Blume Podcast

Blume Ventures

Welcome to The Blume Podcast, where we explore "The Power of Compounding" through insightful conversations with industry leaders. In this season, we bring you four captivating episodes featuring Peyush Bansal, Raamdeo Agrawal, Nithin Kamath, and Dinesh Agarwal.

In the first episode, Peyush Bansal, founder and CEO of Lenskart, shares his journey of building a successful eyewear company and the importance of hiring the right people. Discover how his clarity of purpose and long-term thinking shaped Lenskart's success.

Next, Raamdeo Agrawal, Chairman and Co-Founder of Motilal Oswal Financial Services, shares his investment philosophy and insights on India's growth. Gain valuable advice on building a strong brand identity and the dangers of building a startup for the wrong reasons.

In the third episode, Nithin Kamath, founder and CEO of Zerodha, reveals the secrets behind building and scaling an online brokerage firm without external capital. Learn about the power of compounding and the importance of trust in the financial industry.

Lastly, Dinesh Agarwal takes us on a journey of starting a business in India during the internet boom. Discover his thoughts on business growth, profit margins, and the significance of small and medium-sized enterprises in creating employment.

Tune in to The Blume Podcast and unlock the power of compounding with these inspiring stories and valuable insights. Stay tuned for new episodes coming soon!

