Category Visionaries Mahesh Veerina, CEO of ParkourSC: $90 Million Raised to Pioneer Dynamic Decision Intelligence for Supply Chain Networks
ParkourSC is transforming supply chain management with its dynamic decision intelligence platform, raising $90 million to tackle the industry's most pressing challenges. In this episode of Category Visionaries, we sat down with Mahesh Veerina, a four-time entrepreneur with multiple successful exits, to explore how ParkourSC is creating a new category focused on unlocking trapped value in fragmented supply chain systems. From his early success taking Ramp Networks public in 1999 to his current mission revolutionizing pharmaceutical supply chains, Mahesh shares invaluable insights on building category-defining companies.
Topics Discussed:
- Mahesh's entrepreneurial journey through three successful exits including an IPO
- How ParkourSC pivoted from IoT sensors to supply chain intelligence
- The pandemic's role in accelerating supply chain visibility as a critical business need
- Why life sciences and pharma presented the perfect initial market
- Creating the "dynamic decision intelligence" category in supply chain technology
- Building a platform that integrates fragmented enterprise systems with real-time data
- The strategy for partnering with innovative "change agents" within large companies
- How ParkourSC's technology reduces supply chain planner "noise" by 50-60%
GTM Lessons For B2B Founders:
- Market conditions can validate your vision: Supply chains were "back office" until COVID put them in the spotlight. Mahesh explains, "Any channel you switch on, it's supply chain—running out of milk and bread and essentials." This external validation can accelerate market acceptance of your solution.
- Find the value unlock through adjacent innovation: Rather than replacing existing systems, identify where trapped value exists. Mahesh notes, "Companies spend billions of dollars building their ERP systems... We are a category coming either as adjacency or sitting on top of some of these systems to unlock value." This approach reduces friction to adoption.
- Target industries with regulatory pressure and high-value problems: ParkourSC chose pharma/life sciences because it's "heavily regulated" with "$35 billion worth of product lost yearly to expirations and cold chain issues." Regulatory compliance and high-dollar waste create urgent problems worth solving.
- Co-create with innovative customers: Mahesh advises finding "innovators" within large companies who want to be change agents. "These are the early adopters that take bets... They bring a problem, give you a sandbox to play in." One such customer partner even became ParkourSC's Chief Strategy Officer.
- Expand from a narrow solution to platform vision: Start with solving one specific problem exceptionally well. Mahesh shares, "We got into the logistics, cold chain logistics... but very quickly found within these organizations it's great value but very narrow problem." They expanded systematically from logistics to operations, planning, and inventory—"the mother of all there, that's where all the money is stuck."
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