💸 Investing in startups | ✍🏼 Writing 2 newsletters with 80K+ subs globally | 💼 building community in IND and SEA | DM me here: osborne.vc/dm
Bangalore / Mumbai
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[NEW] spent the last few weeks reading earnings presentations and transcripts of 23 of India's most important financial services companies.
The result: 160+ slides, 100+ insights from 23 financial firms, compiled into a simple report.
Here's a quick snapshot of what I found:
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Two fintech VC's walked into a bar. Digital payments or cards didn't work. They paid in cash and left.
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Don’t know what it is about VLOOKUP, but even after having done it countless times over the years, I still feel a child-like excitement when I get VLOOKUP right in the first try.
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This guy, at the peak of his career, having built the browser used by ~2.65bn people, decides to quit Google and...
not join a flashy VC fund,
not take a VP/CEO role at a large tech co.
but joins another browser co. as an... engineer! Mad man! Respect!
browsercompany.substack.com/…
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Dude! Ranbir Kapoor also started complaining about recurring payments. Will RBI listen now?
RKᵃ
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Wipro smart plug - connected my geyser to this. Now I turn on my geyser when on my way home from Airport or after a work day. There's also a timer to auto turn off after a set amount of time (I usually forget it's on).
amazon.in/Wipro-Monitoring-A…
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India:
- HDFC: we had major tech outages
- RBI: no issuing credit cards till you fix the issues
Singapore:
- DBS: we had a major tech outage
- MAS:
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After living in Bangalore for four years, I have finally found a place that serves excellent Parsi food.
The dhansak was 🤌🏽
Chaat craving was also satisfied. :)
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Don’t understand the incessant need for folks to *get* startups.
“I don’t get what CRED does”
“I don’t get how Paytm will become profitable”
“I don’t get why we need 10min delivery”
If you like the product, use it. If not, move on.
Let teams & investors worry about all else
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From thinking that car ownership will decline because of cab hailing services to planning to buy a car now because of cab hailing services, I’ve grown up.
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in Bangkok, saw this really cool animation of printing the payment slip.
(video is not mine, it's from the internet. The tellers in Bangkok thought I was crazy when I asked them if I could take a video of the animation)
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Ek banking license ki kimat tum kya jano?
Har fintech startup ka khwaab hota hai... ek... banking.. license.
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Consumers don't care if your business is built on web3, blockchain, AI, ML or any other technology.
Consumers also don't care if you're licensed or not.
Businesses don't get built on technology.
Solve a problem, earn their trust and consumers will come.
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Kinda crazy that CashApp now brings in more gross profit for Block than Square.
CashApp has become such a juggernaut.
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Piyush Gupta, ex-CEO of DBS Bank, has become a meme. But not for anything related to the bank.
The person in the first picture met someone she thought was Piyush.
Now others are also posting pictures of "meeting him" and the real Piyush is playing along rather well.
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Oh, the irony of saying "quit school" on twitter but requiring a degree for jobs in one's startup/team!
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Random interesting stats from various Indian banks.
TIL SBI's YONO banking app has an integrated marketplace - YONO Shop. Shop has 10mm customers and does ~$15mm in GMV per qtr.
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Amul is the world's largest DAO! 16.6mm Indian milk farmers own and operate the dairy brand.
What's a DAO though?
That's Edition #49 of Fintech Inside: Amul - the OG DAO
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If you're in college, I get that reading tweets about startups makes you impatient to do something
It's ok if you're not in startups. It's ok if you're not interning at 5 startups. It's ok if you're not writing tweet threads
Whatever you do, go deep and do it meaningfully
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Apple does an impressive $71M revenue in one year from 2 stores (Mumbai and Delhi). roughly ~$35M per store.
Any other brand with close to that revenue per store in India?
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Excited (& nervous) to launch Work at a Fintech!
Work at a Fintech is a platform for stellar talent to find high impact jobs at the fastest growing fintech startups to build the future of finance together.
workatafintech.com
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India's largest IPO ever launches today! No surprises that its a fintech IPO.
This one image has everything there is to know about Paytm's business model.
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Finally RBI released the list of entities allowed to operate as payment aggregators.
The usuals on the list: Razorpay, PineLabs, Cashfree
The usuals not on the list: PayU and Paytm
Surprising one is Google: (given RBI’s apprehension with big tech in fintech).
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Folks have always asked - do banks even pay for tech? they don't possibly pay a lot, do they?
India's largest bank i.e. HDFC Bank, spends $700-900mn a year on tech (excluding people)! That's a huge number!
HDFC Bank spends roughly 5-7% of its total annual expenses on technology (including people).
50% of this tech expense is on people. So, about 2-3% of annual expenses is on software, servers and other infrastructure.
2-3% of total spend on tech is a good rule of thumb for the industry.
One may argue that HDFC is spending more than most banks on tech. Discount that 2-3% to even 1-2% spent by most smaller banks.
That still gives about $7-10bn in total revenue of the industry providing tech solutions to banks in India alone.
