DBS Group CEO Piyush Gupta has built his reputation by transforming DBS from a Singaporean bank into one of Southeast Asia’s largest, with a market cap of over $90 billion. While he’s had a 40-year career in banking, he also had a short stint as a startup founder. We had the pleasure of hosting him at our annual growth equity conference, PitStop, in September 2023. In this episode of Moonshot, Peak XV Managing Director Shailendra Singh speaks to Piyush Gupta about the lessons learned from his startup journey, and the approach he’s taken to leading DBS Bank.

Michelle Zatlyn, Co-founder, President, and Chief Operating Officer at Cloudflare, chats with Peak XV CMO Gayatri Yadav about building Cloudflare, the global powerhouse that stops 209 billion cyber threats a day. In this conversation, Michelle reflects on the initial struggle to garner support for Cloudflare’s offerings and emphasizes the importance of perseverance, especially in the face of skepticism from potential investors, customers, and employees. She delves into why founders should listen to their own voice and not be deterred by doubters. Michelle also talks about Cloudflare’s approach to customer acquisition as well as the evolution of the company’s go-to-market strategy. While talking about the complexities of building and scaling a company, she also delves into the importance of hiring the right people, as well as the leadership principles that guide her.

Brands rarely interact directly with customers in the digital world, making it a challenge to create personalized customer experiences and retain clients. While working at a media company in 2013, Anand Jain, Sunil Thomas, and Suresh Kondamudi, were faced with the same problem. They struggled to find a product that could leverage data to meaningfully engage with customers. To address this gap, they set out to build CleverTap, an all-in-one customer engagement platform that leverages data, analytics, and automation to empower digital brands. In this episode of Moonshot, we speak with CleverTap's Anand and Sunil about what it takes for founders to build products that can adapt to changing markets.

Paying for things digitally is now a part of daily life – but this wasn’t always the case. In 2013, long before the reality of cashless payments had become the norm in many parts of India and the world, Amrish Rau co-founded Citrus Pay, an online payment provider built with a mobile-first focus. This was one of many ventures in his two-decades-long journey to pioneer India’s payment ecosystem in the digital age, culminating in his most recent appointment as CEO of Pine Labs. On this episode of Moonshot, Peak XV Managing Director, Shailendra Singh, speaks with Amrish about his early life and how it defined his approach to company-building, his transition from Citrus Pay to Pine Labs, and how building a company with a heart will help a startup as it scales.

Artificial Intelligence and machine learning are transforming the world of business intelligence and marketing. But before ‘AI’ became a buzzword, it was not easy to convince businesses that the technology could be a game changer for their enterprise. In 2012, Chih-Han Yu launched Appier with a vision to make AI accessible for all. That vision was tough to sell as it was a technology the world had yet to discover. In the years that followed, Appier pivoted many times on its mission to help companies adopt AI and big data to power business decision-making. On this episode of Moonshot, we speak to Appier co-founder and CEO Chih-Han Yu about what it takes to build a global AI-as-a-service company, and how he tapped on his team’s deep technical roots to build a product focused on customer-centricity.

The dawn of AI is upon us and Enterprise AI is finally getting its time in the sun. With more people experimenting with the likes of Chat GPT, Dall-E, and Midjourney, companies are also moving swiftly to implement AI tools to help them drive productivity and efficiency. One person who’s been building AI tools for over a decade is Ashwini Asokan. In 2013, she left her job as a designer at Intel and teamed up with her husband, Anand Chandrasekaran, a neuroscientist, to launch Mad Street Den, a computer vision and artificial intelligence company. On this episode of Moonshot, we chat with Ashwini about the current state of Enterprise AI, how Mad Street Den is setting itself apart from its competitors, and what it takes to build a global artificial intelligence company out of India.

“The best leaders and founders I’ve worked with have the ability to have conviction about a vision and an opinion, but also the ability to open up the decision or the moment and say, ‘OK, is there something I'm not thinking about?’ or ‘What could I have done differently?’” Claire Hughes Johnson draws on her experience leading and managing teams at Google and Stripe, and reflects on all things people management on this episode of Moonshot. Delving into insights published in her book, Scaling People: Tactics for Management and Company Building, Claire discusses the difference between leadership and management, how to build trust and set expectations with early hires, and how startup founders can effectively give and receive feedback.

