Dhruv Sharma: Hey there, listeners. It's time for stream 134. But before we introduce our guests, we just wanted to thank all of you who are taking the time to log in and watch, our streams and then our post stream clips and writing in with your feedback, etcetera. We know you have no dearth of options to pick from, so we are very grateful to you for your time. I will say that if the one advantage of joining our streams live is, you know, you can join on seven nine asking questions. You know, we can just ask them on your behalf, but your questions can come up during the stream. Now with that, we're gonna welcome our first guest. We've got three guests. Today, we're gonna welcome our first guest, Sachin, who's one of the co-founders of a company called Scimplify, which in their own words is a science-first manufacturer of advanced materials and specialty chemicals. Sachin, welcome to The Offline Network.

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Thanks, Dhruv. Thanks for having me. Good to be here.

Dhruv Sharma: So I I mean, I I took a leaf out of, you know, your book and just describe the company, Sachin, but, I mean, it's I think it's best we have you talk about what what the how the company got started and what it's doing today.

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Sure. So I think, you described it pretty well. We, call ourselves an advanced, sorry, a science-first manufacturer for advanced materials and specialty chemicals. Essentially, what that means is that we work with, innovative companies who are our customers, to sort of, make sure that the whole process that goes from innovation to commercial scale production is much more reliable, much faster, and, much more cost effective and sustainable. That's what we do in a nutshell. We started the company in September 2023, so it's been exactly three years as of this month. I mean, a little bit of background. I myself had worked in the manufacturing space for the last, ten years across startups before start starting this company. We saw we understood manufacturing pretty well. So me and my cofounder both have worked in, this, space. We understood manufacturing pretty well. And, you know, when we were looking at this space, we knew that the, the next wave of manufacturing is basically going to come from a lot more technology and IP that, people around us are building. Right? So there's a bunch of amazing technologies that we saw got built, right right from my college days. So I started at IIT Madras. I've been seeing great great technologies, great materials, great new specialty chemicals, that have been coming out. I think the the company basically, to put it very simply, I'll have to explain a little bit about, you know, how the, industry worked before, so, you know, it's still working. See, traditionally, let's say there's a there's a guy sitting in California who's invented a new advanced material, let's say, right, that goes into, let's say, the battery of your phone. And this new material now, once they've invented in their lab, they've gone through many years of work. They've gone through their patent process and all of that. And now they start looking for somebody who can make this at commercial scale. So you make a bunch of phone calls, find a manufacturer, find a factory. Now the factory can churn the asset, but you need a technical team that understands the chemistry, the technology behind that, right, the science behind that. And that's where you need a scientist who you need to have on speed dial. You need to make sure that that person gels very well with the chemistry that you are doing. And then you you you have to make sure that whatever is being executed at the at the factory is actually, pitch perfect, batch after batch over a long period of time. That's where I think there's a lot of room for error. There's a lot of room for failure. You know, supply chains can get cut off. Technologies could fail. And that's where Scimplify sort of comes in. We started the company with a fundamental belief that that the next big, materials or chemicals manufacturing company is not going to come by setting up a decafactory. We believe that there is enough capacity out there, you know, across. In fact, we've gone overboard in the last five years. There's excess excess capacity whether you look at a India or Europe or a China. Right? So we wanted to basically use this capacity. But, you know, in most factories, the technology and the science behind things is an afterthought after you come into demand. So we flipped the script, and we said we'll front load the science and the engineering part of it. So we started by setting up our own our own R&D lab, our own team of scientists. So today we have, like, three labs across, 60 scientists who work with us full time. These guys develop the technologies, work closely with the customer to understand the constraints, and then, you know, make sure how understand how to work with factories on that. And then there's an engineering team that works with a network of 500 factories. Each factory does a respective role for, you know, each, product, and then that's where scale of production happens. So in a nutshell, we basically act as, you know, an alternate sort of technical and science-first supplier for the customer, which does everything from development to commercial manufacturing.

Utsav Somani: Nice. So that's the front end, but the back end is also very interesting. So 500 manufacturing partners, and you've described yourself as Intel is to semiconductors, the asset light model. You were basically the same for advanced materials. So when a customer comes to you, what happens at the back end? How do you become this orchestration layer that's delivering, like, I mean, all of this at scale?

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Yeah. I think, see, to put it very simply, I mean, customers come to us by the way, like, for context, when we started the company, we didn't have a bunch of customers who, came to us. So it was mostly us taking, you know, bets on this is the material that's gonna work with the customer. I think over time, we've been able to win the trust of some of the biggest names in the world, and which is a big deal. I'm pretty proud of that that, these customers are now telling us that this is the material of the future, and this is what needs commercial scale production. Right? So when that happens, you know, first, our scientific team, our scientists and engineers would actually, break down or reverse engineer the, the chemistry or the process behind it. Right? So, we take it to our lab. We have one in Bangalore with Hyderabad where we break down the, process in terms of how this would work, what are the constraints. You know, sometimes you have to, go into very specific things in terms of, you know, what the impurity levels are, in each batch, how you can control that batch after batch, and so on. Right? So, that work happens in our lab. And then once we perfect it in the lab, we send out, like, samples to the customer. They would be like they'd give you a thumbs up on this. And then you identify the right factory for the job, which is also a very technical process. It's called a tech transfer process. Sounds easier than it is. A lot of, you know, iteration could be required there. And once you stabilize that at a factory is when, you know, you have teams on the ground, which are engineers who spend twenty, thirty years working in respective industries, to sort of turn out that product, I mean. And then, there there's there's also other teams. There's quality teams, regulatory teams, supply chain teams even. Just for context, we have customers in more than 40 countries globally now. So there's a there's a multi country operation where, you know, you need a lot of, nuance across each and each and every market.

Dhruv Sharma: Fantastic. I I liked also streaming of the front of the businesses front end and back end. I'm gonna stick with that for my for our next question, Sachin, which is so tell us on on the, in terms of the front end, and you just said customers, and demand coming in from 40 countries. Tell us more about the, you know, global demand and global supply sort of matching system because my I'm assuming here even the 500 factories are spread all across the world and not just in India. So that's on the front end side. And then in the back end, I'm not you know, really just two questions rolled into one. Is it fair to say that you've in a sense centralized the science and the engineering and decentralized manufacturing, and that's how this phenomenal scale up is happening?

