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The Success Journey of Freecharge from a Start-up to a $400 Million Business

Founder, India, start-up, Story, Tech Story / By

Western civilisation had a huge impact on the Indian start-up culture. If you look around, you will find many Indian start-ups taking ideas from Silicon Valley projects like PayTM inspired by PayPal, OYO followed the business concept of Airbnb, and there are many more examples doing the same. This lead to the accusation for the Indian entrepreneurs of recreating ideas instead of digging a new one. In the midst, Kunal Shah and Sandeep Tandon proved everyone wrong and built a start-up to address payment related issues and launched a product called Freecharge, which later, took the digital market space like a wildfire.

Origin of Freecharge and initial success

The foundation of Freecharge started in the year 2010 when Sandeep was an angel investor and met Kunal at his BPO Company. Sandeep recognised Kunal’s potential and admired his entrepreneurship skills. In the year 2009, Kunal started with his own venture Paisaback. The idea was to give cash back to the customers through local business tie-ups. For instance, the customers used to get cash back if they visit any local fast food restaurant like KFC or McDonalds on the reference of Paisaback. However, the business ideas did not work out well and soon collapsed.

Kunal Shah
Image Source: ishaeducation.org

Later, Kunal wanted to make a technology, which would eventually minimize payment-coupled complexities and ease the payment process. His focus was especially on mobile phone recharges. He had analysed it as a million dollar idea which would disrupt the market. The idea gave birth to Freecharge. Both Kunal and Sandeep started with the product development phase. Within no time, they launched Freecharge on Independence Day i.e. 15 Aug 2011. McDonald became their key partner for initial days. For the project, they received an undisclosed amount of seed funding from American Venture Capital firm supported by Tandon Group and Sequoia Capitals. Freecharge tool off their business exponentially and grew into tech giant in coming years.

Investment from top firms to selling out the company

After successful three years from its inception, Freecharge received another round of Series B funding INR 220 Crores from their trusting partner Sequoia capitals, Sofina and Ru-Net. Because of their exceptional business delivery, Freecharge again received 535 crores form Hong-Kong based funding firm Tybourne Capital, Valiant Capital Management and from existing funding partners. The Freecharge was killing the market space and shut down many businesses. Many entrepreneurs saw Freecharge as a big opponent. As a result, in the year 2015, Snapdeal, after realising the potential of Freecharge, acquired the company. Snapdeal bought Freecharge for a whopping amount of INR 2700 crore, which also became the biggest takeover in the Indian history of the start-up.

Kunal’s vision for success entrepreneurship

Before stepping into the entrepreneurship journey, Kunal had taken a bold step, as he dropped out from Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS) while pursuing his MBA degree. Instead, he pursued an education in Philosophy, preferably. He holds a B.A degree in Philosophy from Wilson College, Mumbai, India. According to his controversial statement, he regarded the MBA as a waste of time and money. He believes students should reach out to running companies instead of wasting so much money while studying theoretical pieces of stuff. However, many intellectuals criticised his theory, he remains adamant. Today, he inspires many through his Freecharge success.

Kunal credit his self-devised Delta 4 theory for building Freecharge a successful start-up. It was Kunal and Sandeep homogenize vision, dedication and honest is the reason why Freecharge has become a global name in mobile-based application software. Today, Freecharge has grown a thousand times and has a customer base of more than 30 million people. Freecharge also awarded as the best consumer mobile service at IAMAI Digital Awards in 2015. The journey of a Freecharge is a lesson to many who want to explore the entrepreneurship journey.

Talmon Marco – The Co-Founder of Instant Messaging Software Application ‘Viber’

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When technology, in its early years swooped into our lives and started developing, everyone hoped that it would connect people more efficiently than ever. The telephone was one of the best results produced from the growth of technology, but with the evolution of the internet, the demand for something new and instant started to increase. This demand sparked a lot of genius ideas across the world, which today, have given us n-number of mediums to connect that we operate on today. Talmon Marco, an American-Israeli entrepreneur, also had an idea in his mind, and that idea led to Viber, an interaction-based application software over call and messaging.

talmon marco
Image Source: zimbio.com

In 2010, Igor and Marco started their next startup, ‘Viber’. Viber is a cross-platform voice over IP and instant messaging software application. The inspiration for Viber was the love story of Talmon and his girlfriend (now wife). Talmon lived in New York, and his girlfriend lived in Hong Kong. They both talked a lot on the phone, which eventually, led to huge phone bills. This got Marco thinking that how he can stay in touch with his loved one without sacrificing much from the pocket.

The funds generated by iMesh supported the cause of Viber. Viber’s service started on December 2, 2010, in Israel, and it was rather a soft launch in a market that was willing to try a new app. The software uses telephone numbers to register, though it is accessible through desktop without needing any mobile connectivity. Viber did not receive any venture capital money, and the company was all funded by friends and family.

