Shut down 90% business to focus on one industry: 40u40 2024 Abhinav Shashank

Q1 – What has been the turning point in your career?

Two turning points in my career, the first one was to focus on the SaaS model when building a software company out of India was not considered normal. The second was to move away from being a horizontal company after the first three years in business, and shut down 90% of the business to focus on one vertical, and be differentiated with an aspiration to become the world’s number one someday.

Q2 – What was the most critical problem and how did you handle it?

The entrepreneurial journey is generally glorified, but it shouldn't be. You are starting something, whose most obvious outcome is failure. You are going through that cycle over and over again and you try to survive every single day, build products, and try to take it to global markets. Lots of people cannot believe that high quality software can come out of India. It was very hard to do these things as a 24 or 26 year old, so carrying forward with that journey and facing those troubles on a day to day basis, was incredibly hard. If you really want to pursue entrepreneurship, be ready to take punches in your face almost all the time.

Q3 – Whose is your role model?

For all of us in our generation who are building technology and software, Steve Jobs and Elon Musk are two people to look up to, and I am not an exception. However, from my perspective, I think you have to become your own person. Every entrepreneurial journey is a very unique experience, and if you try to idolise too much, you end up making wrong choices which are not in the best interest of either the business or for us. We want to be the best version of ourselves.

Q4 – How do you unwind?

I watch a lot of movies and am a big fan of both Rajnikanth and Shah Rukh khan. Both me and my wife love watching bollywood movies. We travel a lot, and I have a two-year-old daughter, Anvi, who has been such a blessing. I really love spending time with her. And, most of my time today is devoted to Avni first, and other things second.