What does it mean for startup founders to run a listed company?

With increasing number of tech startups now taking the IPO route, what does it mean for its founders to run a publicly listed and scrutinised business? We explore the nuances.

Tuesday December 07, 2021 , 3 min Read

Good Morning,

The year 2021 has been a spectacular one for initial public offerings (IPOs), with Rs 1.10 lakh crore ($14.88 billion) raised over 52 issues until the end of November. Among these are a sizable number of Indian tech startups that have also hit the capital markets this year.

Starting with Zomato in July, the list includes top startups such as CarDekho, PolicyBazaar, Nykaa, Paytm, and Freshworks (listed on NASDAQ). Healthtech unicorn Pharmeasy and logistics tech unicorn Delhivery have filed their regulatory draft red herring prospectus (DRHP), meaning they would be hitting the stock exchanges soon as well.

But, what does it mean for startup founders, who are used to being autonomous decision-makers, to go public? How do entrepreneurs cope with scrutiny while running a public company?

For starters, there are, of course, regular financial reports and investor relations to be dealt with. But there’s more that goes towards managing a successful public foray. Read More.

The Interview

From how to remain calm in high-pressure situations to making quick decisions, sports teaches us important lessons, and helps us develop skills, expose character, and require certain personality traits to succeed. Running a business is no different.

Cricket presenter and AWS Startup Spin host Vikram Sathaye talks to Shashank Kumar, Founder of Razorpay, on how healthy competition makes champions out of sportsmen and businessmen.

Editor’s Pick: Techie Tuesday

Srikripa Srinivasan, VP-Performance Analytics Group, Dell, traces her career from finance and audit to analytics. Using cricket analogies, she explains why women should opt to play the game well and take advantage of all resources in hand. Read More.

Startup Spotlight

Using WhatsApp to make payments simpler

In India, approximately 75 million SMEs rely on manual processes to track sales, purchases, and payments.

This led serial entrepreneurs Aditya and Sri Teja to start Swipe, a simple billing and payments app for small businesses in India in 2021. Swipe makes it easy for local businesses to invoice their customers over WhatsApp. Read more.

News & Updates

Higher education unicorn upGrad announced that it has entered into an exclusive agreement to acquire Talentedge. Sources say the deal value is 3-4X of this year’s revenue of Talentedge.

IT startup FarEye expects to turn unicorn within the next six to 12 months, based on the revenue growth trend the company is recording. CEO and Co-founder Kushal Nahata said the company has doubled its team size in the US and Europe, as well as increased its engineering team.

WhatsApp has announced an incubator programme to support organisations in building digital solutions to tackle pressing healthcare issues. The 'WhatsApp Incubator Programme' aims to facilitate positive and measurable health outcomes at scale.