but analyze everything for you. It gives you a historical track, graphical chart, analyze your data, and also gives you feedback into an a laymanage language. Your doctor will not be able to explain, or only a doctor can explain.
01:26:59
Speaker
Right. So you are very, very, we we learned that you are very, you have a lot of anxiousness. Your anxiety is high when you are given a blood test and your report is coming and anything coming in bold, probably go on Google and try to search. And it shows that you have a cancer. Right. yes So not everything is a cancer.
01:27:16
Speaker
So that anxiety is something that we want to do. kill And we created a smart board, which basically explains everything in a layman language and tell the person, this is what it is. This is what your next step is. This is what it means, how severe it is, the scoring system on everything and all.
01:27:30
Speaker
So this is like 2015, we made another version of it, then we made an AI version of it, then we made a further version of it. And people still are making in a larger labs and everything because the doctors start to going back to the market and say, why don't you bring this kind of reports? And then everybody had to follow up and see large players are figuring out the way to have these smarter reports. Some are, some have developed it, some are still doing it. But yeah had mean we again, way ahead of that particular curve.
01:27:53
Speaker
And that's at least I would say we credit, we take proud in at least doing 10 first time in industry things that never has been done in diagnostics. Starting from pre-bacoded boils wherein the people used to write till the time I entered the space from a pen on a vial.
01:28:11
Speaker
right We brought a barcode because there were 4% error in terms of exchange of people and that's a nominal this thing. right We wanted to make it a zero error of this thing, so we brought in a barcode while a tracking system, we brought in the live reports, we brought in ah temperature tracking, we brought in things like doctor consultation after the report.
01:28:32
Speaker
Right. And the whole reminding system into a free service, not just a free service, not an installation. Since day one, it was always a free service because idea again, if you go back while we developed our purpose and change our purpose and evolve it over a time, but it was always about making sure that this guy does after something about that.
01:28:51
Speaker
So the another thing that I always used to say that diagnostic industry ends at giving the report. They say, my job is done. Whatever you want to do, you do. My job is done. I said, no, this is not where it ends. It is where it starts because you've just given a report. The guy just sees the report and keeps his in his pocket on a draw does not help. He needs to know what next to be done.
01:29:10
Speaker
right? If you are in a hospital environment, that's a different story because you will then refer it to a direct doctor and say go and meet him because there's something which is there. Otherwise he'll sit at home. So our job is to explain boss. Everything is good. Just keep it like that. Let's do it in six months again.
01:29:26
Speaker
boss, this is abnormal. You're on a track. You have a family history. There's some possible issues. You should see a doctor and make sure that you take your medicines on time and we should track in every three months. So that needs to be told to the guy so that he now knows that I'm on the right track. I know how to be improved. Looking at this report, I'll do something about myself and I will delay the disease or I will actually stop the disease to happen and I will not land into that hospital.
01:29:50
Speaker
And that's why the service continued to provide that end-to-end to people. And it was included in the cost without any extra charges to these people. okay So a lot of such technology, a lot of such things kept first time in the space, which people experienced and people really valued. And that is how today we are proud to say that we have 80% plus revenue coming only from existing customers.
Customer Retention and Industry Appeal
01:30:16
Speaker
Right. So, so very high, of it very high, very high repeat ratios and never seen in this sort of an industry. And we sell preventive tests. It's not something that we are actually targeting somebody who was really ill. So he needs tests anyways.
01:30:32
Speaker
Right. And that too, that still then we have this sort of a repeat ratio is what people stick to us because they like the service and it seems to be convenient. And that's what shows and brings confidence into people, market, investors, and everybody else.
01:30:47
Speaker
ah Why do VCs like this industry? As you said, a lot of players got funded in the last two, three years. ah Very clearly because yeah because if you really look at the but all the three IPOs that happened in this space, actually all were oversubscribed. All went 3x, 4x in the years to come. And during COVID times, all were trending to the best of their 13x, 14x multiples. At the same time, India is very large.