It's certainly tough to sell to banks and the sales cycles are loooong, but the numbers here support the thesis that banks pay for tech and aren't shy to spend for quality and integrity of product, and longevity of partnership.
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Counterintuitive thing I heard recently:
95% of South BOM folks are back after their studies abroad vs. 95% of folks from my engg batch are still abroad after studying there.
Incorrectly assumed that affluent folks would stay abroad but they’re back to work for fam biz
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The one time India's financial services industry is thanking its stars for not migrating critical systems to the cloud and sticking to on prem.
Only 10 banks had minor disruptions, per RBI.
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Over the past two weeks I traveled to 3 countries and 4 cities. Made many transactions across 3 currencies - all with one card i.e. the Niyo Global card.
That card is too good for travelers. I literally saved INR 70-100 per transaction in forex markups and other charges.
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At this point I'm convinced that 95% of the hype around crypto/Defi/web3 is because there are financial incentives involved.
That 5% of signal is all that matters. The real game is finding those 5% founders/projects that will breakout - this as a VC and a user of these projects
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Annual (ended Dec22/Mar23) revenue of major Indian fintech startups:
- Paytm ₹7,990cr/$974mm
- Zerodha ₹6,875cr/$838mm
- PayU ₹3,280cr/$400mm
- PhonePe ₹2,914cr/$355mm
- Pinelabs ₹1,600cr/$195mm
- Razorpay ₹1,481cr/$180mm
- CRED ₹1,400cr/$171mm
- Groww ₹1,294cr/$158mm
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Seriously though, if you’re a fintech startup of any meaningful size in India, make sure you have a regulatory affairs function (person/team).
Engaging with regulators is a moat in itself.
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Folks from VC are getting into starups.
Folks from startups are getting into VC.
Growing trend - wonder what's causing it.
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when founders send me texts like this, it's usually because they
- are doing really well and want to find ways to grow faster, or
- want to have a conversation about getting acquired/shut down.
no in between.
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My partner came across my card statement and saw a recurring expense for Superhuman.
She's very sensitive for anything health related and got worried that I subscribed for some steroid/supplement plan.
Was more worried to tell her I'm paying $30 per month for an email client
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Update: A month ago, I concluded my journey at Emphasis Ventures - undoubtedly one of the most transformative period of my career yet.
It's been a privilege to be a part of EMVC, one of the first global funds to believe in India’s fintech potential.
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Last evening was unreal! The energy in the packed room was infectious! We have such a vibrant fintech community!
Thanks to 170+ folks who came (despite not getting cabs for 45+mins)
@zwitchdotio @JarAppHQ @Card91_io @getpazcare
Getting to meet people whose work you admire >>>
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This video was too short. Need multiple seasons of your sister driving your dad around!
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This PhonePe data is absolutely incredible!
I feel like I'm at RBI's website going through all the payments data (kid at a candy store).
But what's with this Bangalore pincode 560001 coming in at first and second place?! That's a LOT of volume from one location!
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Spoke to a teenager today and he told me crypto fintech is more exciting than TRADITIONAL fintech!
Felt like a dinosaur :/
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A91 is a different breed of investors. Exceptional stuff with them.
Closing a $665M Fund 3, having started only in 2018 is unreal.
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Interesting strategy by @Zomato to release its earnings as a Q&A (control your narrative). Some other aspects that stood out to me:
1. Quick Commerce (QC) is driving Zomato's revenue growth. QC grew avg 24% across 4 Qs, Hyperpure (HP) 21% and delivery 8%.
🧵
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Local saree shop in Bangalore using ChatGPT mobile interface for an ad is a first.
Earlier it would be the Google search bar design.
Just Bangalore things I guess.
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Been living under a smol rock called fintech: TIL of the phenomenon called @total_gaming093
- Anonymous mid-20s guy
- streams his game play on YT
- 34mn subs on YT, 3.3 on Insta, 186K on TW
Thanks to @kalkikanmani's incredible podcast My Indian Life for surfacing his story.
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The Delhi NCR Fintech Happy Hour was 🔥🔥🔥
The fintech community showed up & how! Loved the energy in the room. Everyone there were such fintech nerds, building the future of finance
To everyone asking “does NCR have a fintech community?” These pictures more than answer that q
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This is something I’m deeply intentional about with my events. I try to accept as many people as I can, the only limits: max 2/company & venue capacity.
was never accepted to these events, so I’m changing that with mine - optimise for serendipity.
the fact that the two startup accelerators in BLR hosting @AnthropicAI’s team is gatekeeping online invites makes me respect @paraschopra’s approach with @lossfunk AI Labs events accessibility 100x.
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Early stage founders, do you diligence on investors before taking their money.
Speak to portfolio cos., understand value add, ask why they're investing etc.
But don't stop at VC's, it's even more important you do it for angels. Wrong angel investors can create havoc.
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Recently I learned that Chinese folks send a "~" at the end of their chats to indicate a casual tone/conversation.
I find this🤯because chats are devoid of tone and often we assume the tone of the sender (which often leads to misunderstandings)
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Better late than never, RBI!