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): I think yeah. I mean, I would say that's partially true, in the sense that, today, when we started the company, obviously, the focus was, a lot on centralizing the R&D, centralizing the science and the engineering behind it, and which is why we, over indexed on having on having having our own scientist. And that was, like, you know, the reason that we had to raise investments early on and get that, ball rolling. Right? But that is paid off now and, you know, in the sense that, customers are able to appreciate. So every other, so this is where the front end and back end sort of meet. Right? Like, every month we have customers from Japan, from the US, who come visit our labs, visit our factories. They understand that, you know, the level of technical debt that we've created in these, assets is something that matches the seriousness that they are doing in their respective countries for, you know, whatever innovation that they're doing. Right? We started off with the manufacturing being in India, and now we've expanded quite a bit globally. In fact, as we speak, we are evaluating manufacturing in the US, in Japan. We already have stuff in Southeast Asia and the Middle East also. So, that's also happening. I would say that, the the way forward for us is actually, while a lot of the science and engineering will be in house, we're also seeing a very interesting trend that, you know, there's, there's a startup in Japan which is basically telling us that, hey. We've got the technology that we've perfected over the last ten years. Can you guys help us bring it to life in full commercial scale? Because we definitely can't do it in Japan because the costs are too expensive or whatever. Right? And we need a partner in India who can handle the whole process. So, you know, as we see this mature, we are seeing that even the technologies are actually coming from different parts of the world. And you can't really predict where the next big technical breakthrough will happen. Right? Like, there are countries which have done phenomenally well, like Korea, the US for that matter, Europe historically. So we will be working with all of these guys also as technology partners.

Utsav Somani: And talk to us a little bit about your scientific advisory board because I believe that's a key that you said that you needed capital for early on. And maybe give us two, three examples on what this advisory board has enabled for you. Like, some examples of actual materials being delivered for customers. Like, maybe if you can name them, I think that'll be phenomenal.

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Sure. So, our scientific advisory board is actually a team of, very senior folks, like veterans from the industry, across seven different countries now. So, and these guys I mean, there's for example, there's professor Judy Ata who's a a partnership in India. There's professor Dongshu Shin, who's a, you know, a senior scientist in, South Korea. There's, folks from Europe and, the US as well. So it's a it's a pretty diverse set, and they are the ones who sort of, guide us in terms of, you know, where the next big area of, growth is. Right? So, for example, now we are seeing a lot of growth in the semiconductor chemical space. That's a place where India is seeing a lot of fabs being set up, and there's, new back end supply chains of those that are being, set up, commercialized. Right? So that's a very interesting space that, we are working on, closely with our advisory board to see how feasible it is and, you know, what is the right path, to build this out over the next five years, ten years. So it's actually a very long term bet in terms of, you know, what is the industry supply chain and the chemistry looking like ten years out. Sorry. What was your second question?

Utsav Somani: And some examples of what this advisory board has enabled you to do. Like real customer examples, maybe materials that you've developed because of their inputs?

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Yeah. Yeah. Sure. So, actually, there's, you know, we work across a bunch of segments. So, primarily, I mean, when we started the company, we did a lot of life sciences and crop sciences. So life sciences basically is, pharmaceuticals, nutraceuticals, you know, fragrances, stuff like that. And, crop sciences, basically, agrochemicals largely. Those are those are those are the early sectors and still doing very well for us. I think, more recently, the the breakout sector for us has been the whole energy and infra space. Right? So that's something, whether it's a, a a a product that goes on a semiconductor to improve the conductivity of air or an etching that goes on to, these products, or cathode active materials that go into batteries. This whole energy electronic sector has been has been very interesting. There are products which we are still co-developing with our customer. But, yeah, I think, that's a lot of that guidance has come from a combination of our scientific advisory teams as well as, the customer's, R&D teams.

Dhruv Sharma: So Sachin, before we started the stream, we invited questions from the audience as we typically do now. We have to make good on that promise. So there's a question coming in from, well, the handle says forty boss. We'd love to know your real name as well. And the question is, are you planning to make ultra pure chemicals for semiconductor industry? So talk to us about this, Sachin, but also we'd love to know more about the advanced material side of the business. Right? We've in the past, we've had some guests come talk to us about specialty chemicals, but advanced materials we've not yet had a chance to come in the show to talk to us about that.

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Yeah. I think, the semiconductor answer, the short answer is yes. In fact, almost everything that goes into that space, requires a a level of ultra-high-purity stuff. So we are already doing, a lot of rare earth elements, based oxides and derivatives of those. The challenge here is actually twofold. So one is definitely to actually, there's a big supply glut all over in the world. But the supply glut actually doesn't end with just the, sourcing of the material. Right? You have to get it to the right purity level that can be used for these specific applications. So one is, like, you know, semiconductors is one application. There's also applications that go into MRI machines, for example, even defense application that go into, electronics on drones and stuff like that. Right? So, yes, we are actually doing that. In fact, our new R&D center in Bangalore is, primarily indexed towards the material science development part. Actually, funnily enough, I say that, you know, I I I studied medical science for my graduation, and I'm finally putting it to some use maybe. But, there's there's a bunch of folks, who are far more qualified and experienced than I am, in this space. What we are basically looking to do here is that we, our our belief is that, you know, the number of materials and especially the quality of materials that are going to come out, are are going to be needed in the future. Ultra high purity semiconductors is one example of it. Ultra high purity, rare earth elements that go into defense, permanent magnets, aerospace applications. These are, you know, the materials of the future. The capabilities to build this at scale do not exist in India. Other than a few smaller bodies, there's academic institutions and government bodies also who work on this. We are also working closely with them, sort of co-develop this technology. So we want to be the pioneers in terms of, setting up manufacturing as well as, technologies on this to be able to bring this, to the right supply chain.

Utsav Somani: And what's happening in the world of defense electronics for you? That's also a new pillar, I believe.