Launching a new software product and successfully driving user adoption and retention is a challenge for many startups. According to sales engagement platform Vymo’s co-founder and CEO Yamini Bhat, the secret is to ‘go live’ quickly and show users their return on investment. On this episode of Moonshot, we take a peek into Vymo’s playbook to learn about some of the key product and sales design choices the startup’s team made to attract and retain users across large enterprise customers.

"If you are deciding everything, then you are limited by your own speed". That’s a belief Groww co-founder and CEO, Lalit Keshre, keeps front and center as he and his co-founders scale the investment platform. Keshre believes that by having a decentralized structure, team members are empowered to make quicker decisions around products. On this episode of Moonshot, we chat with Lalit Keshre and Ashish Agrawal, Managing Director at Sequoia India, about key design choices Groww made to take on a market with strong incumbents.

India's manufacturing sector, which contributes 18% of the country’s GDP, is on the cusp of change. This highly labor intensive sector, which is plagued with logistical and technical issues, is undergoing a transformation as workers upskill and companies start to digitize their processes to improve efficiency. In 2018, Amrit Acharya, Srinath Ramakkrushnan, Vishal Chaudhary, and Rahul Sharma launched Zetwerk, a B2B manufacturing network that offers companies manufacturing solutions across a wide variety of products. On this episode of Moonshot, we speak with Amrit Acharya, Co-Founder and CEO of Zetwerk and Shailesh Lakhani, Managing Director at Sequoia India, about how the startup is taking a bold bet to bring a centuries-old industry into the digital age.

In 2017, a group of hackers in India figured out a way to get the best prices on cryptocurrencies at any point in time by aggregating data from all the crypto exchanges. That was the origin of CoinSwitch, a startup with a mission to ‘make money equal for all’. The platform gained traction, went through a few pivots and soon became one of India’s largest cryptocurrency trading apps. On this episode of Moonshot, we chat with CoinSwitch co-founder and CEO Ashish Singhal and Sequoia India Managing Director Shailesh Lakhani about how the startup is taking crypto to the masses by differentiating itself from its competitors, educating users, and tracking user gains to improve their product.

"We need to do the hardest thing. If you choose the easy things to do, many people choose that way. That route is very crowded." It’s this mindset that propelled Hugh Yao to grow LingoAce into a global startup with a team of over 4,500 teachers. The EdTech platform, which was launched in 2017, started out offering Chinese language courses for kids that used gamification to make learning fun. In 2022, the platform rolled out its English program in just three months – something Hugh credits to hiring and acquiring teams quickly. On this episode of Moonshot, LingoAce founder Hugh Yao chats with Sequoia India & Southeast Asia Managing Director Abheek Anand about how he saw opportunity in tough times, what it takes to hire moonshot talent, and how the LingoAce team rolled out its English program in such a short span of time.

Doug Leone has led Sequoia Capital for over 25 years, overseeing the firm’s international expansion. Throughout his time at Sequoia, Doug formed partnerships with companies like Nubank, Medallia, ServiceNow and Wiz. He’s seen thousands of pitches and worked with hundreds of founders as they grow and scale their startups. On this episode of Moonshot, Doug chats with Sequoia India Managing Director Rajan Anandan about some of the insights he’s gained over the past two decades working with startups, common pitfalls founders should look out for, and what it takes to build a truly enduring company. The conversation took place during an AMA at Surge – our rapid scale-up program for early-stage startups.

Millions of people across India buy and sell goods on e-commerce platform Meesho every month. The platform fulfils an average of three million orders a day. Meesho, which started off as a social commerce platform helping millions of women and homemakers run businesses from their home, is now on a mission to democratise e-commerce in India for millions more. Launched in 2017 by Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal, the platform is bringing down costs and lowering barriers to entry for many merchants – while helping them digitise, list their goods, process orders, track payments and manage inventory. On this episode of Moonshot, Meesho Co-Founder and CEO Vidit Aatrey chats with Sequoia India Managing Director Mohit Bhatnagar, about how bucking tradition led to the genesis of Meesho, why startup founders need to regularly talk to their users, and how taking a no-frills approach to pricing can lead to higher retention rates.