01:31:15
Speaker
ah country and our diagnostic industry size is still one-seventh of what China's industry size is, while the population is same. At the same time, ah it is an out-of-pocket a market for a lot of people, so they have to spend their money. right so Diagnostic happens outside hospitals and not in the hospitals, and in this industry is growing, so only three players are listed.
01:31:39
Speaker
and only 10% of the market totaling to the top 5 or 10 organized players is only 10% of the market. 90% is still organized. So there's a lot to happen in this space. Plus it is a very high margin space, right? And there is also a very, very good economies of scale in this business.
01:31:57
Speaker
So unlike any other business, and which is asset heavy, like a hospital, you have a number of beds. Once all number of beds are filled, you cannot make two people sleep on the same bed. So button diagnostics, there is machines. So same lab can do two X, three X, four X volume. You just need to add few machines and few modules. You don't need anything else. And it can turn out to run 24 hours for you and economies of skills would be way, way higher. So it is a scalable business in veteran and becomes really a choice for people internationally and globally and not just in India.
01:32:27
Speaker
and Also, I think high repeat rates i you create go to one player, it's unlikely that you'll change because they have your data. So they can give you a trend analysis that in the last six months, this has changed. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And and unlike e-commerce, the more you grow, the more you need the service, right? ah So that is how it is. So the more age you are, you would probably use us more. So your are LTVs are 60, 70 years down the line and not one year to a year.
01:32:54
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Yeah. ah Tell me something. There is this initiative of a digital health records by the government. I forget what it's called. Maybe Irishman, but I don't remember the name. Yeah, ABDM. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So so in which your health records become transferable. ah So yes that then is no longer a boat for a company like Healthians. Like you might have said earlier that if you keep using us, you can see historical trends of your medical records. So it's now they can transfer out.
01:33:24
Speaker
They can, they can surely transfer out. when they spend So I think it's just still four, five years away when everything gets integrated and there's a portability, but it is actually advantageous also, right? So today, if somebody wants to move from a hospital to me, we can actually put the data to me and I can store that data. If he wants to take that data out, it is also fine.
01:33:42
Speaker
So he, this decision is not on me, it is on the patient. Whosoever he shares that particular OTP, he can transfer his data out, but there's a data in also, right? So for me also, whenever you come to get a test done for me, I'll take that particular thing from you and say, I want to do an entire report for you. And I want to, even if you have tested in five hospitals, five clinics, five labs, I want to combine all that data and give you a consolidated report.
01:34:05
Speaker
So rather than today, for about this eight, 10 million profiles, I had to work very hard to build it, to build on my algorithms. Tomorrow it becomes easier because I get the data in. So it's an advantages. So companies with good service will win because patients will prefer to migrate.
01:34:22
Speaker
ah Yeah. What is the status of this health record initiative? Like for example, are you compatible with that and how many players? Yeah. So we've very earlier, we started to integrate, we created APIs and we have already done. It's like a, it's like a process which has to get switched on whenever we want.
01:34:39
Speaker
And we are also creating ABBA IDs and stuff like that. So it can be linked to the singular health record system. And we are anyways, because we play on data, our data was anyway synchronized, standardized ah ah to anytime, probably use it in any sort of a format. um and And definitely that's the biggest asset that we are creating for future.
01:35:02
Speaker
and So the government is dictating some sort of a standardization of ah data so that it can be transparent not yet, because it not yet, not yet. They have some processes wherein you have to form, but the standardization templates has not been created yet. But there's a thing that you should definitely be anything which is offline should come online. The storage of the records has to be kept in a way so that it is transferred or it has to be, it is the right of a patient to take that and keep it somewhere else. Okay. Okay. But right now it's not.
01:35:31
Speaker
like numbers getting transferred, but it's like a paper document which can be transferred from one layer to the other. the Whoever is receiving it can parse that and turn it into numbers. Okay. so and understood And for a patient, how easy is it to like a patient? is it easy like ah so like ah that id you give your aaba id and you'll get an OTP, share that OTP and the person will be able to download it or see all the records. So probably you will have something called maybe your prescriptions, your pathology reports, your radiology reports, your scans, something like that in a category and you can probably click and download them into your own system and then you can access those records.