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Yeah. So, actually, defense is a industry that relies heavily on critical metals. So if you look at, you know, products such as tungsten, bismuth, a bunch of other, products, antimony, etcetera, these are also, you know, critical metals that, you know, first trial were just mined from the ground and, you know, there is somebody in, let's say, China who's processing this and, shipping it all over the world. Of course, because defense is such a topic of sovereignty, economic security, there's a lot more focus in terms of where these supply chains are coming in and, you know, how much we can build indigenously. Today, we're actually happy to say that a lot of that, even for Indian applications, we are able to build indigenously and get to that ultra-high-purity materials that can be used for, you know, applications and defense that go into, circuits, electronics, even warheads and, industrial tooling applications that go into that as well.

Dhruv Sharma: Sachin, I mean, before we went live, we were just chatting about, you know, how the business is doing, and it pretty much seems like it's in hyper growth mode. So when that happens and I was looking at your website. You've got colleagues all over the world, So you're also, expanding very rapidly, like, geographically. How do you balance all of that with what they call operating discipline?

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): I think, that is, something that, honestly, we are also you know, it's been a learning curve, and that's something that we're figuring out on the go. You know, the best way, that I think that has worked well for us is that, you know, we believe that, people all over the world, the best way to sort of solve that is also be there, spend time on the ground in terms of actually meeting customers. So we do that very actively, as we speak. My cofounder, Dheeraj, is there in the US meeting customers. I'm gonna be traveling to, Japan to meet some of our colleagues and customers there as well. So, you know, we've been, doing our best to sort of, you know, spend as much time on the ground as possible. But I think, you know, one one important thing I want to call out here is that, we've been significantly held today in the day and age of AI, in the sense that, you know, the entire technical network requires a lot of, context in terms of how customer queries are answered, how teams are assisted, and, you know, sales teams are even, helped out. And today, we've been able to plug in our entire intelligence and, you know, network, through, agentic harness that, you know, somebody sitting in the US at whatever time zone is actually able to access information that comes from a lot of our technical teams, you know, with a simple prompt of question. Right? So I think that is helping. And then, you know, in the future, I'm very bullish on, how we scale those harnesses, to

Dhruv Sharma: Is this one called Scinode?

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Scinode. Yes.

Utsav Somani: So, I mean, talk to us a little bit about this asset-light model because I think that's the fascinating part. You're manufacturing and supplying in over 40 countries, and manufacturing in maybe slightly lesser number of countries. But how do you manage all of this? Like, you mentioned previously that you wanna, I mean, backward integrate and actually build your own factories as well. Is there a thought that's crossed your mind recently?

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Definitely. So, yes, I think, see, building our own factories for anything and everything basically goes against the fundamental fabric of, what we are building, or the pieces of why we started. Right? But I think having spent time in this industry, we we realized that, for example, a lot of the, specialty chemicals that we were working on earlier, are areas where we see that there is, you know, I wouldn't say, like, a need for setting up a factory. But a lot of the newer segments I was talking about, which is, like, ultra-high-purity processing and, you know, maybe recycling as a segment, etcetera, these are not areas where, there's large factories that are already there, let alone underutilized. So I think those are areas that we would be evaluating, from a larger global footprint standpoint to see if it makes sense to set up factories. We would also see that, you know, from a, you know, diversification as well as economic security standpoint, if it makes sense to have, factories in, let's say, the US, in Europe also, Those are those are areas that we are evaluating. It wouldn't be a significant part. I mean, it's not like the entire company is going to be based out of factories that we own. I don't think that's ever happening. But, you know, individual opportunities, we will evaluate on a case by case basis. And, yes, I do see some factories a few years out.

Utsav Somani: Alright, Sachin. Thank you so much for coming on our show. Wishing you and the team a very best ahead.

Sachin Santhosh (Scimplify): Thank you so much, Saf.

Utsav Somani: Alright, listeners. Moving on to our next segment. We've got Shweta from SPF, Startup Policy Forum. Shweta, welcome to the show.

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Hi. It's, hi, Dhruv. Great to be here.

Utsav Somani: Great to see you. Alright. Good to be, chatting with you. And, should we start with an explainer of what Startup Policy Forum is and what you were doing in Japan with all the founders and Mr. Piyush Goyal?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Alright. I love explaining what Startup Policy Forum is, because we're just a 20-month-old institution and, definitely one which is very unique in its structure and approach. So just to help you understand, we are a startup that serves the startup ecosystem. And, essentially, we work around four pillars that would serve. One is policy advocacy, which is core to what we do. It it sits in our name, Startup Policy Forum, and we help bridge the gap between, founders and policymakers. So, essentially, sometimes I like to say we we we bring Bangalore to Delhi. We bring HSR layout and Indiranagar to, you know, Vigyan Bhavan and Udyog Bhavan when needed. But the idea really is to ensure that, founders and new-age nation builders, I'd like to call them, members of Startup Policy Forum, have a seat at the table with the government. So that's our first pillar. Our second pillar is a lot around community building. Much like ecosystem enablers like you, we love to bring the community together, which includes investors, ecosystem enablers, founders, as well as government stakeholders. So that's the second bucket of what we do. The third is a lot of global outreach. You mentioned Japan, but I think we're building a network that we think our members and our founders will be able to use to build companies that are built from India for the world and build that global network, help them open doors. And last is a bit of thought leadership and content where we also, like you, love telling stories of founders and the startups they're building. So that's what Startup Policy Forum is all about.

Dhruv Sharma: Fantastic. Shweta, we first used to see you a lot on NDTV when, you know, when you were in your first avatar. I have to ask you, how are we doing, by the way?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): You guys are doing great, I must say. And I think I'm so excited about, new-age media because I think we also rest SPF on the philosophy that new India needs new institutions. So we definitely need new media, and you're the new media.

Utsav Somani: Well, thank you for the support and always giving us a shout out and supporting our, social media presence as well. Thank you so much again.

