Building a 2-sided Farm to Table Marketplace from Indiana: Nick Carter, CEO of Market Wagon (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: What happens when COVID strikes?

Nick Carter: Everything in our company is measured on week-over-week sales. I can remember my co-founder texting me one Sunday afternoon saying, “We had a nice week today.” The sales volume grew 600% in one week. It’s because everybody had to stay home. They needed delivery. The traditional supply chain could not keep up with the demand.

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1Mby1M Incubation Radar 2022: OneNDF, New Delhi, India

OneNDF is a small business loan marketplace that handles all the loan requirements of SMBs and specializes in Secured Loans. It started off as an offline loan marketplace in 2013. It launched its video powered loan marketplace in August 2021 to provide SMBs access to credit facilities through technology. It has 95 lenders and has generated revenue of over $100k through the platform in just 4 months. 

Bootstrapping by Piggybacking: Evenica CEO Sadek Ali (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: You joined that other company, but you kept the software services that was going in parallel.

Sadek Ali: Correct. Then we ended the business when I went to New York. From there, I came home because I felt that I had enough experience to do my own raise with my own ideas. In this next company, I was doing crypto and all that stuff. I learned how to do a raise and had my biggest failure at that point. It was then that I finished my PhD.

Sramana Mitra: What didn’t work in crypto?

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Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapped Y Soft to $30M from the Czech Republic

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. 

This is a wonderful story of a Czech entrepreneur, Vaclav Muchna, Co-owner and CEO of Y Soft. At age 22, at a time when his country was far from ready to support entrepreneurs, he struggled through immense odds and has built a global business. Read on for inspiration and excellent lessons from our discussion in 2017.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Vaclav Muchna: I was born in Czech Republic. I studied electronics in high school, which I didn’t like. It was not possible back then that would parlay into the software industry. Because the country was not so developed, access to technologies was limited. I really didn’t like the school. I was born and raised in Prague and then moved to Brno which is the largest city.

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Indian Unicorns 2022: Upstox Becomes the Second Largest Online Stock Brokerage in India

Like with the US, India’s stock market had a bumper year in 2021. Interest rates in the country kept depleting, but the markets were surging. 14.2 million new stock Demat accounts were opened in FY21 in India and they grew 26% to 51.5 million accounts. Most new investors are attracted by the record-high stock index levels and the continued ease in opening a Demat account in the country. Upstox is among the latest unicorns to benefit from this growth.

Building a 2-sided Farm to Table Marketplace from Indiana: Nick Carter, CEO of Market Wagon (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: From your network, how big of a consumer base were you able to pull together?

Nick Carter: We got to about 70 to 80 orders a week, which is $2,500 to $3,000 in sales. It was enough of a critical mass.

Sramana Mitra: How long did it stay in just Indianapolis?

Nick Carter: The first year.

Indian Unicorns 2022: slice Focuses on Expanding Credit Card Services in India

According to a recent PwC report, India is one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, but there exists a significant gap in accessing formal credit, especially when compared to other developed nations. Banks and financial institutions are helping fill this gap by introducing new payment products and instruments that make it easier for users to access formal credit. Recently, these institutions have shifted their focus towards instruments like credit cards. Credit card issuance has grown in the country by 20% annually over the last four years. The number of credit cardholders increased from 29 million in March 2017 to 62 million in March 2021. New FinTech players are also disrupting the market by introducing new and innovative products and offerings to consumers. slice is one such new fintech player focusing on India’s youth.

Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapping to $10M from Australia, Raising $25M from the US

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. 

“Bootstrap First, Raise Money Later,” is the 1Mby1M mantra. Ashik Ahmed, CEO / CTO Co-founder of Deputy, shared his story in 2017 of bootstrapping to $10 Million before raising $25 Million in the first external financing.

Sramana Mitra: Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background? Let’s start at the very beginning of your story.

Ashik Ahmed: I was born in Bangladesh. In 1997, my whole family migrated to Melbourne in Australia. I did my high school education as well as university in Melbourne. Then we moved to Sydney where I started working for my co-founder. My co-founder and I founded Deputy in 2008.

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