01:36:11
Speaker
And how does the, and so suppose I take a test from healthiest, how do you know what is my ID? Do you ask me when I pay for a test that please enter your ID or is it linked to phone number? No. So I just tell you, so ah we basically right now at the backend check, if this particular phone number has an ID, otherwise we have an API to create that ID. Okay. So wherever you will have an access first, we create your automatic ID and that same ID can then be used. So, so it is linked to a certain records and it is, that is why it is unique.
01:36:40
Speaker
Okay. So it's phone number linked also. So that way any, anywhere where you've given your phone number, you will have access eventually to that data. Okay. Okay. Understood. Understood. Yeah. I want to wrap up with a couple of but broader questions. Um, you know, you, is Handia's a services business or a tech company?
Technology-Driven Service and Employee Growth
01:37:05
Speaker
So for sure, um it is a service business. It's a business of care that we are in, right? But it is driven through the tech. It is delivered to the tech. Okay. So it's a tech enabled services business. Absolutely. So um how does that change the way? because mean say Basically, this is high tech and high touch both. So because it is healthcare, care you can't leave.
01:37:26
Speaker
How does that change how you look at the business as a founder? Because as you said, say someone like a one M.G. or one of these e-pharmacies, if they were to start a diagnostic business, they would say, we are a tech company. Whereas you are very clearly saying, I am a services company enabled by tech. So how does that change your outlook towards managing the business as a founder?
01:37:46
Speaker
Oh, no it does. Because at the same time, see it is, ah when I say the entire service basically has something in the middle of it, which is a customer innovation, right? And that is the guy who you need to keep an eye on mind whenever you're building something out. As a tech business, you basically say that you come access my platform. What happens after that is basically you need to figure out but because so I just enabled you to do something.
01:38:11
Speaker
and that it ends there. so But what India probably needed and what we wanted to build was really making a change and being a part of his health journey. And that you can't do just being a tech player. You have to have that touch base. And for us, that touch base was that until unless we had this level, we can go home and collect the sample. Or if we would have outsourced the service, we would not have built the business that we are in today.
01:38:34
Speaker
So that became a very, the human became the element of the entire digital thing that we are trying to do. And that human touch ah will not go away. ah Probably even if the AI's and everything of the world will come, the healthcare still is the one which will probably require a human touch. And that changes your whole this thing because you start treating people because you know you will have to face them, you will have to talk to them, you will have to behave humanly. And you have a different empathy empathy with them over a time.
01:39:02
Speaker
So it is very different than calling yourself to be tech, because then you take a squeeze of a lot of things. But when you are a service-enabled tech, then you use tech as to be a strength in empowering this versus your service in center code. ah How many flavors do you have on payroll today? um We have close to 2,100. Wow. So how do you scale that consistency of experience with a flabbo because from what I understand, your key service element for a customer is the flabbo experience. He decides whether a customer likes your service or not. I mean, for a customer, the service is what the flabbo is giving. so how do you Yeah, at least that's the first interaction or that's the human touch. And then post that it's an add-on of how you serve them through tech and other things, but that's the face of the company.
01:39:50
Speaker
Right. that's a okay So how you how do you scale that? You know, making sure all 2100 are representing the brand in the right way, giving that right kind of customer service, the right kind of politeness, right behavior, et cetera, because these are like very soft ah elements. how do you Absolutely. The good part is is that in our industry, ah most of these people are uh, educated, right? Because it is not that you unlike a particular rider or a driver who delivers, they get inside the home, right? And they are considered as to be one version down the doctor sometimes by the patient, right? So they have some clinical expertise they have studied and they have some sort of a, you can say an empathy, which is different than ah probably hiding somebody, uh, outside of the industry. So that advantage we already had.
01:40:43
Speaker
The second thing is what they are looking at is that a respect, right? What we are looking at is a service. So you have to give something and you have to take something. So we give them a whole sort of a career growth and path. And at the same time, a lot of training and that trainings are like not just one time training. It keeps on keeps on going till now, right? Because everything keeps on developing over and over our time.
