Z47 Moments

Zero to Infinity, by Z47, is a podcast series dedicated to the founders, startups, and all within the ecosystem through candid conversations on what we think it really takes to survive in this wild startup world. In a world where we are endlessly engulfed with information in all its forms and sizes, this is our attempt to create, curate, and bring to you the insights and reflections that we have had the luxury of having learned the hard way through all the years spent in truly understanding what it takes to build and nurture a startup from ground zero.

Z47 Moments is a business podcast hosted by Z47, with 271 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Z47 hosts Z47 Moments, a business show with 271 episodes published.

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  Episode #265

  265: From a Small Town in Assam to India's First AI IPO | Srikanth Velamakanni, Fractal

  Oct 1, 202640 min

  Srikanth Velamakanni built an AI company before most people knew the A in AI. In 2000, long before ChatGPT, he and five co-founders started Fractal Analytics with a simple bet: that math could predict human behaviour and help companies make better decisions. The market wasn't ready. HDFC took 18 months to convince. Citibank made them prove themselves against 100 in-house PhDs. They won on accuracy, stayed profitable, and 26 years later Fractal became India's first AI company to go public. In this episode of Unstarted, Srikanth sits down with Avnish to talk about the story behind the story. Growing up middle class in a small oil town in Assam. Why he never thought he was founder material, and the Narayana Murthy lecture that changed his mind. If you are building, or still unstarted, this one is full of hard-won lessons on conviction, timing, co-founders, and staying relevant across 26 years of technological change. Chapers 0:00 Intro 1:15 From a small town in Assam to Fractal 2:47 Math plus human behaviour: an AI company before AI 3:34 "I never thought I would be an entrepreneur" 5:01 The Narayana Murthy moment 5:54 Not money: building a 100 year company 6:57 Conviction vs market readiness 9:32 When the market is not ready (ICICI, HDFC) 10:27 The Citibank bake-off against 100 PhDs 12:00 Compounding your core passion 15:44 The two co-founder types you actually need 18:39 Finding your ICP without chasing noise 19:16 26 years of AI, from regression to transformers 23:08 Strategy is what you refuse to do 26:24 Elected CEO, then asked to leave in 6 months 28:02 Defining the company's values after crisis 29:19 Raising money and investor expectations 31:34 Will AI make Fractal obsolete? 33:58 Why Fractal was built in Mumbai 36:30 Advice: build what OpenAI cannot kill

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  Episode #264

  264: From a village to building a profitable business in 3 months | Amit Lakhotoia | Founder, Park+

  Sep 24, 202631 min

  Amit Lakhotia moved from a village in Churu, Rajasthan to Delhi at 10, speaking Marwari and barely any Hindi. Twenty people shared three rooms. His father couldn't afford the school fees, so he made a bet with the principal: if his son didn't come first within a year, throw him out. That year Amit scored 19 out of 20 in Maths and Hindi, and 1 out of 20 in English. His tuition was waived from class four through twelve. He went on to NSIT and IIM Ahmedabad, helped scale MakeMyTrip, Paytm and Tokopedia, built a taxi business that was four times Ola's size before shutting it down, and then founded Park+ — which raised its first cheque two months before COVID shut down every mall and office in the country. In this episode of Unstarted, Amit talks to Avnish Bajaj about when to walk away from a working business, the vitamin versus painkiller test for choosing what to build, why he picked parking as the wedge into the car ownership market, how access control emerged from the worst possible timing, and why brand and revenue aren't a trade-off if you think creatively. Unstarted is a series for founders, by founders, with questions crowdsourced from the audience. Guest: Amit Lakhotia, Founder & CEO, Park+ Host: Avnish Bajaj, Founder & Managing Director, Z47 Chapters 0:00 Intro: the founder who gets away with scolding me 1:14 Churu to Delhi, and 20 people in three rooms 2:09 Arriving at school with no English 3:04 The bet his father made with the principal 5:01 How he survived that first year 5:47 19 out of 20 in Maths. 1 out of 20 in English. 7:21 NSIT, IIM-A, and where the confidence came from 9:20 Sitting in his father's shop and deciding to drop out 10:12 Turning around the IIM-A souvenir store 12:15 GetMeCab: profitable in month three 13:42 Why he walked away from a business 4x Ola's size 14:50 Q: I want to start a business. How? 17:57 Vitamins vs painkillers 18:38 The two ideas he shortlisted, and why parking won 21:24 Q: How do you measure progress during a pivot? 21:36 Two months in, COVID arrives 22:52 Turning a pandemic into the access control business 24:38 The metric that mattered: client acceptance 25:35 Revenue vs brand, and getting signage for free 27:43 Closing: build the network, and give before you take

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  Episode #262

  262: He Saved ₹50 Lakh in College - Then Sold His Startup at 25 | Aman Goel, Grey Labs AI

