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Kadhaipoma with Sridhar Vembu is a casual fireside chat session of the event where Sridhar candidly opens up in a conversation about his life lessons and the journey of building Zoho for 25+ years hosted by Ambi Moorthy, Co-founder & CEO, GoZen.ioThis session is a part of the Annual Startup Confluence of Tamilpreneur named Grand Sangamam 2023 happened in Chennai on 17/12/2023.Tamilpreneur Club is the largest online community for Tamil-speaking entrepreneurs across the globe with over 2500+ entrepreneurs, investors, and industry experts. To know more and join the Tamilpreneur Club, click here: www.tamilpreneur.in/clubCopyright @ Tamilpreneur 2023. Any illegal reproduction of this content will result in immediate legal action.Chapters:00:00 Praveen's gratitude and a glimpse of Tamilpreneur00:51 Sridhar entering Tamilpreneur Grand Sangamam 202302:29 Introduction to Tamilpreneur & Grand Sangamam03:10 Inviting Sridhar Vembu & Ambi Moorthy to the stage05:40 Introduction to Kadhaipoma with Sridhar Vembu session06:29 Why is Sridhar focused on Rural Revival and R&D?17:00 How did Sridhar's parents shape Zoho's culture?21:48 Sridhar's thoughts on funding and life lessons being frugal29:17 How is Zoho able to retain employees over a long period?37:30 Importance of a college degree in 202340:26 Importance of mental health and Sridhar's take on spirituality48:18 How should someone find/look for a co-founder?50:13 Sridhar's thoughts on Valuation and Value Creation?51:39 How to overcome Ego in Entrepreneurship?54:17 Sridhar's day as the CEO of Zoho57:43 Sridhar's failure in his hardware startup1:01:58 How is Zoho competing with Google and Microsoft?1:05:23 Sridhar's thoughts on one of his inspirations - Lee Kuan Yew & Singapore1:10:52 How would Sridhar start if he's starting a CRM Saas in 2024?1:12:58 About Sridhar's school in Tenkasi - Kalaivani Kalvi Maiyam1:17:58 Sridhar's thoughts on Zoho Mafia1:19:37 Will Sridhar start a Zoho Fund1:21:36 Why is Sridhar wearing Veshti wherever he goes?1:25:58 Audience Q&A1:34:10 Public Petition to Sridhar to open his private blogs by Tamilpreneur and a group of entrepreneurs1:35:36 Sridhar giving personal health tips for founders1:37:12 Tamilpreneur following Zoho's PSP model and handing out the cheque1:37:43 Sridhar's final note on Tamil Culture and Language About Tamilpreneur: Tamilpreneur is a home for entrepreneurs, right from ideation to IPO Accelerator: Get traction & 6 digit revenue 30 days2025 - Blod, A health tech Startup we accelerated, got acquired by a NASDAQ listed entity.2026 - A hospitality tech startup went from ₹50k ARR to ₹1.5Cr ARR in 1 month Community: Largest and Most recommended ecosystem in TN. - 6000 Entrepreneurs part of network (4 years active) - Every 2 hours an entrepreneur joins Tamilpreneur Club - ₹12.5 Crores saved for founders via startup credits (AWS, Zoho, Mixpanel, Notion) - ₹150 Crores capital raised by founders through our introductions - 300+ Events across 10+ cities impacting 1.2 Lac people. Narrative and Distribution: Sustained and Consistent Media Momentum for Brands - 20 Million lifetime impressions across IG, LinkedIn- An awardee from our event got acquired for ₹100Cr 6 months by an NSE listed entity - A company that pitched on our demo day raised $5M from a Top Accelerator in the US - Another company that pitched got acquired by a NASDAQ listed entity- 150+ Tamil speaking founders interviewed since 2019 More about us: ⁠tamilpreneur.in⁠ Tamilpreneur Universe: ⁠https://linkthread.com/tamilpreneur

In this episode of Tamilpreneur,  Rajamanohar is joining us. Rajamanohar Somasundaram is the Founder & CEO of Aquaconnect, a full-stack aquaculture technology platform.  Around five million rural farmers and coastal communities depend on shrimp and fish aquaculture, where traditional farming practices prevent them from achieving production efficiency and disease prediction. In 2019, He was awarded '40 UNDER 40 Ecosapien' by The New Indian Express for the promotion of sustainable aquaculture practices in Asia. Aquaconnect has recently raised its Series B funding of $15 million led by Lok Capital. The complete episode can be accessed at Tamilpreneur Club.  Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1000+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho, Freshworks) worth INR 10 Lacs 30+ recorded sessions Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