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Episodes

S2 E5. Manish Sabharwal from TeamLease on the upside of being a second-time founder
27-09-2023
S2 E5. Manish Sabharwal from TeamLease on the upside of being a second-time founder
In this episode, Manish Sabharwal from TeamLease discusses the origins of the staffing company and the key traits that contributed to its success. He shares his memories of India Life and how it eventually led to the creation of TeamLease. Additionally, he talks about the differences in decision-making between the two companies and the advantages of being a second-time founder. Manish discusses the key areas that need attention for India's development. He emphasizes the need for civil service reform, as it plays a crucial role in regulatory reform and ease of doing business. The conversation also touches upon the significance of human capital for a country's growth. Manish cites India's achievements in software exports and the pharma industry as examples of successful utilization of human capital. However, he acknowledges the need for basic school education to ensure a strong foundation for the entire population. Manish discusses the concept of balancing short-term and long-term goals, drawing on the distinction between Amanat and Jagir from his Kashmiri upbringing. He explains that Amanat refers to a trusteeship, where one is expected to pass on something in better condition to the next generation, while Jagir represents personal ownership and consumption. Drawing on this analogy, Manish highlights the importance of expanding time horizons beyond immediate gains and optimizing for long-term growth, rather than focusing solely on short-term profits by emphasizing the achievements of companies like HDFC, Infosys, and TCS, which have built lasting value through decades of consistent growth and compounding. In this conversation with Karthik B. Reddy, Manish discusses why, for long-term growth, a company should adhere to certain principles. Firstly, it should differentiate between a "baby" company poised for growth and a "dwarf" company that remains small, based on a balance between short-term and long-term goals. Manish emphasizes the importance of the cap table and funding sources to secure perpetual capital for future aspirations. Additionally, he stresses the need for cognitive diversity within the team to incorporate different perspectives and skills. Lastly, Manish advises companies to avoid making detrimental decisions, such as diversification, excessive debt, or non-compliance and recommends having safeguards in place to prevent such mistakes. Check out the entire episode for lessons on building a long-lasting business.
S2 E3. Nithin Kamath of Zerodha on bootstrapping his way to build the largest online brokerage in India
30-08-2023
S2 E3. Nithin Kamath of Zerodha on bootstrapping his way to build the largest online brokerage in India
In this episode, Nithin Kamath, founder and CEO of Zerodha sat down with Karthik B. Reddy, Managing Partner at Blume Ventures, to talk about building and scaling an online brokerage firm without any external capital. Nithin's idea was to attract a small niche group of active online traders, which is how Zerodha started. The company was never meant to be a large brokerage, but rather a boutique firm to cater to these traders. Nithin's journey serves as an example of the power of compounding and his ability to inspire young entrepreneurs.He emphasizes the importance of building trust before buying a financial product, which is built through word of mouth. They have worked on building trust by answering customer queries on forums and providing market intelligence.Highlighting Zerodha's self-sustainability, Nithin argues that having growth capital could have allowed them to grow faster, but also acknowledges it still happened at the same pace nevertheless minus the pressure of raising one round after the other. Nithin discusses the importance of long-term thinking in business, contrasting with other peers who focus on short-term goals. At Zerodha, the core team has been together for at least five or six years, ensuring their understanding of the business and skill sets compound over time. This approach has kept the business together, as the top hundred members are dedicated to the company's philosophies, such as treating customers right and using success to give forward.In this season of Blume Podcast, we hosted another eminent personality in the finance space, Raamdeo Agrawal of Motilal Oswal Financial Services. Check out our last episode here - https://blume.vc/podcasts/blume-podcast/raamdeo-agrawal-podcast
S2 E1. Peyush Bansal of Lenskart talks about clarity of purpose, customer obsession and leading with culture.
02-08-2023
S2 E1. Peyush Bansal of Lenskart talks about clarity of purpose, customer obsession and leading with culture.
In this podcast, Peyush Bansal, founder and CEO of Lenskart, India's largest eyewear company talks to Karthik B. Reddy, co-founder and managing partner of Blume Ventures,  the importance of hiring the right people in building long-lasting businesses, the pathological obsession of founders to solve a particular problem, which is essential in India's small market, and balancing short-term objectives with long-term goals.  Bansal built Bagskart, Watchkart, Jewelkart, before focusing his energies on Lenskart, and the disturbing statistic where said that 75% of people in India who need specs are not them helped “focus his vision.” And as a reward for his clarity of purpose, IDG Ventures was soon on board.  Bansal was also inspired by Uniqlo’s growth in the West, where it managed to create differentiation in the same category of products. He gives the example of shoes: People no longer just want sports shoes. There’s one for walking, one for fast-paced running, and one for slow running. This trend is expected to continue in the future, with eyewear products being offered to cater to every single need of a consumer.  Bansal also emphasizes the need for long-term thinking and sustainability in the business. They discuss the success of Maruti and the importance of considering the long-term impact of their decisions. Peyush also shares his thoughts on wealth and the influence of Indian entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala, who has significantly impacted his outlook on life and career.  For more on the importance of hiring right, check out Naveen Tewari of Inmobi’s episode on X-Unicorns.  https://open.spotify.com/episode/2b0PgICcwg2DQI49zqpWayhttps://blume.vc/podcasts/blume-podcast/naveen-tewari-on-the-quest-for-a-purposeful-life-the-beauty-of-creating-versus-competing-and-building-a-culture-of-compounding-trust All episodes: https://open.spotify.com/show/227rW4Ee4ob6wRT8U7pJ8shttps://podcasts.apple.com/in/podcast/blume-podcast/id1651800944https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cub21ueWNvbnRlbnQuY29tL2QvcGxheWxpc3QvNGJiMzM3MDQtNjE1Yi00MDU0LWFhZTktYWNlNTAwZmQ0MTk3L2IxZjk3NGJiLWUxMWMtNDZlYy1hNzFkLWIwMTgwMDlkZjk1Ny8xMTViMzZlYi0yNzY0LTRiZTEtYThmYy1iMDE4MDA5ZGY5ODEvcG9kY2FzdC5yc3M
S2 E0. Karthik Reddy and Rohit Kaul talk about the Power of Compounding
02-08-2023
S2 E0. Karthik Reddy and Rohit Kaul talk about the Power of Compounding
The Blume Podcast is compounding! Our new season will feature remarkable founders who have dedicated their lives to building generational companies. The focus will be on their tales of courage, anecdotes of resilience, and the stories of compounding. Why are we doing this? Because there is an urgent need to shift the narrative away from the obsession with unicorn valuations and instead highlight the importance of building sustainable and profitable organisations. Karthik B. Reddy, co-founder and managing partner of Blume Ventures, takes us through the motivations that drive an entrepreneur to persist and ride on incremental wins only to create outsized returns in the long term. Warren Buffet attributes his wealth to living in America, fortunate genetics, and compound interest. He is known as one of the best investors and wealthiest individuals globally, with a net worth exceeding $100Bn. Interestingly, almost 98% of it accumulated after his 60th birthday. This is the Power of Compounding, the overarching theme of the current season. In the trailer, we talk about how this compounding can create institutions out of companies and why these stories need to drive upcoming founders to build for the long term. Think of it as the story of the hare versus the tortoise race. Who cares about who leads when 25% or 50% of the race is done? What matters is the end outcome. And as Buffet has shown, it's clear then which path gets you favourable results. In our last season, we covered X-Unicorns. These aren’t your blue-eyed, pedigreed, get every round systematically every year or two and rapidly scale to a Unicorn status in five-six years. They didn’t fit the traditional mould of the type of Unicorn that the media was obsessed with, yet attained long-term success. Check out all the episodes here: https://blume.vc/podcasts/blume-podcasthttps://open.spotify.com/show/227rW4Ee4ob6wRT8U7pJ8shttps://podcasts.apple.com/in/podcast/blume-podcast/id1651800944https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cub21ueWNvbnRlbnQuY29tL2QvcGxheWxpc3QvNGJiMzM3MDQtNjE1Yi00MDU0LWFhZTktYWNlNTAwZmQ0MTk3L2IxZjk3NGJiLWUxMWMtNDZlYy1hNzFkLWIwMTgwMDlkZjk1Ny8xMTViMzZlYi0yNzY0LTRiZTEtYThmYy1iMDE4MDA5ZGY5ODEvcG9kY2FzdC5yc3M