The company was producing a promising product from the very beginning, in fact, since it released its first iOS version. The latter gained Viber nearly 350 million users. The company also released an Android app six months later but at first, it was limited only to 50,000 users. A full version of the app was released a year later. In May 2012, Viber announced that it would be rolling out the software for Blackberry and Windows phones. In the span of two months, Viber gained a total of 90 million users. The company was progressing at a pace and decided to bring in the availability of high-definition voice calling, “Viber Out” and group messaging.

The app gave a tough competition to WhatsApp, Skype, and the other similar software present. It had an advantage over Skype. For using Skype, one had to register using password and had to maintain a buddy list, whereas to use Viber, the one simply needed to register using the phone number.

After 2 years, when the software established itself as one of the top connectivity apps, the company generated no revenue, and so it started to monetize itself via user payments for Viber Out voice and stickers store. The company’s support system was attacked by the Syrian Electronic Army. However, the company disclosed that there was no important information that was compromised.

On 13th February 2014, Viber was purchased by Japanese Electronic commerce and internet service ’Rakuten’ for a massive $900 million. The founders saw a 30-times return for what they invested. Rakuten merged its 200 million user client base with Viber. As of now, Viber has more than 650 million registered users. Marco stepped down as the company CEO in 2015.

The story of Talmon Marco’s founded Viber shows that anything can be done even when one has limited resources. All one needs is to find the light at the end of the tunnel.

Tencent Replaces PUBG with a Less Popular But Patriotic Alternative for Chinese Players

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One of the top games in the world, PUBG, has been pulled out from its homeland China, following the new rules the China government introduced last month for the video games. Though it will no longer be available for the Chinese consumers, the company is providing them with less-popular, but a politically acceptable option, i.e. Heping Jingying or Elite Force for Peace.

pubg china
Image Source: mensxp.com

The company had to take the decision as the new rules from the government was restricting the company from securing the license for the game, that would allow it to collect the revenue from it. In fact, after a month-long freeze on approvals, the Chinese government restricted the title from making any money ever in the country. Until now, the company was running the game under testing, but finally, it has pulled out the plug for the game as it failed to monetize the game in the Chinese market.

Tencent brought the title Elite Force for Peace as soon as it circulated a message about it ending the testing period for PUBG on Wednesday. The title belongs to the same Hunger Games-style genre and resembles the widely-famous PUBG. The game is a tribute to the Chinese military and the Chinese Air Force. In fact, the company developed the game by taking advice from the recruitment department of the Chinese military.

The game has been developed by the similar Korea-based publishers as of PUBG, ie. Krafton (earlier known as BlueHole). Including the graphics of the game, there are a few other similarities to PUBG, except its missions targets on vanishing the terrorists in the game. Many of the players have also claimed that their achievements and the progress in PUBG has even transferred to the Peace game.

The game allows the players to add money to their accounts, enabling Tencent to monetise the game. PUBG had to suffer financially due to the Chinese license freeze last year, and this is the time for the company to buckle up to get back on the track. Force for Peace is a game which can be played by the players of age above 16 and is only available for the android users only.

Aurum Wellness : An App Helping People Prioritize their Mental Health

Health, start-up, Story, Tech Story / By

It all started with a thought, “is mental health not as important as our physical health? Then why do we not prioritize it when we should be able to talk about it and get help? Is it fair that treatment should be sought only when extremities like clinical depression or suicidal tendencies set in? If we can provide help in the earlier stages, so much good can be done in the world”

Fresh from graduating from college, Dhwanil Shah and his co-founder Meet Patel knew that they wanted to work in the area of mental and emotional health. Dhwanil’s father has been taking stress management seminars since he was a kid, and it had always inspired him. After noticing the end number of interactions in the seminars, it dawned on him that people in all areas of life have immense stress, anxiety, or some issues that they want to tackle, but they don’t, due to constraints of time, accessibility, pricing etc., and it takes a toll on their mental health to a great degree.

The two of them, along with working in a corporate, started meeting a number of well-known psychologists and counsellors and realized that although there is a small shift happening within the community, there is still a long way to go in making people open up. He says, “There is always room to do more and more in this space. Affordability also is a major issue in seeking help. Most people do not believe that it is worth spending Rs 500-1200 for a 45-minute session, because somehow to them, their anxiety, their stress can take a backseat. We want to change this. What scares us is if we do not communicate about our emotions and mental health, we will ultimately suffer from the physical health front to a big extent. Is that ideal?”

“We conducted a lot of surveys and talked to a lot of people to figure out the pain points and decided to come up with a solution that would address them. The main concerns were accessibility, affordability and continuity. People were just not able to allocate time and money for regular sessions. They usually stop after a couple of sessions and try to resolve their issues on their own, possibly falling in the same trap again. That is how Aurum was born. We wanted Aurum to be an app which provides affordable and expert services for mental, emotional and diet wellness, a new age holistic wellness platform. We wanted to bring more to the table than just anonymous counselling. There is a section for people who still do not want to communicate with counsellors called “program” which using a very tuned algorithm, let them recognize their own problem areas, set their own improvement targets and provides simple, yet effective soothing exercises. One more very important factor in this whole holistic wellness area is that many people have issues like body image problems, Non-communicable chronic issues like diabetes, cholesterol etc which are directly related to their diet. So these diet-related issues eventually take a huge toll on the persons mental health as they are constantly in anxiety about their diet-related problems. So we also have on the platform professional diet counsellors who understand the importance of diet with respect to overall well being and they are trained to provide such quality counselling. We have on board some of the best psychologists and dieticians who are keen to be a part of a team which is so dynamic and ready to do what it takes to help in alleviating these mental and emotional health problems of the masses.”

