During this week’s roundtable, we had Marina and Nick Davidovs, Cofounders and Managing Partners at DVC, a firm that backs only repeat founders doing AI startups. We had a terrific conversation on cutting edge issues within the AI ecosystem.
NETSPOC
As for our entrepreneur pitches, up first we had Jacob Manamel from Bengaluru, India, pitch NETSPOC, a company that is already in revenue and profitable.
SOREYA
Next, we had Ellie Bramer from Cambridge, UK, pitch SOREYA, a concept stage AI venture.
Yana.travel
Then we had Sanket DK, also from Bengaluru, India, pitch Yana.travel, a company that is just starting to generate revenues.
You can listen to the recording of this roundtable here:
Yesterday, Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) announced its second quarter results that surpassed market expectations, but the stock fell 3% in the after-hours session due to worries about geo-political conditions.
>>>Sramana Mitra: So, talk to me about the various business models. Is it the regular one – the college counseling one where you are hiring mentors or college counselors by the hour, and they’re being paired with the families that are seeking guidance?
>>>Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) continues to benefit from its AI investments. Yesterday, it announced its fourth quarter results that surpassed market expectations and sent the stock soaring 7% in the after-hours trading session.
>>>Sramana Mitra: It sounds like it’s a two-sided managed marketplace. What’s the business model? How much are you paying the counselors? How does this work out?
>>>Vinit Bhansali, Founder and General Partner at Takshil Venture Partners, discusses how his firm is investing in India.
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Sramana Mitra: That’s interesting because you had already validated that there was a market for what you were offering. One of the things that I don’t like about demo days at all is that a company just goes into an accelerator with no validation, and within three months has to go in front of investors and raise money; it hasn’t had the time to do the kind of validation you’re talking about.
You, on the other hand, had done several years of validation before going into demo day.
>>>Ukrainian entrepreneur Vladimir Gendelman started as a solo entrepreneur in Detroit and, when we spoke in 2023, he had bootstrapped a $5M+ niche e-commerce company called Company Folders.
Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born and raised? What kind of background?
Vladimir Gendelman: I was born and raised in the former Soviet Union in Ukraine. We came to America when I was 16.