Dhruv Sharma: Thank you for that. Shweta, can you tell us at this point in time, at this moment in time, which, sectors are great candidates for policy support and advocacy and why?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): So it's a very interesting question and one that I got get asked very often. And I would say that, three sectors are exciting us a lot in the policy space right now. One, of course, is fintech, and that's because a large part of our membership is still, you know, dominantly, fintech companies that I describe as a crown jewel of India's startup ecosystem. And we've got the who's who when it comes to fintech, you know, right from Groww, Zerodha, Razorpay, CRED, Pine Labs, you know, ACKO. We've got it across several segments of fintech. We've got some of the topmost members, 30 plus members who are, who who we work with. Fintech remains exciting because it's highly regulated, and it needs a lot of regulatory, intervention and hand holding. We know there's a lot going on with regard to MDR, and I'm gonna park that for later. But I think Fintech will remain a sector that will require a lot of, I would say, regulatory attention always. The second and third sectors that I think where there's a lot going on is, of course, AI and deep tech. And deep tech, I know, is a catchall phrase right now. We use it loosely. But within deep tech, there are so many subsectors whether it's semiconductors, drones, aerospace, robotics, and there is just so much action both within the government and the ecosystem on deep tech that that's an area we're working on very actively on on policy support to the government and to the ecosystem. And the third is AI. That's, again, a no brainer. With everything that's going on in AI around the world and AI regulations, we are also working actively with the government, on on AI and AI policymaking as well as with with the ecosystem.

Utsav Somani: I think a little bit more personal question. You spent twenty five years reporting on policy, then you spent time, I mean, doing actually policy work with Sequoia, Salesforce, Uber. At what point did you decide you wanted to build an industry body around it?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Great question again. You know, Utsav, I I would say it was nearly two decades, about eighteen, nineteen years actively in the media covering policy and covering the economic policy landscape of the country. And then over a decade now as a policy professional across Uber Salesforce, Sequoia Capital that's now Peak XV. And I think close to 3Decades of work in the policymaking space, whether it's media or it's public policy actively, made me realize one thing that I think India has changed, but our institutions have not. You know? Institutions have just not kept pace with the needs of what, the current new economy requires. And I think that realization helped me understand that there's a clear white space. There is a gap to be fulfilled where, you know, new-age nation builders, founders, the new economy needs a new style of advocacy, a new-age way of doing advocacy. And I think the other thing that I felt was that we wanted to bring a lot of rigor as well as intellectual honesty to policymaking conversations. I think the time that we're in right now, whether it is geopolitically or technologically. I mean, the this is this is absolutely transformational, what we're seeing happen around the world. And if at this point, we don't have industry, and by industry, I mean, every single founder who's building right now, if people are not gonna take active part in policymaking conversations, we're really missing an opportunity because can I tell you the government wants to hear from everyone? The government wants to hear from the founders. The founders want a seat at the table. So it was a new no brainer that we needed a body that could bridge this gap and that could, you know, sort of act as that, I sometimes say, translator in the room or a bridge between the two ecosystems, but that's what we're here to do.

Dhruv Sharma: I think just a quick follow-up to that, Shweta. So, again, I'm gonna borrow from what you said. When you have, on the one hand, these legacy institutions and on the other hand, these new economy, you know, companies that, constitute industry and there's a trust deficit in between, how does working with a body like SPF really help bridge that trust deficit over a period of time, especially when you show up as a collective?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Sure. And I think that's the power of the collective that matters. Right? Today, in a short span of twenty months, we have scaled to represent 75, you know, high-growth startups in India. This includes and, you know, of course, we use the word startup very loosely as well, but at least all of us who have been part of the ecosystem understand what what we mean when we say startups. A startup could also be a unicorn, could be a decacorn, could be a listed new-age company. So while we use that term startup in a in a broad based way, this is really new economy that we're referring to. And I think the the the exciting part of this is that over the years, what I have seen is legacy businesses or India Inc as we like to call them or corporate India as we like to call them, you know, they understand policymaking, and they've been doing it in a certain way and style over the years. Also, having worked with large multinationals like Uber and Salesforce, you realize that big tech also gets its public policy very well. Right? When when we were at Uber and Salesforce, we had large budgets to influence policy. We had big teams. You know, to give you an example at Uber, we had a 12 member team that was just dedicated to India and Southeast Asia. I mean, just imagine, the kind of, I would say, investment and time and effort that goes into public policy by some of these large, multinationals. Similarly, I mean, in fact, why just talk about India? Uber's public policy and communications team globally, when I was there, was about 300 people. And, again, when you look at Meta, you look at Google, you look at Amazon, all of those big tech companies make a lot of investments in public policy. They understand and prioritize it. And during my time working with Sequoia Capital, Peak XV partners, and working with absolutely brilliant founders, the one thing I realized is that we need a lot of hand holding and understanding on why policy is important. And once you understand that, how is it to be done? It's data-driven. It's evidence-driven. There is an art and a science to it. So how do you go about it? I think that's that's the part that excites me. Specifically, to answer your question, Dhruv, it's not easy always because there are obviously lot of pressure groups. The government's job's not easy. They have to listen to everybody. But I think that's the reason why we exist because we wanna make sure that if, you know, legacy institutions, legacy, corporate India has a seat at the table, if big tech has a seat at the table, if large multinationals have a seat at the table, then why not our founders and why not the new economy?