Instant noodles may not be the first thing that comes to mind when we think of healthy food, but Indonesian startup Lemonilo is disrupting the country’s consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry by offering a healthier version of Indonesia's favourite instant meal. The company is building relationships with communities to educate them on the importance of healthy living, while leveraging technology to get healthy snacks into the hands of consumers quickly. On this episode of Moonshot, Lemonilo's Co-Founder and CTO Johannes Ardiant chats with Rohit Agarwal, a principal at Sequoia India and Southeast Asia about the need to take a community-first approach when building a consumer brand, how Lemonilo is getting its products to market quickly, and why startup founders should pick the right problem before focusing on a solution.

Indonesia’s food delivery sector is a crowded space - dominated by industry giants and an increasing number of startups all vying for a slice of the pie. It’s also an industry that’s rapidly growing, with more cloud kitchens opening across the country to cater to young, tech-savvy Indonesians looking for a variety of food options to be delivered right to their doorstep. Hangry, a fast-growing cloud kitchen startup that launched in 2019, is feeding this demand by offering international cuisines, along with local favourites, to appeal to an increasingly global-minded target market. On this episode of Moonshot, we speak with the co-founder and CEO of Hangry, Abraham Viktor, and Sequoia India and Southeast Asia’s Aakash Kapoor to discover how the startup is taking on industry giants, riding the K-pop trend, and creating a winning recipe for cloud-kitchens (and hungry customers) in Indonesia.

The quest to find safe, toxin-free, natural skincare for their baby led Varun and Ghazal Alagh to launch Mamaearth - Asia’s first MADE SAFE® certified brand of skin and body care products. In just four short years, the startup has disrupted India’s FMCG space by leveraging tech and innovation to help millennial consumers make natural, eco-friendly choices for their bodies. On this episode of Moonshot, Mamaearth’s Varun Alagh chats with Sequoia India Managing Director, Ishaan Mittal about the strengths of building a startup with your spouse, crafting a purpose-based brand through nano-marketing, and how founders can perfect their brand through purpose, quality, and consistency.

Indonesian coffee chain, Kopi Kenangan, serves affordable brews made with local ingredients and recipes. The company, which employs a ‘Grab & Go’ model, delivers most orders through its app, making it a convenient alternative to traditional coffee houses. In this episode of Moonshot, Kopi Kenangan Co-Founder, Edward Tirtanata talks to Sequoia India & Southeast Asia Principal, Rohit Agarwal about how he’s building a well-loved brand with authentic Indonesian flavours, a deep understanding of what customers want, and staying true to his brand’s DNA.

Prukalpa Sankar is on a quest to help ‘the humans of data’ do more. In 2019, she and Varun Banka launched Atlan, a powerful collaboration platform that helps teams made up of different people, jobs, and tools, work together to translate vast amounts of data into actionable insights. The two developed the idea for Atlan at their prior company, SocialCops, a data-for-good startup that partnered with the World Bank, and helped build India’s national data platform. In this episode of Moonshot, Prukulpa talks with Anandamoy Roychowdhary, a Principal at Sequoia India, about how her first-hand experience as a ‘human of data’ shaped the data leader she’s become today, the importance of making tough design choices early in your startup’s journey, and how empathy has been Atlan’s greatest competitive advantage in its mission to build a global SaaS brand and become the icon on the desktop for every data team.

Building trust with first-time consumers is critical for any brand - particularly where their money is concerned. In 2019, Sigit Kouwagam and Wellson Lo launched Bibit, a robo-advisor that makes it easy for Indonesians to start investing and build a portfolio. The country’s stock market, which has long been dominated by institutional investors, is now attracting more retail investors as Millennials and Gen Z look for new ways to grow their savings. The Bibit team started a Telegram group early in their product journey and invited users to share complaints, ideas and questions. Some of the app’s key features - such as a shared portfolio for spouses and an auto debit function - emerged from that customer feedback. On this episode of Moonshot, Sigit chats with Rohit Agarwal, a principal at Sequoia India & SEA, about how Bibit is empowering Indonesians to make sound investment decisions, and building a brand that first time investors trust by actively engaging with them.