ASYMMETRIC

ASYMMETRIC

by Shantanu, Chirag and Revant
EntrepreneurshipInvesting
Season 1
Why We’re Pausing & Year-End Reflections
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant Bhate: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu Deshpande: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag Taneja: Founder, GoKwik Ashish Sangle: Co-Founder, Yoso Media Chapters 00:00 Intro 00:52 Intro & Welcome, Ashish :) 02:24 The Real Reason for Pausing 05:39 How Legacy Companies Protect the Core 12:25 Wealth Creation vs. Conservation 16:39 The “Two Houses” Analogy 22:55 Does Growth Solve Everything? 25:08 Going Public: Ecosystem Incentives 37:41 Conscious Capitalism vs. Pure Shareholder Value 42:12 China’s Capped-Profit Story 45:59 The Tata Model: Ecosystem Building & Trade-Offs 49:42 Wrap-Up 53:16 So, How Should We Solve This? Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E60
Dec 19, 2025
56:23
Helmer’s 7 Powers: Choosing Your Moat Vector in India + AOP Done Right (What, How, When)
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant Bhate: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu Deshpande: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag Taneja: Founder, GoKwik Chapters 00:00 Trailer 01:05 Intro 02:13 When should a business start making an AOP? 05:03 AOP as guidance, not target setting 13:17 Seven Powers and thinking in moats 20:16 Why counter-positioning fades, and other moat types 23:54 Lenskart’s moat 28:27 Wakefit’s and Groww’s moats 33:00 Do new-age companies need a new framework? 36:59 The Indigo fiasco and earned monopoly plus process power 43:55 Swiggy QIP and the Q-Comm PR wars 48:53 Amazon Now and clean dark stores as a moat 52:50 OpenAI code red Article Link: https://tyastunggal.com/p/7-powers-the-foundations-of-business Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E59
Dec 12, 2025
57:35
Inside India’s Healthcare Stack: Capex-Heavy Hospitals, Supply Gaps & Venture-Scale Hospital Alts
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant Bhate: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu Deshpande: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag Taneja: Founder, GoKwik Varun Dubey: Founder & CEO, Superhealth Chapters 00:00 Teaser 00:58 Intro & Welcome, Varun 02:27 Black Friday: Consumer Behavior Shifts in India 06:23 Seasonality in Healthcare 09:36 Status Signaling vs. Health Needs 12:31 Medication Adherence & Reducing Friction 15:56 Why Patients Avoid Preventive Care 19:01 The “Legacy” Hospital Model 25:25 Why Indian Hospitals Are Artificially Expensive 33:52 Unit Economics of Delivering Corporate Care at Half the Price 37:48 Operational Innovations at Superhealth 46:57 Why Are Large Hospital Chains Not Innovating? 51:22 Healthcare Profit Pools: The “30% EBITDA” Standard 54:40 The Supply Crisis: India’s 3 Million Bed Shortage 01:02:09 Venture-Scale Model for Hospitals 01:05:09 User-Experience-First Building 01:09:51 The “Tesla for Healthcare” Vision 01:14:12 Closing Thoughts Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E58
Dec 5, 2025
1:18:44
“Indian Consumer at 2030” Report by Fireside Ventures: Channel, Category & Consumer Fragmentation
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant Bhate: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu Deshpande: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Vinay Singh: Founding Partner, Fireside Ventures Nandika Pradeep: Director - Strategy & People, Fireside Ventures Chapters 00:00 Trailer 00:53 Intro & Welcome: Vinay and Nandika 02:46 Purpose Behind the Fireside Ventures Report 04:36 Overview of the “Indian Consumer in 2030” Report 07:48 Will Brand EBITDA Compress in India? 09:55 The 3 Cs of Consumption 13:30 Talent Shift Toward Entrepreneurship 18:01 Defining Consumers: The 3×3 Matrix 20:00 Quality of Revenue Framework 22:02 Category, Consumer & Channel Adjacency 30:30 Should BSC Enter Fragrances? 34:02 Gen Z Behaves the Same Across India 39:53 China’s Three Epochs & India’s Way Ahead 42:22 Pilgrim’s Power-7 Strategy 48:01 Need for a Sharper TG 52:37 The J-Curve Ahead for Consumer Companies 54:40 Building Leadership Pipelines in Brands 59:09 Apprenticeship → Shared Success → Redundancy 01:03:50 IC Track vs. Manager Track in India 01:08:39 Concluding Thoughts Charts referred to in the episode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dZYVmYl_aGyt7eHivqsZDEig0ULKHZKl/view?usp=sharing Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E57
Nov 28, 2025
1:15:51
Physics Wallah Equation: Low ARPU + Low CAC + High NPS = ₹3,000 Cr Revenue | Alakh Pandey
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant Bhate: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu Deshpande: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag Taneja: Founder, GoKwik Chapters 00:00 Trailer 00:42 Intro 01:42 Physics Wallah journey: From YouTube to IPO 06:25 Thoughts on Alakh's personal brand 13:30 The Bharat-first pricing playbook 16:20 AI tutors & avatars 19:30 Is the Physics Wallah playbook replicable? 24:00 Is offline the way forward? 30:45 Building for NPS 32:25 Real capital allocators & market noise 37:15 Founders vs professional CEOs Charts referred to in the episode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ld_VZwX-lBFg1Tv9-0AmfwGPawBt3sYb/view?usp=drive_link Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E56