Utsav Somani: Let's pick up some live policy threats. So MDR on UPI, you've got tax treatment for reverse flips. You want neutrality in that. And then ESOPs, also are a big topic of discussions. What are the startups asking for? How is that coming along?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Yeah. I think we, at any point in time, are working on at least, 20 to 30 policy priorities depending on what our members want. But to touch upon the three that you have mentioned, ESOPs, of course, has been an age old conversation where we want India to have slightly different tax treatment, you know, when it comes to ESOP taxation. There is a a a kind of double taxation. There is a taxation even before, you're at the point of exercise, even before ESOPs have been invested. It is a big pain point impacting the entire startup ecosystem, not just founders, but literally everyone who is an ESOP holder gets impacted, and I think that's an active conversation. The government has its viewpoint, and it's an ongoing conversation with the government. When it comes to reverse flips, more than taxation, Utsav, I think the part that we've already solved for largely, but we continue to work with the government to make the process easier, is just the time constraint and just the how cumbersome the process is. So earlier, for reverse flipping, it was required to go through a judicial process, which means through NCLT, which was a judicial body. You had to apply for a foreign company to flip back into India. Now with a lot of policy advocacy, we've managed to get the process down to bypassing NCLT altogether and applying straight to the regional director, which means you're easily saving, I would say, possibly more than a year's time in reverse flipping. So I think it's about procedural delays that we have solved for. The taxation question only comes in in some cases in a reverse merger case. It does not come in. So taxation during reverse flip is less of an India problem. You do get taxed at your at at at the at the home country. And lastly, on MDR, again, it's a very live topic. Again, there are so many I would say within within the fintech ecosystem, there are so many views and and and points, but I think we're at a stage where the government has recognized that UPI has been such a fantastic enabler, for India's digital payments ecosystem. It has taken India's, digital payment ecosystem even global. We've seen tremendous growth by keeping the merchant discount rate zero, but now is the time, for the fintech ecosystem to make it more sustainable and to make it more equitable. So we're working again actively with government stakeholders to ensure that there is parity when it comes to UPI economics.

Dhruv Sharma: Shweta, now you've been in many of these rooms and on many of these tables. I'm wondering if you if in the moment, you can come up with an example of, you know, a time when a founder was able to make and I know it's it's more than just, like, speaking once, but when a founder was able to make a case so persuasively in real time that whoever was on the other side said, alright. We'll go back and maybe reverse or at least reconsider our policy posture. Maybe there's a lesson in there for founders on how to do it.

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Yeah. We've seen that happen. You know, we with the best best part of our work is when we see faces light up, either, with the government or, with the founders. And I can give you an example of a recent meeting we had with some finance ministry, stakeholders around the the digital gold ecosystem that continues to face some regulatory, I would say, you know, headwinds. But, you know, sometimes we understand how simple it is to simply explain a particular business model or a sector or a space to a regulator or a policymaker. And I remember we were in one of those meetings where we had a bunch of fintech founders with us, and we were talking with the top government official and trying to explain digital gold. And, you know, they really had an, an an incorrect and I would say misplaced understanding of what digital gold really is. And, you know, one of the founders along with me, you know, we literally took our phone. We opened the app. I showed him the app that I had on my phone and how I was, you know, doing a daily digital gold saving to just to understand because very often we we tell founders, demo your product to the government. It's almost like you're you're talking to the to your customer, right, or you're talking to any other stakeholder. Just demo the product, help them understand how it works because half the times, they don't get it. Right? And it's not because they don't they don't want to. It's just because nobody has cared to explain it to them. And I think the sudden shift that we saw in that policy maker, in a very senior decision maker's perspective on digital gold was very, very heartening because all it took was those what literally that two minute elevator pitch in which you can explain your product or your business model, and they're like, ah, we understand this is kosher. Right? You're not running away with somebody's money. You can withdraw the gold. It sits right there. It's transparent. Technology actually makes it transparent. So I think we encounter many such situations, Dhruv, where all it needs is, just a bit of, I would say, effective communication to get your message through.

Utsav Somani: And semiconductors seem to be having a moment, right, in the country where, our minister, Ashwini, is putting out, clips about, explaining fabless wafers and many other things in the semiconductor industry. You made a report out of it also, and you launched the semiconductor consortium as well. So talk to us about what's happening on ground.

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Yeah. So I think, Utsav, what we have identified is that within the broader new economy ecosystem, there will be subsectors and sectors that will see a lot more action both from the innovation side as well as from the policymaking side. And when you marry the two, that's where you see magic happen. You know, just yesterday, we were at, an event organized by an investor. We had the founder of a Granny Labs with us, and he was explaining to top decision makers, top policymakers about some of the changes that are happening. And, you know, in real time, again, they were understanding, the innovation ecosystem. Right? So I think what is very, very important is that, you know, when it comes to our semiconductor companies, when it comes to the innovation that we're seeing, they are able to take an active part with the government that also realizes India's semiconductor potential. I think everybody has watched Ashwini minister Ashwini Vaishnaw's video and the kind of potential that the government sees. Now, you know, to me, what's exciting is I actually when we sit in these rooms, we realize the government is speaking exactly the same language as the founder. There is absolutely no difference. What you need is just the two talking to each other and arriving at a place where policies can be enabling. And semiconductor is actually ripe with that. We've just seen ISM 2.0 come out. We've just seen the rules coming through. The kind of active conversations we had in the run up to that, I think that to me is where the magic is happening, where actively the government is listening to stakeholders who are truly builders. And this is not and, you know, inputs that we end up giving are real inputs. These are inputs from founders who are truly building, and then they're incorporating them into real policymaking. And that's what's really happening.

Dhruv Sharma: In most of these conversations, Shweta, generally, industry is making a case for deregulation or light touch regulation. But, if you if you flip that a little bit, are there active sectors right now which you as a as an industry body would like to see get regulated in the near future?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Well, I think the hot topic there is AI. Right? Within AI, again, there is just so much that is going on. And, you know, in my, I would say years of doing policy, I've never seen such an active conversation where people are actually saying, you know what? We wanted light-touch. Yes. But we want some regulations. We want some understanding because, you know, when it comes to the enterprise adoption of AI, there is still a huge trust deficit with regard to AI adoption. And the popular understanding is that unless we have some guardrails and checks and balances, we're not gonna see that accelerated enterprise adoption in AI for AI come through because everybody wants to work within certain boundaries and guardrails. So for the first time actively, we're seeing conversations where, you know, whenever there would be an innovation or as we famously say in the world of policy, you know, innovation precedes regulation, and then we push back and push back and wait until it there is no choice but for an for for a particular subsector to get regulated, and that's when the conversations begin. I think for AI, it's happening very differently. We already see a very proactive stance on, you know, I would say a lot of stakeholders saying, you know what? Let's get ahead of this, and let's try and do it. And yet this is a technology where nobody can get ahead of it. Right? Forget policymakers. How do you regulate a technology like AI where there is just so much going on? So I would say that this is the most fascinating time to be in policy because we are seeing in real time conversations around the globe and so many burning issues with regard to AI, whether it is harm or it's copyright or it is, you know, just just generally what AGI is gonna do and, you know, how do you how do you just regulate a technology like this? So I think those active conversations is India are gonna see a separate AI regulation. Are we going to just have the current, you know, rules, whether it is around data privacy or it is the current IT rules, take care of everything that AI is posing as a possible risk or harm. I think those are very active conversations that we love being a part of. And I think to answer your question, this is the first time we're seeing some sort of push to actually get regulations in place.

