Vinayak
Bhavnani, co-founder & CTO of Chalo discusses his entrepreneurial journey,
building bus transport technology and trends in the Mobility industry with host
Gautam Srinivasan.
Vinayak
Bhavnani, co-founder and CTO of Chalo discusses his entrepreneurial journey,
building bus transport technology and trends in the Mobility industry with host
Gautum Srinivasan.
India has emerged as the world’s
third largest startup ecosystem over the last decade. Startups play an active
role in surging innovation and job creation in India. The pandemic exposed the
flip side of all sectors, but it accelerated digitization globally, and even
more so in India.
The "Crafting
Bharat - A Startup Podcast Series" powered by AWS, and an initiative by NewsReach, in association with VCCircle, unlocks the secrets behind
these successful entrepreneurs’ journeys aiming to equip aspiring entrepreneurs
and business enthusiasts with invaluable insights. The podcast series is hosted
by Gautam Srinivasan, famed for hosting a diverse range of TV and digital
programs, currently consulting editor at CNBC (India), CNN-News18, Mint, HT
Media, Forbes India, and The Economic Times.
India’s rapid population growth and
urbanization is creating blind spots for innovation, but a curious and passionate
founder Vinayak Bhavnani, co-founder and CTO of Chalo, is digitizing the public
transport system of India. In the Crafting Bharat Podcast Series, Bhavnani
talks about his entrepreneurial journey, building a bus transport technology
company and trends in the Mobility industry.
Explore the tales of Indian startup
founders' transformation from dreams to reality, navigating challenges to seize
opportunities through the Crafting Bharat Podcast Series.
Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vX_6EayNks
Segment 1: The Incubator
Preference
for public transport in India is reduced by reliability issues. Take us through the phase where
customers started to see the benefits of using Chalo in terms of reliability
and convenience. What did they really like?
From a customer’s standpoint there
are two key value propositions that we offer. First, being live tracking, bus
passengers on average end up waiting for 15-20 minutes per bus ride, leading to
40 minutes of time wasted everyday. Our live tracking solution has brought down
this time to less than 2 minutes which is a massive delight. And second, is
that back in 2018-2019 a couple of years after the demonetization we introduced
tap-to-pay payments and we saw another surge of customer delight. I think these
are some of the unlocks which we were able to leverage.
Digitizing and transforming public transportation, the gaps are
significant. So, why do you believe the challenge of urban public
transportation has persisted without a satisfactory solution. A lot has
happened including digital payments, digital infrastructure, consumer
awareness, consumer habits have changed but still those gaps exist. Your
thoughts on this?
This is a great question, and one
which needs a lot more reflection. As a
fact, the majority of our cities are built for cars and not for public
transport. We got it wrong by prioritizing private vehicles over public
transport
Beyond this, there are 3 more
reasons I can think of –
- Lack of focus on this category.
Most companies would rather build for the top of the pyramid, for the more
affluent high LTV users. So we have products for air travel, intercity
luxury bus travel but not as much for intra-city bus commute. These bus
passengers unfortunately are the lower end of the pyramid.
- Second is the blindspot. Most
people think that buses are run only by Governments, and usually there is
hesitation to build a business completely dependent on the government. But beyond our metros, most
buses serving daily commutes
are run by small private operators.
- And the third is complexity. People logistics is complex
and already underserved, hence it will take both time and massive
innovation.
You operate in more than 50 cities across India and are present in
5 international locations. All together a lot of scaling up and your cloud ops
are powered by AWS. Take us through the cost savings and operational efficiencies
unlocked for Chalo with AWS?
Our vision is to solve end-to-end
mobility, we want to make sure that your travel is hassle-free and while the
bus is the best main mile or the anchor mile, you need to solve for more
accessibility to bus networks or Metro networks and hence, first and last mile
must be solved. I personally believe in long-term partnerships and AWS has been
one true partner. The biggest test is when adversity strikes, back during covid
time all mobility was at a standstill and we were on a very tight spot. AWS
helped us out massively by helping us reduce cost and to extend our
commitments, so from a cash flow perspective we are better off as a company.
These simple gestures go a long way to build trust and respect which are
essential for any partnership.
Segment 2: The Accelerator
Technical founders need to know when to take off their developer
hat and when to put on their business hat. Your thoughts?
I follow this one principle which I also preach a
lot, and that is to maximize the value that
you create. Every time you look at a problem or an opportunity, Think about
what’s the best way of solving, and not necessarily the best tech way of
solving. In simpler words, we are biased to use our own tools vs the best
solution possible. So one always needs to see things from a founder perspective
vs. a techie perspective. `Tech is a subset – it’s a means and not the end. `
Your view on traffic in Mumbai versus Bengaluru?
That’s a controversial
question. But traffic is on the rise in all the cities Bengaluru, Delhi and Mumbai. If you look at the number of cars on the road in all these
cities in the last decade, it has rammed up. For example, 50% of road space is
consumed by cars in Mumbai. And Bangalore has seen a 2x increase in the number
of vehicles on the road over the last decade, with almost no increase in the
number of buses. So traffic is a nightmare everywhere. We need to solve this.
None of us deserve to lose our time and well-being in the middle of congested
roads. And I’m hopeful that it will be solved.
The startup ecosystem of India has
been growing leaps and bounds with exceptionally great innovations by visionary
entrepreneurs. The increasing adoption of digitization across sectors has
created avenues for various budding startups.
Stay tuned to the Crafting Bharat Podcast
Series as we bring you these inspirational entrepreneurs for insightful and
candid discussions with Gautam Srinivasan.
Focusing on maximizing value and finding optimal solutions instead of fixating
on familiar paths leads to better outcomes.
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