Bootstrapping a Technology Product Company from India: Sachin Bhatia, Founder of Ameyo (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: What was the average deal size in the enterprise product? 

Sachin Bhatia: At the time, it was around $25,000 to $50,000. Today, It’s a much different story. We have micro-segments, large segments, and extra-large segments. The deal size now is from $50,000 to $250,000. Our typical model was after you enter, there’s a maintaining cost.  

Sramana Mitra: It’s not a subscription revenue model yet?

Sachin Bhatia: Yes, it’s still not completely subscription. It’s still a license sale. 

Sramana Mitra: Were you doing this all bootstrapped or did you raise money at this point?

Sachin Bhatia: No, we haven’t raised money until now. It was a profitable venture. We were generating cash and we didn’t know what to do with it. We were just reinvesting and growing. 2009 was a tough time for us. We had to let go of a few people. There was a financial crash at that time. It was tough. 

Sramana Mitra: In that period in 2010 and 2011, the venture capital market in India hadn’t taken off yet. I remember that we funded Freshdesk in 2011 with $1 million. Soon after, the market started to go crazy, but until 2011, it wasn’t a crazy venture capital market in India. 

Sachin Bhatia: B2B happened much later but B2C started to see some traction at least in pre-series A at that point in time. 2012 and 2013 was an exciting time. A lot of companies were getting funded.

Sramana Mitra: Freshdesk and Druva were the two pathbreaking B2B companies. 

Sachin Bhatia: The founder and I were college mates. He was junior to me. I remember when he started Druva, I was in his apartment discussing the same passion that there has to be a product coming out of India. He has done a brilliant job. There was a small community at that time. We were blessed that we got in touch with each other when there were hard times. Even the early VCs are trying to get the product ecosystem out of India.

I’m sure you know Avinash Salgar. I’ve been in touch with him since 2002 in discussing when India would crack products. The product ecosystem in India has come a very long way. In 2013 or 2014, we were still bootstrapped. We were more tired at this time, but the company was growing.

By 2014, our revenue was about $5 million to $6 million. That is when we were thinking that this was a little slow for a global world-class company. We were looking at the stories around SaaS companies that were growing fast. The company was growing at 30% to 40%, but we asked ourselves if it could grow to 300% to 400% and what it would take to achieve that.

In 2014, we decided that we should raise capital and go to the US. The theme was going cloud and go to the US. We raised $5 million of capital at that time. In the US, we were asking ourselves some questions. Which product would we pick? Do we go for mid-market or do we go for SMB?

The typical playbook from India was you go SMB and convert. We said, “Let’s pick one product that we can crack.” At that time, I went to Boston and San Francisco. I attended the Hopscotch event and the Dreamforce conference.

There, I realized that there is a space called sales engagement. Today, you have two unicorns in that space – SalesLoft and Outreach. We thought that we should play in this space. This was a mix of what we do in the contact center. It could also be sold on cloud later.

It has good value because the B2C segment was only happening in larger companies. Talkdesk did not happen until that point in time. We told ourselves, “If we have to sell to enter enterprises, it will be very tough. Let’s pick up SaaS companies and let’s make sure that we create pure cloud products on the same platform and sell it to B2B companies that are doing sales.”

This was a tough time. We raised capital. While I was doing this, we hired a VP of Sales for our core business so that emerging market business could grow well. By this time, we had established a presence in all of Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. 

Sramana Mitra: With the old product?

Sachin Bhatia: Yes, with Ameyo – the old product. Whatever enterprise sectors that we saw in India, we now wanted to repeat it. Some of the early markets were Malaysia, Indonesia, and the UAE. These were national choices for Indian companies who were delving into enterprises. We were able to establish channel partners in both markets.

While this was happening, we thought that this was the time to go to the US. In 2015, we raised our round and hired a VP of Sales to manage the old business. We were going to create a separate team for the new product. Part of the plan was that I will go to the US and make this a success. 

This segment is part 4 in the series : Bootstrapping a Technology Product Company from India: Sachin Bhatia, Founder of Ameyo
1 2 3 4 5 6