In this episode of Tamilpreneur,  Arun Prakash is joining us. Arun Prakash, a graduate of a tier-2 city college in Madurai co-founded a one-of-a-kind learning platform called GUVI along with his wife Sri Devi and friend Bala Murugan. His YouTube tutorial on coding in ‘Tanglish’ had hit one million views which encouraged Prakash to start GUVI GUVI’s platform offers live classes and self-paced courses across C++, Python, Java, Big data, ML and R programming in major regional languages including Tamil. GUVI was incubated at IIT- Madras's Rural Technology Business Incubator in 2014. HCL has recently acquired a majority stake in GUVI. Both HCL and GUVI are working together to create more skilled tech professionals in India and abroad The complete episode can be accessed at Tamilpreneur Club. Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1000+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho, Freshworks) worth INR 10 Lacs 30+ recorded sessions Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

Radha Rengachari was born in Thanjavur and brought up in Chennai. She did her Bachelors in Bio Informatics from SASTRA University. She always wanted to start something on her own and never failed to try her hands in potential ideas. She had tried multiple things like being a yoga master, school teacher, radio jockey, voice over artist etc.. along with considerable years in the IT industry. She has worked in product based companies like Freshworks and Zoho as a presales engineer for a few years. She identified that customers faced struggles in finding the right product and implementing them as per their needs. That's when Radha decided to start her own company to help these people. Spikra Pvt Ltd was started in December 2018. They are currently Zoho exclusive Implementation partners with over 150+ clients and are present in 3 locations including the US. They have recently opened their 3rd office in Thanjavur and are predominantly planning to hire from the Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities. Her family has been a pillar of support. She has always decided for herself and her family stood with her in every move. That really boosted her up and pushed her off limits. Being confident is the key, says Radha. She takes up one professional course every year to learn new things and to experience them. Upskilling is very important and how you merge it with your journey matters. Radha envisions to be the growth and technology partner for startups and medium sized companies in the long run. "If you have the will, everything else will fall in place" - Radha To watch the full interview, Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1000+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Virtual Networking session. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho, Freshworks) worth INR 10 Lacs Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

Premanand Sethurajan needs no introduction if you watch YouTube and love science. Premanand is the founder of Let's Make Education Simple (LMES) Academy, which started with a YouTube channel in 2014, today has over 1.6 million subscribers and clocked a total of over 17 Crore views since its inception. Later, he went on to start multiple ventures around education and career enablement for students with Chitti App, and PickMyCareer. Chitti App is a learning platform for K-12 students that explains the curriculum-oriented syllabus in an entertaining and interesting manner with real-time stories and animations. PickMyCareer helps school students to find their dream careers. Their AI-based career assessment, personalized career report, one on one expert session will help the students to find their career interest and maps them to the field that best fits their career. To watch the full interview, Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1000+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Virtual Networking session. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho, Freshworks) worth INR 10 Lacs Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

In this episode of Tamilpreneur,  Jahabar Sadique is joining us. He is the Cofounder and CEO of Chai Kings. Chai Kings is a Chennai-based QSR retail chain Chai Kings raised $1 Mn from The Chennai Angels (TCA), Hyderabad Angels, and TiE India Angels. They target to reach 100 stores in 5 years. Chai Kings sells over 25,000 cups of tea per day, including deliveries and corporate orders. On an average, 7.5 lakh cups of various kinds of tea are sold per month through its 40 stores. To watch the full interview, Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1000+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Virtual Networking session. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho, Freshworks) worth INR 10 Lacs Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

We tend to overestimate the city life when we are in a village or rural area. We also undermine the life of people living in rural areas.  Some of the biggest entrepreneurial lessons are hidden in rural villages. It's in the simplest of things. Just like a tea kadai. Think about it. The tea kada annachi is the one gathers the information. He is the community manager. The tea kada bench is the community platform for discussing interesting stuffs that happen in any particular village. Have you had similar experiences, share it with us :) Mukkiyama, Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1100+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Virtual Networking session. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho) worth INR 10 Lacs Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

