From Solo Techie Entrepreneur to High Growth, Profitable Enterprise AI Success Story: Findability Sciences CEO Anand Mahurkar (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: What year did you get funding?

Anand Mahurkar: Late 2017.

Sramana Mitra: This was after how long from founding?

Anand Mahurkar: About six years.

Sramana Mitra: You had substantial revenue already?

Anand Mahurkar: Yes, we’ve been managing it profitably every single year except for the two quarters of the pandemic.

Sramana Mitra: Do you feel comfortable sharing how much revenue you had when you got the investment from Softbank?

Anand Mahurkar: That is confidential.

Sramana Mitra: Besides the Softbank business, you were also doing business development on your own?

Anand Mahurkar: Yes. When we got the funding we decided to expand in India and the US. I recruited salespeople for the first time. In 2019, we started growing well. I talked about the data platform and the ability to find information. From 2017 to 2019, we actually built an AI stack. The AI stack was very attractive. We added machine learning, natural language processing, and computer vision on top of the data platform.

We are probably the first company to have multiple models deployed. Another thing we found is enterprise AI for traditional enterprises. When I talk about traditional enterprises, the companies are about 10 to 15 years old. They have software solutions, so they create a lot of data; but it is underutilized or not utilized at all. Those companies need these types of solutions.

We started marketing in India, Japan, and the US. We have a couple of customers in the Middle East. We plan to expand in other territories. Our solution is being used by the who’s who in traditional enterprises. Department by department, we are transforming their business using enterprise AI.

Sramana Mitra: Do you have any industry sector where you are dominant?

Anand Mahurkar: No, we continue to market horizontally. Our implementations are customer-specific. We deploy the entire solution for customers in a separate environment.

Sramana Mitra: Does that mean you have a large professional services play?

Anand Mahurkar: Not really. We focus on products. We have a professional services element linked to our product implementation.

Sramana Mitra: Who does the domain-specific implementation?

Anand Mahurkar: Customers help us on the domain, but we do the rest. We call this a data science lab model. Customers bring their domain knowledge and data, and we bring people, processes, and technology on AI and ML.

Sramana Mitra: Is it a subscription fee business model?

Anand Mahurkar: Yes, we charge monthly. We also have multiple customers who have between three to five-year contract tenures. Customers have seen the benefits. They know that AI is not just a proof of concept. When we deliver solutions, we do three types of ROI. One is strategic ROI. The second is capability ROI. After that is the financial ROI.

Most of the corporates focus only on financial ROI. They miss the bus of building capability for AI. When we explain this to C-levels, there is such an acceptance. AI is very strategic and they need to build capability. After that, they are good with getting financial returns.

This segment is part 3 in the series : From Solo Techie Entrepreneur to High Growth, Profitable Enterprise AI Success Story: Findability Sciences CEO Anand Mahurkar
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