01:41:07
Speaker
So the module that we created in initially was like one-to-one, then we digitized it, then we made it remote, then we made it like a scoring system, then we made it like a examination system, then we made it like a graduation system. So you keep on learning and you keep on building and you keep on moving ahead. And that is how the system became very, very, very standardized. But still, when Aflebo is being hired, he has been tested on his technical skills. so scoring on how much pain he's causing while collecting the sample. And first, that is a step. Second is his skills in terms of talking, in terms of how experienced he are and knows the name of the test and all where it can be trained.
01:41:49
Speaker
And if he does require standing that training and go as big as 20 days, 30 days also, right? But he has to first been technically trained then, then there is a technology training, which is like how to use an app, how to do that. So the multiple level of offline, like you have like, it's all offline. Okay. Yeah. It's like all offline. Now we do a lot of training while he is studying because we want to hire from those institutes. So there's a specific course we run at the end of that particular course for one month.
01:42:18
Speaker
So that we can train him during that and then bring him from there and know his skills and out from that particular place. But then, then so it's a continuous cycle. So one is that ah when a person comes in, you have to basically tell him very clearly why he's coming in. What's the purpose of this organization? Is it to just make sense or is it to really deliver service?
01:42:39
Speaker
And then you make a sort of a, this, this team for us isn't like an army. So if you walk, talk to them, we'll feel like they talk about like soldiers, right? They think they're always on a mission and then mission has been created for them. And that's a culture for them. Then mission during the COVID was seen that mission during Difficult times are seen that mission from 6am every day is seen, even if it is raining or it is heavy so far or anything. They know their mission is to reach the person's house and collect it, collect it in a form that it is their security in a way that's their own family member and deposit it on time so that the results can happen.
01:43:16
Speaker
Now that culture drives in their blood right now. And that's where if you have a basic team, which is set it up like this, anyone who would not adopt to it will turn out. Anyone who adopts to it gets become team and team and team. And that is why what they needed was a lot of respect. And what we needed was a larger team. So we created something for them so that they can actually become. So like I told you in the starting prop that 9,000, 10,000 today, my level, minimally makes 20 to 23,000. It's a fixed income.
01:43:44
Speaker
Over and above that, there are people who makes incentives. They're taking at least a lot of people that I know they're taking more than 70, 80 K home every month. row Okay. You will see them having a good number of bikes. They are, they have now flat LED TVs at their homes and all that stuff. So they've just, they've succeeded with it. And that is why you would probably, I would have people from last 10 years with me who've been still with us. Okay. I scheduled I was over, but can I ask you one or two more questions?
01:44:15
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, we can five, seven minutes more. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. You know, you ah we had a preliminary call and at which time you had spoken about how you built both with the scarcity of resources and with abundance of resources. Like today you are building with abundance of resources. You have more than a 50 million last fundraise. I think you've raised close to 85 billion till date.
01:44:43
Speaker
How has, you know, what is the difference between these two mindsets when you're building in a scarcity mindset and building with an abundance mindset? So I think, see, ah you always, whenever you are in any of the situation and you are an entrepreneur, you should always look at ah somewhat a scarcity mindset when you are developing and when you are at a development stage of anything, because ah you can't go extra board and you have to select your things and you have to first test your models.
Resource Management and Business Philosophy
01:45:13
Speaker
And you should know that anything behind you is in a very limited sort of a thing. Either it is your own time, either it is the money, either it is the people that you are hiring in their time and their career. So you have to always know that there's a less number of times so that you can figure out things much faster. This company is not working a bit faster. And because you have to survive, it's a survival mode kind of a situation. And that survival mode teaches you a lot of things. Your learning comes from that.
01:45:37
Speaker
right But while your learning comes from there, usually we mistake out, that's my learning in the life too, usually we mistake out when you're scaling, you always feel you are in a similar situation. And then you start to take decisions, which always about ah saving money. right And when you are scaling, saving money is not the right thing.