In this episode of Tamilpreneur,  Rajesh Kumar is joining us. Rajesh is the Co-Founder and CEO of Kalvium. Prior to Kalvium, he co-founded Faceprep (famously known as FACE Academy) In my honest opinion, parents and students both look for placement opportunities as a key factor before choosing a college. And in 4 years, lot of things change in the job market - whereas the college curriculum still remains the same. Bottomline : "College doesn't prepare you for the Job Market" Enter Kalvium. Kalvium is India's first liberal engineering program in Computer Science. Classroom learning while building real world applications. Guaranteed Placement at the end of 1st year in leading Global Tech Companies Well, who knows the job market better than the employers themselves. The course curriculum is designed by top CXO's of the tech industry such as Cred, Flipkart, Ola. They teach you skills that you make you industry ready today and future proof tomorrow. In addition, you graduate with three years of industry experience. Beauty right !! Lets dig deep in this interview with Rajesh. Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1000+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Virtual Networking session. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho) worth INR 10 Lacs Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

Checkout all our works here -  https://linktr.ee/tamilpreneur Kumar Vembu, CEO of GoFrugal, a digital-first company offering cloud and mobile ERP solutions to Retail, Restaurant and Distribution businesses.   He shares his thought on gap in our education system and tips for future entrepreneurs. Join Tamilpreneur Club - a family of 1000+ Tamil speaking entrepreneurs. You get Exclusive App based Digital Community. Interactions with Startup Founders. ​Startup Masterclasses in Tamil. Virtual Networking session. Discounts on Sangamam and Workshops. Startup Credits (AWS, Zoho) worth INR 10 Lacs Join Tamilpreneur Club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST

Bored of our interviews? Here we come, UNCENSORED - an unbiased discussion on everything in and around the startup ecosystem For this week, we discuss the following, Invact Metaversity Panjayathu Tiger Global - Pasithaal Puliyum Pullai Sapdum Indian Startups - Velai Illa Pattadhari - Layoffs Spree "Kaasu Ila Bha" - Slow down in VC/PE Fund Flow Funding Scenario for TN Startups "En Vazhi, Thani Vazhi" - Kunal Shah, Founder - CRED "Ini Elarume Amazon/Flipkart Aagalam" - Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) "Recession Adhiyavasiyam" - Elon Musk Internal Tech Email - Private Conversations of Elon Musk with other Founders and Investors Live Q&A with Tamilpreneur Club Members This episode was recorded on June 10, 2022. Join Tamilprenuer Club and participate in upcoming live Uncensored Sessions - www.tamilpreneur.in/club. Use coupon code - UC1 for a flat 10% discount. Follow Tamilpreneur - https://linktr.ee/tamilpreneur Follow Praveen - https://twitter.com/krpraveenkrish Follow Venkat - https://twitter.com/kvenkat24

It feels so happy to see people from Tamilnadu are delivering world class products, but disappointing at the same time that no one is bringing out their stories. Meet Prasath Prabhakaran, Sandeep Prabhakaran and Udhaya Chandran the Co-founders of Timeless Ventures. They have built products & apps for Smallcase, Ditto Insurance, Freshworks, Chargebee, Privacy.com and much more.  Building world class designs just sitting at Pallikaranai, Chennai :) Their workplace design would definitely inspire one to think different. The founders were so polite and friendly. Sandeep Prabhakaran is also an entertainer who always keeps his team cheerful. Found him sharing a joke with one of his newly married teammate with hands on his shoulders. They have fun friday, play games together and lot of benefits for employees. They are hiring for different roles like Senior Product Designer, Marketing Intern, Marketing Associate, & HR  Interested people please send an email to [email protected] Checkout tamilpreneur club here - https://cutt.ly/WJIazW5 . COUPON CODE - PODCAST. You get access to  Exclusive app with Digital community, Startup Masterclasses, Founder Interactions, and Networking sessions. Join our exclusive club and experience Entrepreneurship !!

It feels so happy to see people from Tamilnadu are delivering world class products, but disappointing at the same time that no one is bringing out their stories.  Meet Prasath Prabhakaran, Sandeep Prabhakaran and Udhaya Chandran the Co-founders of Timeless Ventures. They have built products & apps for Smallcase, Ditto Insurance, Freshworks, Chargebee, Privacy.com and much more.  Building world class designs just sitting at Pallikaranai, Chennai :) Their workplace design would definitely inspire one to think different. The founders were so polite and friendly. Sandeep Prabhakaran is also an entertainer who always keeps his team cheerful. Found him sharing a joke with one of his newly married teammate with hands on his shoulders. They have fun friday, play games together and lot of benefits for employees.   They are hiring for different roles like Senior Product Designer, Marketing Intern, Marketing Associate, & HR  Interested people please send an email to [email protected] Checkout tamilpreneur club here - https://cutt.ly/WJIazW5 . COUPON CODE - PODCAST. You get access to  Exclusive app with Digital community, Startup Masterclasses, Founder Interactions, and Networking sessions. Join our exclusive club and experience Entrepreneurship !!