Utsav Somani: So building on that, you've capped, the membership for SPF at 100 members. And how do you deal with is that a reason is that one of the reasons that you've capped it at 100 because, potential member conflicts can arise as well? Like, somebody wants, like, faster execution of MDR. Some somebody doesn't want that. So is that something that, you how do you handle something like that in a group, like yours?

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Yeah. I think we want to bring a lot of, intellectual honesty and rigor to policy conversations, and we do encounter situations like these. And I think one thing that a lot of industry bodies in India are are failing to do is help resolve some of these issues, which could be potential conflicts within a sector. I think the one thing that I always, you know, talk to founders about is, you know, let's go as a united force and let's resolve these conflicts. And I think we saw that happen in gaming, which is a classic, I would say, lesson for everybody in policy in the policy world on, you know, what could go wrong if you if you're not united or if you don't have a have a consensus view on policy. Right? And I think growing from that example, we often tell founders, let's go together as one voice, and whatever we need to resolve, let's resolve in the back end. Or if there is a conflicting view, we can put out dissenting notes and say, this is a view. So I think we try to solve for these issues. We definitely don't want to sit out of a policymaking conversation just because we think two of our members don't agree. But to your point on on the number of members, yes. We've been going slow despite a lot of, I would say, requests coming in. We're right now at about 75 members. We're sitting on at least thirty, forty more leads of members who want to come, but we want to give a put a very high bar on the quality of service we provide. And I think just the sheer volume of work that we're doing with our members right now, we're very happy with where we are. We are going to expand to about a 100 members and then pause and see and go back to our original members. You know, serve, some of the original members who backed us and who believed in us and supported us, we wanna make sure that we are never going away from our promise of being always available, of providing high quality, attention to them. And I think that remains the core of what we do. Of course, we end up doing a lot more across our other pillars, but we wanna make sure we're very thoughtful about our design choices and how we're expanding.

Utsav Somani: Awesome. Thank you so much for coming on our show, Shweta. Wishing you a very best ahead for SPF.

Shweta Rajpal Kohli (Startup Policy Forum): Thank you, sir. Thank you, Dhruv. Great to be here.

Dhruv Sharma: Thank you for your time.

Utsav Somani: Alright. Listeners, final guest before we move, closer to the weekend, we've got Teja from Water. Teja, welcome to the show.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Hey. Hi, also. Thank you so much for hosting me.

Utsav Somani: I think before I ask you what the company does, I wanna ask, how did you get the trademark for something like this?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): I think the world is sleeping.

Utsav Somani: Are you serious? You can trademark, water? Yeah.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): It's available, and then I we hold it both in The States and India.

Utsav Somani: Holy Moses. I didn't even know that. Cool off white t shirt, by the way.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Thank you.

Utsav Somani: Awesome. So what is WATER doing now?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): WATER is a biophysical intelligence company. We build, in in simplest way, we build the human surface interaction layer of this world. How should the surfaces around us adapt to the humans so that, humans can lead a better quality of life? That's it. That's the the simplest problem statement to start with. We can double tap and go on and on and on on this topic. But, yeah, that's, in short, what it is.

Utsav Somani: Maybe, like, explain some of the products. So you've got VORTEX, you've got CAMA, you've got a bed, you've got a chair which is coming up. So I mean, talk a little bit about that so we can, like, paint a better picture.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Sure. The easiest way to look at this problem is, as humans, right, all of us have one common problem, which is, this is how we're supposed to sit. Like like, we deprioritize posture management the moment we find something more important. It could be listening, reading, typing, coding, sleeping, what whatnot, everything. So how can we manage our postures when we actually cannot anymore? So that's where, we decided, let's build a world that adapts humans. Like, for example, imagine, multiple degrees of freedom chair, a multiple degrees of freedom bed, multiple degrees of freedom not not the sofa, couch, airplane seat, car seat, anything you can think of. Anything that you can actually interact with. You can you can like, which is a chair, obviously, which you can sit or which you can stand or or which you can sleep. Today, we're going after sleeping and sitting. One fine day, we'll go after standing as well. But the idea is we want to build a world of robots that are working for the humans, but not just replacing humans like others.

Dhruv Sharma: I like this. Teja wants the brain to spend zero calories in all those you know, when we were young, you'd get those instructions like sit up straight, throw back your shoulders. You don't want the brain spending any calories in that. But Teja, talk to us a little bit about those surfaces. Like, now I thought that was a very interesting way to describe what you're building. How many surfaces does a human being come in contact with through the course of the day? I've never even never even thought about it that way.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): See, we divide okay. Let's let's try to attack this problem from the, number of hours in a day. More than number of surfaces.

Dhruv Sharma: Yeah.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Eight hours of sleeping, eight hours of sitting, and eight hours of standing for lack of whatever. Right? It's it's not true, but, like, let's assume sixteen hours a day for sure, we'll either be sitting or sleeping. Now, the types of surfaces human surfaces humans interact are, the morning they wake up from the bed, they sit in their car seat or dining table seat having their breakfast, and then car seat, and then they come to office, their work chair, their, lunch table, chair, the table, the desk, the, again, electrician airplane airplane, seat going back home, couch, sofa, lounger, bar stool, like like like there are a lot of surfaces we can think of. And none of them today understand, who is Drew, who is Teja, who is this. So what do what do we want? Where are we in our life? What is the stage of our life are we in? What are we prioritizing for? Nothing they don't understand. They just dump static, nonliving, dead beings living amongst us.