01:45:58
Speaker
and a lot of times. So when I see situations now and then I can give you a very small example. Probably if I was the guy who was in 2008, nine, growing my business, somebody would tell me, Deepak, you should put some firewalls in place, thickness, IT solutions, this and that will take about 50 odd lakhs, but it will make sure that everything is there. I would probably say I will take 40 lakhs home rather than spending on it. You spend 10 lakhs.
01:46:22
Speaker
right And today, if somebody tells me, I say, boss, whatever it takes, even if it takes a double of it, it has to be there. The power of decision changes, and that power shows how you can scale faster. In that situation, I would probably have the journey like this, up and down, up and down, sometimes in an issue, sometimes a security issue, sometimes close sometime now. And I will never be able to scale. The moment I will scale, I will come down.
01:46:45
Speaker
Now here, the decision-making power changes and you start to decide that the money has to be utilized in a way where the scale can come and that's where you make big companies. So with that set of a mindset, you can start, but you can't make big companies. With this sort of a mindset, you can make big companies. Okay. okay Fascinating. ah Let me end with this. What's your advice to young people who are listening to this show?
01:47:11
Speaker
My advice to a lot of young people ah probably is that there are the businesses, if you are an entrepreneur and a founder, Your job is to be always working and you should be on the field, right? What camera kind of the business with the field means you should be always in an active mode, right? It's founder's job can never be sitting in an AC cabin to build his business because a lot of us think it is like that. ah At certain point we will reach, we'll sit from our um any fascinated cafe or a coffee day or something and start building in the business from there and it works. It never happens that way.
01:47:48
Speaker
right we still We see a lot of stories online and we get inspired by it. And we got inspired by the success. Some of them told, tell them the struggles they have. Some of them does not, but every story has a certain struggle behind it. So the business of today has to be built on the field. right And then I say on the field, there are three, four more most important things that you should never miss. You should never miss spending time with your customers, even if you are 10X bigger.
01:48:15
Speaker
or your 50x bigger. You should never miss spending time with your employees because the moment you become bigger, you become inaccessible. The moment you become inaccessible, you don't know what's happening in your company and you lose the track and the people start to feel that they have a disconnect and they never connect to your same vision when you started. So you need to spend with them. You have to always spend time with your vendors too. They're the people who tell you what is your standing in the market, what other people think about you and what do Are you going on a right track on a wrong track? And what's the perception? Because within our cabins, we think we are doing great, but we are outside perceptions being told by them. So I always make sure that whatever happens or done, my my priorities always should be that I'm spending time with at least these three people the most.
01:49:02
Speaker
and why do anybody else like do you Do you go with the flavors for collection visits? and I do everything. So I write emails automatically to all my customers every Friday who have taken the test in the last four, five days. And that goes directly from my desk, wherein there is a lot of feedback and a lot of input keeps on coming in. I speak to ah them on phone.
01:49:23
Speaker
Whosoever replies there, I also call them sometimes and meet them because they have some great ideas. Like I basically call them over tea or coffee. And I also spent a lot of time with these Phlebos understanding all the things are whenever they are meeting me somewhere, there are a lot of people who have my direct WhatsApp today and they keep on telling, Sir, this market is happening. This player has come, that player has come and all that stuff that keeps on giving me a boost in terms of what's happening on the actual ground.
01:49:52
Speaker
A lot of time I do spend and I make sure that I'm spending with my employees. So from a from all the levels, right? And it is like a fixated schedule, which everybody manages it and then says that, okay, this is what the time spent informally, formally over a coffee, somewhere else, whatever it is. I do make sure that I am actually talking to them and understanding what do they feel about it. And I always check about what they, what I've been, is it still on the ground or not? Because many a time I see.
01:50:19
Speaker
I said X and the person has joined three months back. He knows why about the company because he's learned somewhere else because he went on Google. He said something. He said, this is what it says. I said, no, this is not what it says. This is what we are. And this is how we built it. So you have to track, keep a track on where the organization is going. And you have to actually bring it back to say, no, that's not our real true self. What you see online, because somebody has written it. This is the real true self.
