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Twelfth Episode of Crafting Bharat Podcast Series Discover the transformative impact of AWS on startup journeys through diverse use cases. 

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Kumara Raghavan, Head of Startup Sales at AWS India, talks about how AWS empowers startups through essential tools and innovative applications.

India boasts the world’s third-largest startup ecosystem and is on track to become the third-largest economy globally. India offers abundant opportunities, great potential, and is home to disruptive innovators with transformative ideas. Furthermore, it has the second-largest developer base in the world, reinforcing its position as a leading technology and innovation powerhouse.

The ‘Crafting Bharat – A Startup Podcast Series’ is powered by AWS and is an initiative by NewsReach in association with VCCircle. The podcast aims to uncover the secrets behind successful entrepreneurs’ journeys, providing valuable insights for aspiring entrepreneurs and business enthusiasts. The series is hosted by Gautam Srinivasan, a well-known personality with a diverse range of TV and digital programs. He currently serves as a consulting editor at CNBC (India), CNN-News18, Forbes India, and The Economic Times.

In a podcast discussion with Kumara Raghavan, Head of Startup Sales at AWS India, we explored how Amazon Web Services has become an essential support system for many Indian startups, enabling them to enter new and global markets. The conversation highlighted the growth of India’s startup industry and how entrepreneurs leverage technology to solve widespread problems. For instance, MoEngage, a company in the customer experience space, expanded into the ASEAN market with AWS’s assistance. They gained networking opportunities to connect with over 200 CMOs across six ASEAN countries, leading to high-quality business prospects. AWS’s support and networking capabilities, along with the advantages of a containerized world, open up new possibilities and help lower the cost of curiosity for startups.

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We are seeing Bharat in terms of Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities and towns emerge as a fertile ground with over 50% of DPIIT recognized startups coming from these areas today. What’s your sense of the transformative effect of these Bharatiya startups in making India atmanirbhar? 

As of December 2023, there are over 117,000 startups listed with DPIIT. That’s quite a phenomenal achievement, and as you say, a lot of this is coming not just from Tier 1 cities or the metro cities but also from Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. I believe the expansion has reached Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, fueled by startups. If you look at jobs, for example, over 12.4 lakh jobs have been created by startups, which is quite impressive. Today’s startups are emerging from every state and union territory, spanning 80% of the districts. This truly shows India’s potential and the untapped power of innovation that we are all eagerly looking forward to.

In running a startup there’s always a balance needed between innovation and costs, especially in their starting phase since building a minimum viable product involves constant experimentation and being curious about upcoming consumer habits, trends, and pain points. How is AWS helping startups build products without worrying about costs? 

I think you have touched upon an important point. Often, people see it as two diametrically opposite ends: either being innovative or being very cost-conscious. However, I think they are really two sides of the same coin and, counterintuitively, both go hand in hand. Typically, when depicting the journey of a startup, particularly those in their initial stages, they conceive a brilliant concept, construct their product, develop the MVP, and endeavor to attain product-market fit. At this phase, extensive experimentation is essential to substantially enhance the customer experience, not just marginally. This is where AWS’s flagship ‘Activate Program’, in operation since 2013, comes into play. Startups in the early stages can benefit greatly from AWS credits, which offer access to a range of services, including computing, storage, networking, databases, and advanced solutions like AI/ML. This access allows them to experiment and innovate with minimal risk, as they can “fail fast” with little to no penalty.

For example, when it comes to technological innovation, AWS’s custom Graviton processors offer a significant advantage. Compared to traditional x86 compute options, Graviton provides a 40% improvement in price-to-performance ratio. This leads to a substantial increase in ROI, as businesses benefit from enhanced performance while also reducing costs. This innovation not only boosts performance but also delivers significant cost savings.

Take us through some conversations that you’ve had with startups on challenges that they face around building capabilities and mastering new technologies to future-proof their business since the narrative has shifted from pure growth to profitability for this ecosystem?

Currently, our conversations tend to be around how to use Generative AI, which is one of the most transformational technologies of our times. What they’re looking to do is improve the efficiency and creativity of their own employees while also enhancing the customer’s journey. When they try out new technologies, they want to do it right. That’s where our philosophy comes in: although there is a new technology, there are some foundational principles that are best adhered to if you want to get it right.

A great example is DeHaat, which operates with a “farmer-first” philosophy. They currently serve about 1.8 million farmers across 11 states in India through 11,000 DeHaat centers. DeHaat assists farmers by addressing various challenges, such as crop classification, disease prediction and remediation, and yield forecasting, to optimize the supply chain.

By utilizing tools like Amazon SageMaker and Amazon Redshift, DeHaat has achieved impressive results. They have helped farmers reduce costs by up to 15%, improved yield predictability by 90%, and increased the accuracy of disease prediction and remediation by 80%. This highlights how integrating advanced technology with a strong foundational philosophy can drive significant improvements and create lasting value for both businesses and their customers.

For startups with game-changing ambitions for Generative AI, how does AWS Accelerator enable them to be up and running within weeks? 

We run AWS Machine Learning (ML) Elevate, which is the cohort for ML-based startups. We have had a number of startups come up through that program; to name a few, we had Blend and Dübverse. To elaborate on Blend, they’re making commercial-grade photography accessible to SMBs. Blend can help you with removing backgrounds and polishing images in a matter of seconds, making them readily available to be displayed on 16 different e-commerce sites and 8 different social media platforms. They are essentially reducing the dependence of SMBs on professional photographers for making their products highly visible.

The startup ecosystem in India has witnessed significant growth over the last decade, driven by increasing technology adoption and urbanization. With various AWS services, we are making the startup journey more efficient for disruptive founders.

Quote: One of our leadership principles is customer obsession; we aim to deliver measurable impact.

Byline under the photo: Kumara Raghavan, Head of Startup Sales at AWS India, engages in a candid discussion with host Gautam Srinivasan about how AWS empowers startups and fosters their growth through a wide range of applications.