Utsav Somani: And you invented a word active ergonomics. That's the first time I've heard of that. So that builds on this, philosophy of yours. Can you double down on that?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Yeah. Yeah. It's like it's for lack of better word, it's, ergonomics itself is a field of, designing, stuff so that, it doesn't cause harm to humans. But, for lack of better word, we or for lack of better compute slash I mean, efficacy of robotics and materials, we are stuck with passive world. Anything any chair you can think of is fundamentally passive, ergonomic chair. Chair. Anything a bed is there's something like ergonomics in the bed today in the first place, which is very sad. But, it's not like there is there is passive ergonomics was designed by humans. It's just that they couldn't do anything till then till now. They were like we were we were all just constrained by access to compute, access to materials, access to robots. That's it. So we decided, let's put an actual use of robots and robotics to actually solve human problems other than replacing humans. So active ergonomics is just a a a a a for what we call passionately internal company internal to a company, a word to to tell the world is moving away from passive world to an active world, like a passive-noise-cancellation world to active noise cancellation. That's the idea behind us, the finding the word of active ergonomics.

Dhruv Sharma: Earlier in the day, I was seeing one of your products, which is, CAMA, or is it's a CAMA. Right? I guess that's what you call it. And minus the mattress, it's very interesting. The structure is very interesting. It's like there are surfaces, sensors, actuators. Talk to us talk to us about all of that, like the engineering behind the bed.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Oh my god. I can go on and on and on on the engineering. Let's start with the thesis, and then let's go on to the engineering. It's much easier. Okay. Imagine any surface is divided into pixels, and each pixel can be controlled for whatever, a control system. That's it. That is what the inter engineering is about. We divide it into as many aspects as possible, which our financial constraints will let us do. Will let it will will not okay. Right? What does not let us do will not stop us from doing it. And, there are a lot of sensors. We sense, then reason. We actuate. I mean, we act. In this case, action. And, again, we learn from the human vitals on how the, what did we do in the in the in the real world. And then, again, do the next action. Again, sense, learn, analyze, act. So it's it's the same loop. So, at a high level, a physical engineering is surface is divided to multiple pixels, and each pixel is controlled using a control system. And the physical intelligence engineering is about this specific loop I spoke about. Sense, reason, action, learn. And, again, sense, reason, action, learn.

Utsav Somani: And this must be super expensive, right, if you're putting, like, 10,000 sensors and motors and, like, I mean, controlling every pixel differently?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Yeah. I mean, today, we do not control each and every pixel, though the objective is to control all 10,000 pixels at some point. Today, we, even though we sense it 10,000-pixel resolution, we act only at the 46-point resolution. We don't act at 10,000-pixel resolution because each resolution is massively expensive to actuate today. I mean, we have, we are we're actually researching on something, on materials to get to that, but today, we we can't talk much on that. It's expensive, inexpensive, or not so expensive. I don't know. But, it is $12,000.

Utsav Somani: $12,000. So how much is an Eight Sleep for?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Eight Sleep as a mattress topper plus Eight Sleep mattress plus Eight Sleep base. All of them for a California king split comes to around 9 to $10,000, if I'm not wrong.

Utsav Somani: Okay. So not too different Yeah. In terms of pricing at least. And Eight Sleep as, I mean, widespread adoption at least in the more developing developed markets.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Yeah. Yeah. Eight Sleep as primarily after temperature. We are, primarily after, MSK. Musculoskeletal. Yeah.

Dhruv Sharma: Speaking of, Teja, how do you guys, study the human body anatomy, the biomechanics of it, and the the exoskeleton or the term that you use?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Endoskeletons. Endoskeleton. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I mean, two two simplest answers. We have researchers from math, physics chemistry, and biology on the team. So we all constantly learn and work with, an like, an adviser council of neurosurgeons and Ardo. And, together we and get like, enrich our understanding of biomechanics. And that's how we design this product. But, I mean, that's much easier. The more I mean, the more serious answer for me is, it's a real time feedback. Right? Like, RL reinforcement learning with real time human feedback or autonomous human signals. We take the vitals of a human. So, for example, let's say you're sleeping, and then we do something. We we on, let's say, some row and some column, some pixel, and, your HR changed during the sleep done to follow it to normal pattern. We know it's, it's not what we want to do. So the machine, like, the learn the system learns that it doesn't need to do it again. So the objective is, the it's itself learning, it's self evolving machine, and, the model is getting, smarter day over day. Right, but it's night over night.

Utsav Somani: And talk to us about the model itself. Vortex, which is the foundational model. So is it collecting a lot of real world data like how Tesla is, why are their cars, and improving their models on the go?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Yeah. The only difference is, there's no simulation data available. So we, collect all the data ourselves today.

Utsav Somani: So you've trained basically VORTEX on entirely all data collected by you?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Yeah. Yeah.

Utsav Somani: And what will it enable for you in the future?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Today, we have already established cross user transfer. What it means is something, also, it's never seen you in its life. The model can instantly work on you, keeping you the best comfortable sleep, at the same time, not compromising on your health, of your back health. But what we haven't yet established is cross surface transfer. The same model, when we put it on a chair or put it on a car seat or as, airplane seat, you should ideally pick up from the point where it it left off from the bed. Or, like, even have even even other than that, it should just work for your betterment. Even on a new surface is what we are actually actively working on today. Like, what we call cross surface transfer. The model's efficacy on multiple surfaces without showing the surface also to the model. Like, imagine, like, a general purpose biophysical intelligence. You take any device. You just, slap the model onto it. It should ideally be managing you the best.

Dhruv Sharma: Oh, fascinating. I'm you know what I'm thinking about, Teja, right now is in before, you know, water ro robotics came along, what were the most comfortable, you know, seating and lying options available to people? Like, you must have done your research.

Utsav Somani: Herman Miller chairs. Like, I remember, like, Angelus has this thing where, like, Herman Miller chairs was, like, standard spec. Like, I've I've seen some job post as well in Silicon Valley that standard Herman Miller chairs are issued along with MacBook Pros.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Wow.

Utsav Somani: Is that the most comfortable chair in the world?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): I'll I'll I mean, it's very it's a okay.