Nov 21, 2025
40:38
Bharat Consumer Insights: AI as the Adoption Bridge and Understanding Gen Z & Gen Alpha
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant Bhate: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu Deshpande: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag Taneja: Founder, GoKwik Anand Lunia: Founding Partner, IndiaQuotient Chapters 0:00 Trailer 1:07 Intro & welcome, Anand! 1:56 Congratulations to Shantanu on the fundraise! 2:40 Kuku FM's 1 Cr paying users 4:14 Bharat UX reality & the role of AI 9:44 When founders age out of their own users 13:37 India is becoming homogeneous 16:58 Understanding Gen Z & Gen Alpha 21:15 Senior-living gated communities 24:03 70% of millennials say they are pro-socialist 29:18 Can Bharat subscriptions be cheaper? 35:49 AI adoption for Bharat 40:00 New-age IPOs, Lenskart & legacy media 43:50 Founders should control the narrative before the IPO 48:40 The status game 54:57 Founders' 2-hour wealth management tax Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E55
Nov 14, 2025
1:00:38
Breaking Down India’s SaaS Market: US Dollars vs Indian Distribution, Will Enterprises Buy or Build
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag: Founder, GoKwik Kuldeep: Co-Founder, @Last9 Chapters 00:00 Trailer 01:04 Intro & welcome, Kuldeep Dhankar! 03:58 Early CleverTap: painful demos, priceless feedback 04:20 Customer Success ≠ Sales 09:38 Shantanu’s new board-meeting framework 13:33 India’s consumption story is finally evolving 21:03 Can you build a $150M SaaS business selling in India? 30:12 India ACVs are rising: Swiggy, Zepto, Eternal 30:55 Where did the SaaS startups go? 35:12 Why aren’t VCs investing in SaaS? 37:32 Freshworks’ CAC payback & key lessons 45:18 Do VCs want SaaS companies to sell in the US? 48:26 The 99.5% reliability opportunity 49:50 Software: buy vs. build? 1:02:52 The rise of forward-deployed engineers 1:12:59 Airports, infra, and India’s compounding optimism Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E54
Nov 7, 2025
1:16:42
Meesho’s Bharat Playbook: India’s Only 4-Sided Marketplace; Unpacking the Design and Cultural Moat
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag: Founder, GoKwik Chapters 00:00 Trailer 00:57 Introduction 01:52 Meesho’s 4-Sided Marketplace Flywheel 05:50 Why Meesho Deliberately Reduces AOV 11:58 IPO Math: Who Actually Makes Money 19:49 Opportunity for Lenskart? 21:58 Meesho’s Unit Economics 24:00 Shopee vs. Meesho 29:50 How Selection Helps Meesho Creators 34:02 The Operating Lever That Makes Low AOV Work 41:12 Meesho’s Design Choices 43:31 Merchant-First Thinking 47:09 Concluding Thoughts Charts referred to in the episode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xXcB9DidsIAQJ-4wT2heYksQqFsPp0Ti/view?usp=sharing Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E53
Oct 31, 2025
49:59
Breaking Down India’s IPO Wave 3, The Series C Drought & Happy Birthday to the ASYMMETRIC Podcast
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag: Founder, GoKwik Chapters 00:00 Trailer 00:58 Intro & Happy Birthday to the ASYMMETRIC Podcast 01:42 Wave 3 in IPOs is coming 05:03 The TRMG RainGauge Index is now beating the Nifty50 05:46 Drought in Series C funding 08:36 The shift in investor sentiment and market opportunities 12:21 The rise of secondary funds 18:59 The future of startup funding and IPOs 23:50 The liquidity flywheel has started 28:36 Traditional sectors vs. startup IPO sizes 30:57 Commodities vs. Nifty 33:27 AI infrastructure capex and the U.S. growth narrative 38:48 How Shantanu asks the right questions without going too deep 44:09 Shantanu guesses RB and CT’s personalities Charts referred to in the episode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1SA2UAE4yfPK-ABQTYeq4DGguPKtLXj0b/view?usp=drive_link Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E52
Oct 24, 2025
46:47
Deep Dive into India’s Consumption Story This Festive Season: Signalling Changes in Hiring Dynamics
The ASYMMETRIC Crew today: Revant: CEO, Mosaic Wellness Shantanu: Founder & CEO, Bombay Shaving Company Chirag: Founder, GoKwik 00:00 Trailer 01:04 Introduction 02:02 A Mercedes every 6 minutes? 02:22 Where’s the slowdown under the hood consumption 03:47 Long tail D2C compounding faster than FMCG incumbents 10:19 Bumper festive signals categories driving growth 12:08 Navratri automobile surge 34% YoY growth 14:56 Category wise growth numbers 17:11 Credit led consumption on the rise 20:38 Why brand dot com works in the US not China or SEA 26:04 Hiring reality why 15 year veterans struggle unlearning 32:06 Entrepreneurship needs a beginner’s mindset 37:19 Build institutions bottom up train for culture 40:48 SD’s brand archetype 42:08 Gen Z’s edge in critical brand thinking 52:47 GPT’s engagement KPIs 54:15 Bitcoin crash Charts referred to in the episode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1SA2UAE4yfPK-ABQTYeq4DGguPKtLXj0b/view?usp=drive_link Follow us on: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theasymmetriccrew/ X: https://x.com/ASYMMETRICCREW LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theasymmetriccrew/
S1 · E51
Oct 17, 2025
55:29
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