Would you believe if we told this startup is competing with big  players like Zoho, SAP while sitting at Coimbatore ?   What's so surprising is that this startup was running operations from Namakkal initially for the first two years. They offer 25+ modules across production, marketing, invoicing, inventory, HR management, CRM, accounting to SMEs and startups. They have a total of 30,000 users till now.  As on date, they have processed INR 5 Billion worth of invoices, and INR 2.5 Billion worth of payslips.   Some of their notable customers include Godrej Group, noon, Ola Electric, Schwing Stetter India, Milacron.   The name of the company is Effitrac Solutions and the CEO is Logesh Velusamy.  Happy to be having him on Tamilpreneur's Rising Stars show. Checkout tamilpreneur club here - https://cutt.ly/WJIazW5 COUPON CODE - PODCAST You get  access to  Exclusive app with Digital community, Startup Masterclasses,  Founder Interactions, and Networking sessions. Join our exclusive club and experience Entrepreneurship !!

Imagine starting an EV based startup in India and raising funds from Ratan Tata and Kris Gopalakrishnan  Today it's easy. Imagine doing it in 2007. Yes that's right. Hemalatha Annamalai started Ampere, an EV manufacturing startup in 2008.  You would all be seeing Ampere Electric Scooters on road for a long time now. It's Hema's brainchild.   Ampere was acquired by Greaves Cotton in 2019 for Rs.150 Crore. Greaves cotton's long-term strategy was to strengthen and expand its presence in the last-mile e-mobility space. Post her exit, Hemalatha spends time mentoring and investing in startups. Currently she is a Member - Constitution of Expert Committee for Revival of MSME's. Tamilpreneur is excited to be interviewing the Founder and Ex-CEO of Ampere Electric on Women's day. Checkout it out works here -  https://linktr.ee/tamilpreneur  Join Tamilpreneur club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club  COUPON CODE - PODCAST You get  access to  Exclusive app with Digital community, Startup Masterclasses,  Founder Interactions, and Networking sessions. Join our exclusive club and experience Entrepreneurship !!

Just like a family doctor, let's have a family farmer"    A typical city brought up who had grown up hearing about connecting to the roots by her father. As an young entrepreneur, Archana Stalin took the lessons from her first venture and created myHarvest Farms in 2016.  myHarvest Farms is a company which delivers fresh produce and organic food directly to customers. Today they have more than 100 farmers serving more than 2800 families with their list grown from 40 items to 200 items. Building a healthy community which enjoys safe, healthy food and practices natural way of living has been the dream of Archana and team. Service to humanity has always been in her mind. She had started an NGO while in college with the sole aim of serving people. Today, she serves as a mentor to many startups and her growth as an entrepreneur in immense.   Few key learnings from her :  1. Pilot your product 2. Pivot when required 3. Necessity will help you take the next step 4. Empathize with your customer 5. Own your decision    Pilot your product(MVP)  Archana and team started with 1 farm and 18 families to pilot their model. They started small so that they can practically learn and understand their mistakes. This pilot phase helped them iterate and work constantly on their model. Pivot when required Covid was an unexpected bash for many and so was for myHarvest Farms. They were operating earlier in the subscription model and had to pivot to D2C model when situations demanded.   "It was not us, but the local supply chain that won", says Archana. Necessity It will help you take the next step Started with a small terrace garden, understood the basics and decided to setup their own farm. Once they started farming, they learnt that there are seasonal vegetables and certain vegetables doesn't grow in certain areas. This urged them to travel to learn and create the ecosystem that is present today.   Empathize Managing Supply chain was difficult in covid times. And unexpected delays were unavoidable. Being transparent with their customers had helped and Archana insists on being empathetic. Empathizing with customers and farmers has helped them earn their customers' and farmers' trust.   Own your decision  It has not been an easy thing to convince her family. But she and her husband who is her co-founder as well, had showcased strong will and continuous efforts in whatever they did. If you believe and own your choice, everybody around would respect and trust your choice.  "If you build something exciting, people will want to use it" - Archana Stalin. Checkout it out works here -  https://linktr.ee/tamilpreneur  Join Tamilpreneur club here - https://tamilpreneur.in/club COUPON CODE - PODCAST You get  access to  Exclusive app with Digital community, Startup Masterclasses,  Founder Interactions, and Networking sessions. Join our exclusive club and experience Entrepreneurship !!