  Sep 10, 202651 min

  Aman Goel, founder of Greylabs.ai , joins Avnish on Unstarted for one of the most relatable founder journeys yet — a middle-class kid from Kanpur who was hustling for money from his first year of college and never stopped. Aman is refreshingly honest that his motivation was simply to make money. He earned his first ₹4,000 solving JEE papers, built a content-writing business with his now-wife and co-founder Harshita, and had saved close to ₹50 lakh before he even graduated. He went on to build Cogno AI - an AI chatbot and voice company for banks - in 2017, before generative AI existed, bootstrapped it to a million-dollar revenue run rate, and sold it to Exotel at 25. Now with Greylabs.ai , he's building voice AI for India's banks and financial institutions. In this episode he breaks down finding customers in an industry you have no network in, the "student not salesperson" playbook that got him into SBI and HDFC, why he and Harshita split the company cleanly into "she builds, I sell," how to part ways with a co-founder without a fight, picking a razor-sharp ICP, and why in a world of weekly AI launches trust is still the only thing that sells. Chapters 00:00 Intro — a genuinely relatable founder story 01:00 Growing up middle-class in Kanpur 02:50 "My motivation was money" — where ambition came from 04:00 The internet, Silicon Valley, and deciding not to settle in the US 05:50 Earning in college: ₹4,000 to ₹50 lakh before graduating 08:20 How to create your own opportunity in college 11:50 Starting Cogno AI — and the RED vs REL framework 15:40 Building AI in 2017, before ChatGPT 17:20 Getting into banks: the "student, not salesperson" playbook 21:40 Negotiating with SBI as two 20-year-olds 24:40 The first customer, and the referrals that followed 25:30 The co-founder exit: quick decision, generous separation 27:20 Harshita joins: "she builds, I sell" 30:40 The exit to Exotel — doubling the ask in 10 minutes 34:40 Finding the market first: why he stayed in India 37:50 Founder-market fit and picking a razor-sharp ICP 40:40 Can AI disrupt his AI business? Why trust wins 42:50 Eating your own dog food: building internal tools on Replit 44:40 AI adoption in banks — from pilots to 50 lakh calls a month 46:14 The coming pricing pressure, and how service is the moat 49:20 Closing advice: persistence is the one thing that can't be replicated

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  Episode #260

  260: Shiprocket's Saahil Goel on their IPO, PMF & Building AI for Bharat | Unstarted

  Aug 20, 202655 min

  Saahil Goel, co-founder and CEO of Shiprocket, joins us for a candid deep-dive into how a self-taught coder from Delhi built the logistics and enablement backbone powering a huge chunk of India's direct-to-consumer commerce. Sahil takes us all the way back selling his dot matrix printer on Baazee as a kid, teaching himself HTML by hacking "view source," and building websites for cash in college. Along the way he shares the hard-won lessons behind every pivot: why Indian SMEs won't pay upfront, why you should never fall in love with your product, and how obsession with the merchant's problem kept the company alive through years when every investor said the market didn't exist. We also get into co-founder dynamics and trust, what actually changed scaling from 25 to 1,500 people, why culture is the "uncodified personality" of a company set by the founder's actions, and being a "microsurgeon, not a micromanager." Finally, Saahil lays out his conviction on AI - from writing 70%+ of code with AI, to Shiprocket's in-house voice model built for India's 22 languages, to the "AI for Bharat" mission of reaching the next 58 million merchants. A rich, practical episode for anyone still unstarted. What they talk about: 1. From selling a printer on Baazee and self-taught coding to building Shiprocket into India's commerce shipping backbone 2. The real story behind the pivots KartRocket to Kraftly to Shiprocket and why you stay stubborn with the problem, not the product 3. What PMF actually feels like, plus co-founders, trust, and scaling culture from 25 to 1,500 people 4. His bet on AI: writing most of the code with AI, an in-house voice model for India's 22 languages, and the mission to reach 60M MSMEs 00:00 Intro - Saahil Goel and Shiprocket 02:30 Delhi boy, self-taught coder & selling a printer on Baazee 07:00 Business family & knowing early he'd be a founder 12:00 Meeting Gautam & the start of Bigfoot Retail Solutions 17:00 Co-founders: trust, complementary skills & full commitment 23:00 PMF is a journey, not a destination 29:00 Stubborn with the problem, not the product 35:00 CartRocket to Craftly: the pivots and hard lessons 42:00 Building Shiprocket & why B2B behaved like consumer 48:00 Scaling 25 to 1,500: culture, micro-surgery & builder mindset 55:00 Bias to action vs bias for excellence 60:00 AI at Shiprocket: 70% of code, voice for Bharat & 60M MSMEs 70:00 The IPO ahead & advice for the still-unstarted

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  Episode #259

  259: How two founders sold to a billion-dollar company with no factory | Wootz Work | Unstarted

  Aug 13, 202636 min

  Our first-ever episode with co-founders. Karan and Himanshu of WootzWork join Avnish to talk about building a hardware and manufacturing exports company out of India — and why they leaned into a market everyone told them wouldn't work. From an investment banking and Stanford GSB background (Karan) and IIT Kharagpur mechanical engineering (Himanshu), the two met at a previous company where one interviewed the other as head of engineering a one-hour conversation that ran three hours. In this episode they unpack how a single insult ("we don't talk to Indian engineers, we work with Germans") lit the fire, how they closed their first order from India with no factory of their own, and why the naysayers became their strongest signal to go ahead. What you'll learn in this episode: 1. Why starting in a market everyone doubts can be an advantage — and how to tell real naysaying from noise 2. How to win your first customer with no factory, no brand, and no track record 3. The co-founder decision that actually matters: why the answer is never "the middle" 4. How to choose a co-founder — honesty and complementary skills over everything else 5. Why customer obsession beats worrying about network or capital early on 6. Manufacturing as a system: how fragmentation held India back and how to fix it 7. Scaling global sales by hiring domain experts in their 40s–50s who are local to the market Chapters 00:00 Intro 02:00 Karan's path: banking, AirAsia India, Stanford GSB 04:30 Himanshu's path: IIT Kharagpur, ITC, and the machines 05:15 "We don't talk to Indian engineers" — the moment that lit the fire 06:30 The China vs India buying experience: what's actually broken 08:00 Why the market was ripe — and betting on exports 11:45 Customer obsession: getting the first customer in 13:15 The co-founder dynamic: why the answer is never in the middle 20:25 Turning the naysaying into conviction 22:30 The first order: won with no factory 23:12 Why the customer still needs them: engineering vs manufacturing 28:30 Managing people with 40–50 years of experience 30:30 AI and robotics in the manufacturing story 33:40 Closing: why 2.3 is the right number of co-founders

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