INSIGHTS #68: GRIT Stories | The Ups & Downs of Aprameya's Startup Life, from TaxiForSure to Koo

Aprameya is no stranger to the entrepreneurial journey. He’s the co-founder and CEO of Koo, a microblogging platform catering to the Indian vernacular. Koo was born as an offshoot of Vokal, a vernacular question and answer platform. Within one year, it amassed over a million users and became a force of its own.

Before this, he was at the helm of TaxiForSure, leading it to a successful acquisition by Ola Cabs back in 2015. I was part of this journey, and Aprameya’s clarity and grit has been something I’ve been aware of throughout.

This was among my favourite conversations, and not just because of having known Aprameya for so long. It helped me better understand the fast-shifting world of content, and the directions in which it is headed.

Koo is about to make some noise, and we are excited for it. 
Listen and find out more.

• 00:00 - 3:10 - Introduction
• 6:35-8:38- Parents not agreeing for his startup stint; Shift in his own inclination towards startups and getting conviction
• 9:04-10:24- Grit to start TFS; anyhow getting people from point A to point B
• 10:57-12:32- Angel Investors being very scarce and lack of information
• 12:34-14:25- Market explosion and TFS being not really ready for it
• 18:09-20:05- Grit to build for local language and not English: Vokal story- empowering non-English speaking crowd
• 20:27-22:41- Challenges as a founder of shifting from a transactional business into a non-transactional business
• 27:28-29:05- Pursuing the right person to rope him in as a co-founder
• 32:08-34:04- Atmanirbhar Bharat victory, being just a 3 month old product!
• 34:59-35:57- Moving fast to capture the Nigerian market
• 44:11-45:03- Advice to new founders: Start early & Always trust in your first thought!

Check out other episodes from the Insights Podcast series at https://www.seedtoscale.com

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