The statistics for people suffering from holistic wellness issues like stress, anxiety, depression and diet-related issues like Obesity Diabetes, Chronic Depression, Hypertension is alarming.

Some stats which will help put things in perspective:

  • 15% of the Indian population suffers from a mental issue,
  • There are only 2000 estimated psychologists in India,
  • 45% of the working population suffers from high levels of stress.

There just aren’t enough qualified professionals in the traditional network to support these populations. Technology is the way forward, and as such we have done our best to come up with a solution, which can be both effective and appealing at the same time. They have got a very positive response, since the time it has launched. More than 2000 downloads on the play store and almost 100 paying subscribers have validated the fact that there are a lot of people who want to do this, and who find it useful. “We want to keep doing this to help those who want it but are not too willing because of the above-mentioned concerns. We aim to become a top brand in this space that people can trust and come back to whenever they feel like it”.

Alan Mamedi : The Person Who Made the Phonebook of a Smartphone Smarter

Founder, start-up, Story, Tech Story / By

The telephone is the most useful invention by humans. The era changed and brought the revolution in the telephone industry, jumping from two-piece landlines to a chordless smartphone. But, one thing that was constant, the reception of blank calls and cold calls. Even at the time of landlines, people could not identify the caller, as there was no medium that could show the identity of the caller. But, yes, later on, the caller Ids, did help to an extent. However, it was still impossible to recognise the callers from the new numbers. The same problem remained in the time of the mobiles and smartphones as well. But, Alan Mamedi, a developer from Sweden, came to the rescue and gifted the much-awaited app Truecaller to the world.

Early Life

Mamedi was born on 30 October 1984, in an Iranian family. His mother was a Kurd, and his father was an Iranian political leader. After the Iranian revolution took place, his family brought him to Sweden. He was a bright student and completed a B.sc degree in Computer Science, from The Royal Institute of Technology, in Stockholm Sweden.

Alan Mamedi
Image Source: techinasia.com

After completing his education, Mamedi started working as a Salesman at The Phone House and stayed at the same company for two years. With an experience of two years and a graduate degree in Computer Science, Mamedi got inspired to start his own company. In 2006, Mamedi founded ‘Bidding.se’, an auction website, where the one with the lowest bid would win the auction. The website was a success, and Mamedi received an offer to sell it, within three months of its launch.

In 2007, Mamedi again came with another product, Möbeljakt.se, that became the largest search engine, working in Sweden, for the home interior. In 2008, he started working as the Chief Architect at Birdstep Technology and Företagsinformation i Mediaportalen, at the same position, for the next two years.

In 2009, Mamedi launched Jobbigt.se, an employer review website, known to be the biggest employer network in Sweden. Through the website, people could post reviews about their current or previous employers.

Founding Truecaller

After the launch of Jobbigt.se, Mamedi started receiving calls from those employers, who had got bad reviews on Jobbigt.se. The employers wanted Mamedi to delete those bad reviews as those were affecting their reputation.

This incident made Mamedi, think and discuss the matter with his old friend Nami Zarringhalam, as he was receiving unlimited calls regarding the same. The discussion also included the issue of increasing cold-calls, invading the privacy of people. At the time, there was no such software that could help in avoiding those kinds of calls and identify the new numbers. The two came to the conclusion that there must be a software that can handle those issues. The software must have a caller ID so that people could decide the priority of the call. With the intense discussion, Mamedi and Zarringhalam finally decided to create a new app; Truecaller.

On 1 July 2009, Mamedi released the initial version of Truecaller, under the name of his company True Software Scandinavia AB. The company was founded by Alan Mamedi and Nami Zarringhalam in the same year and is situated in Stockholm, Sweden.

Initially, the app was launched for the BlackBerry smartphones, but due to huge success, it was also released for the Symbian and Microsoft Windows mobile phones. On 23 September 2009, the app became available for the iOS and Android phone users. By the year 2012, it was also launched for the RIM Blackberry, Windows Phone, and the Nokia Series 40, and it grew to five million global users in the same year.

Truecaller in 2012, received US$1.3 million funding from OpenOcean, a venture capital. In 2014, it also received an investment of $18.8 million from Sequoia Capital and $60 million from Niklas Zennstrom’s Atomico investment firm and from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

Due to the increased user base in India, Truecaller also launched another app, exclusively for India, with name Truemessenger, that can identify the sender of a message.