Vendor Relationships and Future Challenges
01:50:43
Speaker
And then the vendors, again, spending time with them is the greatest education that you can get. They make and break you. they can they They spread things about you in terms of a positive manner. And they are the one ah who would probably tell you about what's your actual standing and what others are saying. So you can alter your image and perception over a time because that's what is going in the market.
01:51:06
Speaker
And they also feel that ah spending time with you means that you feel them as to be a real partners. And in times when you need them and have tested and tried it, they are the first one who would help you. And COVID was one of those times because we developed such a kind of relationship, there are tests which was not available probably globally, but there was a reagents and tests available with us because they prioritized us.
01:51:28
Speaker
And they knew what we are building and we, they knew what our purpose is and why we are serving those particular people. And they gave us those sort of reagents, which was not available anywhere in the world at that point of time. And they were just picking it from smaller labs and giving to us saying that this lab is shut. Why don't you take it from there and also, so this all shows.
01:51:47
Speaker
ah I can talk to it today because I've seen how it helps, right? When I was doing it unintentionally, I could not imagine that these are the things. When I look back, I could probably say this actually builds the business very, very stronger. And that's the best advice that would give it to people today to probably go on and spend time with all these three guys, you will be different guy and you will be building a very different business.
01:52:11
Speaker
One last question. What are the challenges in front of you today? You know, like how will this become a thousand crore business? What do you think are the challenges you need to solve? Sure. So challenges in front of us today is very clearly ah one we need to figure out.
01:52:31
Speaker
that do we stay at what we are ah providing as a service or should we expand more, which is basically at certain level, you can provide services through these flabors, which is like a tier one tier two, but there is something much beyond that. So can you, and then the flabor does not make sense because it's already a very small, MRI, these No, not the radiology thing that we are very, very clear about that. We don't want to do radiology, but I just talk about an expansion in terms of geographical expansion. First, should we go more deeper into cities where the FLEBO service might not work, but you have to change a little bit of economy, including international expansions and stuff like that. That's where the things are. And the second challenge obviously is because now a lot of people are approaching us with their prescriptions and specialty tests and everything else. Right. And luckily,
01:53:20
Speaker
Yeah. So luckily what is happening is a lot of doctors have approached us during COVID and after COVID because we always respect when they are the people who run this industry, right? And um ah we and now now they call us and say, the patient is anyways bringing your report, right? And I don't want any arrangement with you, but I want my patients to be serviced well at this city, that city, and there are a lot of inbound interest coming in there.
01:53:45
Speaker
So that relationship is betting form with them, which means probably that the model stays where in it is, or it expands into specialty testing or specialized tests, including things like cancer, genetics, and all those stuff. While we do this largely, but we still do a small portion of those specialized tests.
01:54:04
Speaker
So that menu and agreement will happen ah based on that. It's totally about learning from what the consumer is saying and the industry is saying and the inputs are coming in. And that's where we are basically feeling like there is something that is our next evolution for us. Scalability, I don't think so. There is a problem.
01:54:25
Speaker
Becoming a largest player could be a good challenge that we would like to take versus probably hitting double the number from where we are. and and to And to be the largest player, you have to cross at least four X of what we are. And I think the industry is much bigger in India for that, and it can be done.
01:54:43
Speaker
that's ah That probably could be a good challenge to take and then probably figure out that ah with the same sort of a thing, we can still grow in the same speed for the next four or five years, or will there be a lesser growth as compared to it in the times to come. And then you have to re-figure and re-strategize on where to we bring that particular word from. Amazing. Thank you so much for your time Deepak. It was a real pleasure. Thank you Akshay. Thank you. Thank you so much.
01:55:09
Speaker
And that brings us to the end of this conversation. I want to ask you for a favor now. Did you like listening to the show? I'd love to hear your feedback about it. Do you have your own startup ideas? I'd love to hear them. Do you have questions for any of the guests that you heard about in the show? I'd love to get your questions and pass them on to the guests. Write to me at adatthepodium.in. That's adatthepodium.in.