Much needed Discussion Paper released by RBI aims to consider charges in various payment systems in India - including UPI!
Read here: rbidocs.rbi.org.in/rdocs/Pub…
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The best email hack I've learned of is to create a create a new filter to move all incoming email with the word "Unsubscribe" to a folder
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PJ is a goat’ed founder. Very very few people come back this strong, that too in just 4-5 years.
Unicorns are back and now at home 🦄 😅
On a serious note, our gratitude and thanks to all who have supported us - as users, partners, well wishers and supporters in our journey of building @DhanHQ @scanx_trade @Upsurge_club @FilterCoffeeHQ and @ask_fuzz 🙏
We hope to make a dent with @RaiseTheBarHQ 🚀
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This is the part of Twitter that no other social media platforms have and that’s what makes Twitter special.
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VC at IPO and Founder at IPO
/s
nitter.app/TheRoyalSerf/status/18…
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Signed up for an account with one of the larger private banks in India.
A month later, I still don't have access to my account and the debit card doesn't work. Nobody at the bank knows why.
You *cannot* convince me that the opportunity for fintech doesn't exist. Now or ever.
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If you're the founder of an early stage (pre-seed to Series A) company and raising funds, please reach out to investors yourself.
It's crazy to see so many investment bankers and "founders office" folks reach out for fund raising.
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Love this founder's comment on a LinkedIn post of the VP of Tech and Innovation at a Bank.
People talk a big game on social but there's nothing under the hood.
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Two big updates from the @RBI's MPC related to payments in India:
1. UPI now allowed to be used for blocking user funds for specific purposes.
2. Bharat Bill Payment System now open to all categories of billers.
Both have incredible implications for the ecosystem.
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Not sure why @Nithin0dha decided to pull a rather scary prank on their support staff, but glad he did!
This is from 9 years ago, when the ecosystem didn't take itself too seriously.
Best is lady saying she thought she forgot to pay stamp duty! 🤣🤣
piped.video/watch?v=tbSaenIt…
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TIL: Bing is a $11bn/year revenue business.
For a product that no one uses, $11bn revenue is insanity! Distribution is king!
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#TIL Kailash Nadh, Zerodha's CTO and founding member, developed ListMonk, an open source newsletter and campaign manager. It's repository has 5.3K+ stars and 370+ forks on GitHub! listmonk.app
Who are some other Indian engineers we should know of? Link to their Github
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"So that’s exactly what I’m going to do next — and not as a manager of managers, but as a software engineer. Because if I’m helping build the browser of the future again, I want to be back in the code doing it.
-Darin"
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IMO, if BigBasket, Swiggy and the rest launch a toll free number for elderly people to order, their numbers will go through the roof.
Then again, call waiting will be an NPS nightmare.
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TIL, NRI's hold $150Bn in deposits in India.
That's about 20-25% of all deposits with banks in India.
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How many users do you think these financial firms have?
And what is the valuation of these financial firms?
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If I was not investing in fintech, I'd be investing in Space Tech. Pixxel and Agnikul are some incredible space companies being built out of India. Mad talent and ambition.
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Didn't have to go so hard for this launch, but what a stunning video.
CRED just does it better.
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i keep asking myself if I would have invested in zepto when the founders were just starting out. Not that I had the opportunity to evaluate/invest, but this question keeps haunting me every time I dismiss an opportunity. There's probably no right answer, no heuristic, just gut feeling. but it's a tough muscle to build as an investor - to evaluate people, to take risk on people and to listen to your gut.
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2024 is going to be an interesting year for geopolitics.
All these countries have general/presidential elections:
🇮🇳India
🇺🇸USA
🇮🇩Indonesia
🇵🇰Pakistan
🇵🇰Sri Lanka
🇰🇷South Korea
🇲🇽Mexico
🇪🇺EU
🇫🇮Finland
🇷🇺Russia
🇦🇺Australia
🇿🇦South Africa + 14 African nations
and many more.
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Tried unsubscribing from Tata Cliq.
The "unsubscribe" link leads you to this page with the email field disabled. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Never seen this before.
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Fintech in India is so back!
FLDG guidelines released by RBI! At least someone is reading my newsletters 😉
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Funny to me that some VCs are reluctant to use AI for serious internal ops but are building theses on investing in AI agents for financial institutions.
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A young founder based in New Zealand has been a long time reader of my newsletter (what?!). He decided to reach out to me on LinkedIn 12 months back to mentor him or help him with his fintech startup. We spoke a couple of times but I was of no help....
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If you really want to understand NEFT, RTGS, UPI, IMPS, Debit Cards, Credit Cards a.k.a. India's payment systems, there's no better reading material than this RBI doc.
It breaks down the payment flow, what each intermediary does and how much it costs in each txn type.
Better late than never, RBI!
Much needed Discussion Paper released by RBI aims to consider charges in various payment systems in India - including UPI!
Read here: rbidocs.rbi.org.in/rdocs/Pub…
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