Entrepreneur Navya Naveli Nanda on building businesses with purpose

Only 16% of the total capital raised in the startup ecosystem—from January 2022 to October 2024—was allocated to women co-founded startups, suggests the CXXO State of Female Entrepreneurship in India report by Kalaari Capital. Moreover, 40% of women entrepreneurs suggest that they lack role models. 

Entrepreneur Navya Naveli Nanda is on a mission to change that. Having co-founded Nimaya Foundation, a career accelerator for girls, in 2021, Nanda is focusing on empowering women entrepreneurs—from grassroot to boardrooms—through her non-profit initiative Project Naveli. 

Project Naveli is working with Aspire For Her—a collective that provides women with career resources, mentorship, and job opportunities. Together, they aim to bring 10 million women to the workforce by 2030 with the power of communities and networks.

“Indian women contribute only around 18% of the total economy, but we know that Indian women are among the best and brightest in the world,” Nanda tells YS Life. 

Aspire For Her uses a five-point model to build communities and change mindsets. “We are using the power of communities and networks to build our platform—from young girls in school, women in college, early and mid-career professional women, women wanting to return to work, women in technology, sales, e-commerce, and more,” she says. The model includes mentors, role models, upskilling programmes, cohorts and learning opportunities, career previews, resources, and community support. 

Of the 24 communities that have been built by Aspire For Her, EntrepreNaari is one of the most critical levers. It is a community of women entrepreneurs and aspirants including women trailblazers in urban India to artisans and agri-workers in rural heartlands. 

A Digital Technology and UX Design graduate of Fordham University, Naveli also runs podcast series ‘What The Hell Navya’ with her mother Shweta Nanda and grandmother Jaya Bachchan, bringing in different perspectives on various topics. Naveli is currently pursuing a Blended Post Graduate Programme MBA at IIM Ahmedabad. 

At the heart of EntrepreNaari is its pop-up that provides small, homegrown women entrepreneurs a premium platform to sell their products and services, in  partnership with Phoenix Palladium in Mumbai. This year’s popup featured Akshaykala Junction, which works with underserved tribal women in Jamshedpur to create handmade artefacts, to social organisations like Tisser and Aftertaste Foundation. 

In a conversation with YS Life, Nanda talks about the initiative, providing a platform to small female-led businesses, and using her privileges for the greater good. 

Edited excerpts from the interview:

YS Life [YSL]: What was the core problem you wanted to address when you first envisioned this initiative? 

Navya Naveli Nanda (NNN): At EntrepreNaari, our community connects with each other, motivates each other, elevates each other, and solves problems creatively and collectively. 

On one hand, we have SheExports for women who have the ambition to export their products and services and take India to the world. On the other end of the spectrum, we have created a movement called Humsafal—to accelerate the aggregators in rural India.  

YSL: Women entrepreneurs often lack visibility and access—how is EntrepreNaari changing that narrative? 

NNN: In today’s day and age, with so many new brands coming up, social media platforms are flooded with new startup ventures. But the biggest problem is bringing visibility to your brand. These pop-ups allow us to bring that visibility and focus to our homegrown female-led brands by giving them the opportunity to showcase their products and bring in footfalls to give them the recognition they deserve. 

Though our pop-ups are physical, and usually a couple of times a year, we have also created a virtual platform called Shop EntrepreNaari that hosts these brands all year round. 

YSL: What drives you to build purpose-led ventures rather than take a more traditional business route? 

NNN: I believe we all have a moral responsibility to help make the society a better place. I, along with the entire team at EntrepreNaari, built this community with the intention of making the lives of women founders easier. 

The entire team works towards building on that purpose everyday through the events we plan, or the resources we have made available to our members. 

Leading with purpose is something that is at the heart of EntrepreNaari and the women who join the community are strongly aligned with that. We will only grow if we grow together—and working towards impacting not just the lives of women founders, but our society as a whole is the way forward for us here.

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YSL: You come from a family with a powerful legacy and name. How has that privilege helped—or perhaps complicated—your journey as a young entrepreneur?

NNN: I believe that everyone has a last name, and a responsibility to live up to that. I have always accepted and been extremely grateful for the privilege I come from. It has given me many opportunities that I am aware most young girls my age do not get, and I have tried to do justice to that and use that towards the work we do at EntrepreNaari to build ecosystems where that privilege can be shared among a larger community of women. 

YSL: Starting young and starting with access—do you approach risk, leadership, or innovation differently because of your background? 

NNN: There is always a sense of risk, failure, and doubt being an entrepreneur, no matter where you come from. The common question that most young people get today is whether they are experienced enough to be running the kind of ventures we see today. I don’t think age can or should ever be a factor that casts doubt on doing the right thing. You are never too old or too young to become an entrepreneur, our community is a symbol of that. 

We have women from across all ages—18 to 70 years—starting their journeys despite the risk that comes with running a business. 

YSL: How are you building towards closing the gaps that women entrepreneurs still struggle to fill? 

NNN: When it comes to building a community such as EntrepreNaari, the largest gap we were trying to fill is the sense of community around female founders. 

Entrepreneurship can be a lonely journey, and having like-minded individuals around you who are going through the same experiences can only add towards creating more inclusive and knowledge-led spaces. 

Access to resources is also a gap we saw when conceptualising this initiative, networking and visibility for brands were a few others that we wanted to bridge the gap to. 

YSL: Who or what has played the biggest role in shaping you as a founder? 

NNN: I have grown up in a business family. My father is a businessman himself and as a young girl I have always admired him for his leadership and business acumen. A large part of my inspiration came from him, and till date he is someone who I go to for advice around my career as an entrepreneur. 

I also believe that most learning comes from actually being on-ground—the daily ups and downs of running a business is what teaches and mentors you the most. I am also blessed to have an incredible team of women who are far more experienced than I am, and act as mentors to me on a daily basis. 

YSL: What space do you see yourself entering next? Will you continue to focus on women-led verticals? 

NNN: There are endless opportunities when it comes to women-led verticals, but an area I would love to continue working towards is definitely financial services. That is something we have been conceptualising for EntrepreNaari as well—creating opportunities or additions to our existing pool of resources to allow women founders to access capital to start their businesses. 

YSL: In your journey so far, what’s been the hardest truth, and the most rewarding win?

NNN: The hardest truth is to embrace the fact that changing mindsets of our society is incredibly difficult. At every step of the way, women face problems, barriers, and challenges that distract them from their career trajectories. I am conscious of my privilege, but deeply conscious of societal frameworks that hold women back from fulfilling their potential. 

The most rewarding win has been to see the ignition of ambition in the EntrepreNaaris of our community, dreaming to enhance their footprint and find opportunities to write their own stories on the sands of time. Our small role in their trajectory has been a very fulfilling part of my own journey.