Utsav Somani: You don't wanna call them out?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): No. I mean, like, I'm I'm fine calling I mean, it's it's all good all good with everyone. They're doing the best in their I mean, with whatever they can do. Yeah. Under that constraints, right, whatever the constraints. We are constraint free. We can, I mean, we we we we are changing the game from passive to active? So a passive I mean okay. Let's take step back. You are an active body. Like, it's a it's an active system. You fundamentally have to keep moving. You can't be static. There is like like, I can't put you on a static surface and say, hey. Live. You can't you you move. You continuously change pressure across multiple discs of the body. You continuously change your posture. You this like, let's say, if you attend to you again, suddenly move forward, and then you relax, you can go back. So all these things happen. So it's it's not like we are a static object. So if you're static, how can a static surface be slapped onto an active human and then let everything happen, which it fundamentally, it can't. So there is where we come with an active surface, number one. So having said that, coming to the word comfort, comfort, for lack of better word, is very subjective. For some folks, it is common. Some folks, I think, for some folks, it's human skeleton. For some folks, it's steel case. I got about it. There are different types of comfort, like, people can think of. But, do you measure today what has happened to your body? Craving for the comfort? No one. So we help you not compromise your comfort. In fact, that is, you know, the best comfort the world can give, without, creating any harm to you as a human. So, I mean, it's it's it's a it's a different, field for us is how I view it.

Utsav Somani: Alright. So let's close this out. 2,500,000 you've raised, with India. Congrats on that. And the release mentioned that you're doing cars and airplanes next?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): No. No. Car seats and airplane seats.

Utsav Somani: Car seat I mean, seats. I mean, of course, the ergonomic aspect of it. So you're just renting those

Dhruv Sharma: comfortable airline seats, especially in coach. Are there Indian airlines that are right now putting, like, almost, like, those bus lights?

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Exactly. Yeah. I have myself have an L4-L5 disc bulge. So, it is irritating because it's chronic. Anytime I stress it out, it come the pain comes back. Like, for example, now I'm pretty cool. Let's say if I take an economy coach class ticket to Phoenix, over 34 hours layover layover, That's it. Welcome to, like, nightmare. So, that that really should be happening. The world shouldn't be so dumb. It should ideally know that I have a disc bulge and should take care of me.

Utsav Somani: Alright. Wishing we see that future very soon. Thank you so much for coming on our show, and thank you again.

Teja Vinukollu (WATER): Thank you, sir. Bye bye.

Utsav Somani: Thanks, Cheers.

Dhruv Sharma: But, sir, if you know the only other seat that I can think of that is more useful to to humans is it's called a Martin Baker ejection seat, for fighter aircraft. And that's the one. Yeah. That's that. And you know what's the only metric they measure? Lives saved. So every time a pilot ejects somewhere in the world on their Twitter page, Martin Baker says, oh, 7,500 lives saved. And I'm like, you know, for any company that that what a metric to that.

Utsav Somani: Yeah. I think Volvo also is, it's I mean, they market themselves as one of the safest cars in the world. And there's this documentary on Netflix that's come out, make 21 pay here. So I wanna watch that. I saw a clip of it. It says, I mean, how fast it goes and stuff just because you said, fire fighter jets. So I think it's fascinating. Alright. What are you looking at? Wow. Dude, this is insane. Like, I mean, what the launch video talks about is just fascinating. Like, I think so I'm gonna do a readout of some statistics and stuff, about what OpenAI launched, I mean, early in the morning today. OpenAI launched Gbree six Astra. It's the sixth generation model. The first one, under the six moniker, and, it's priced at 10 and 50 per million tokens for input and output respectively. And they've called it critical for cyber capability under its own preparedness framework, which almost nobody else, and which is why almost nobody can use it yet. And that's why the president, Greg Brockman, also told reporters that it's unreasonable to feel that we are now it's not unreasonable to feel that now we're in the AGI era. So AGI is here. And, I mean, people are putting up screenshots and videos of what they've made from this whole thing. It's fascinating. I can't wait to get my hands on it. And this is also the first one that they trained at that Stargate, cluster in Texas. One line GPUs were used to pretrain this, and agents were overlooking the training of this whole thing. I mean, we're living in alternative sci fi reality now.

Dhruv Sharma: Okay. Okay. Like, AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI AGI.

Utsav Somani: Let's get a gong on our, show and, like, ring it now. AGI has got guys. But, it's 2.5 x, Sol's, 5.6 model promotional price and on level with Anthropic's table 5.1 right now. But the benchmarks and everything is just fascinating. I mean, just look at this. You can literally, I mean, this video in itself is fascinating. So there are I mean, we spoke about instinct on the last show. You can literally just while making a presentation, ask it to book a tennis court for you or a pickleball court for you, and it'll do it in the background. Like so I think they're setting the ball, in motion for the hardware devices to come out, very, very soon. But it just literally blows every model out on all of those benchmarks that are out there. So it's fascinating.

Dhruv Sharma: I'm gonna ask you, Nadi. Is OpenAI back in the poll position?

Utsav Somani: It is by a mile by a mile. Anthropic is being left behind and, I mean, look at the things, dude. Like, I mean, it can create a circuit board, I mean, redesigned in, like, seconds now.

Dhruv Sharma: Yeah.

Utsav Somani: And so I think that's what there's meaning by AGI that they can literally create new knowledge from this. So I think that truly will be a true test if AGI is here or not, if it can really invent new cures.

Dhruv Sharma: I I just noticed Encore on their page.

Utsav Somani: Go Encore, baby. But, I mean, it's yeah. I mean, you can make your games like 3D models like this. I mean, g d would probably spend, like, ten years making g d s six, but g d s seven should be out much sooner now that, this is here. Like, I mean, you can literally, like, do a walk through of any property. Just put in a Zillow link, and it'll create a 3D walk through for you on the fly. It's crazy. Alrighty. Sounds good. I think, let's end this show on that note, and happy to to anyone who's celebrating. We'll see you on Monday. Have a wonderful and a safe weekend. Thank you for tuning in. Bye bye.