 Good afternoon everyone and Thanks, thank you for being here. It's a pleasure to to be moderating a session where my childhood Idol Obviously I used to I used to ride a bike But then when we would hear about Narayan we would get inspired But in small towns you're not allowed to you know drive so fast, but you know Narayan did it I think in his backyard Fathers car where you started with or something so we will know all about it in a bit, but now he's an entrepreneur also and He's found something called Rivex, which will know what it is about So now and thank you for you know agreeing to be here It's an absolute honor and the way people were taking pictures you understand that how much we love you So thank you. Thank you. Good afternoon everyone. It's a pleasure to be here amongst you all and yeah Thank you for having me here today. Thanks, Narayan. So Narayan to start with tell us about your venture, you know, Rivex You know the idea the execution cause I believe you turned it around in a very short period of time during the lockdown and Where is it today? Yeah, well, I am you know actually I started riding of bikes as most of us do when we are We are you know as a teenager and even before But yeah, most of my life, you know has been Motor racing I've done, you know all sorts of disciplines in motor racing Formula one world championship NASCAR the 24 hours of lemon and and drove for large manufacturers in Japan between 2014 and 19 and Then everything came to a screeching halt end of 2019. I won my last race in Fuji in Japan driving for the Honda team and You know, I come from a family of entrepreneurs and it was always something that I wanted to do after my racing career and it so happened co-wit happened and You know week, you know, we were all putting ideas together and and mobility was something was in everybody's mind and Mobility which was affordable was was something everybody wanted so in August 2020 we Put together a platform called Rivex. It's primarily pre-owned two-wheelers which we put it out on the rent and the subscription model and eventually We started another vertical to refurb these bikes and then sell them on to customers so that's how we started off and in the last two years we've You know as all startups do we We you know, we pushed it pushed along with very very tough times But this is something I really love and I'm very passionate about Well connected in the outer space as you can imagine so we got the OEMs to back our platform and you know, we Kind of you know growing quite quite fast in this space All right, so, you know, I I saw a tweet by you where You were talking about non affordability of go-karting and that that is you know an impediment for youngsters to get exposure to Racing and you know, I believe affordability is also the principle for your startup drive X So tell us the parallels that that you've drawn here. Yeah I want you know young young young kids who take up motor racing to be affordable but my sport It's quite a capital intensive sport, but then the platform we have it's all about affordable mobility And you know India's the largest market for two-wheelers and the opportunity is very very large and quality pre-owned two-wheelers that is quite a huge market which we are trying to address and We have you know, we've built the ecosystem around that And we've got a lot of you know mainstream finance companies banks OEMs A lot of other players onto the platform So yeah, we're at it. You know, we have a good start Right now you're only operating in Coimbatore and Bangalore on southern reasons. So what are your plans for, you know, pan India plans? So recently, you know, we've We've expanded into other locations Primarily we operate out of Bangalore Chennai, Madurai, Coimbatore But now we've started to expand into NCR and other parts and Yeah, we'd be, you know pushing quite aggressively here Okay. All right. So, you know, I'll be talking to you about, you know, the way you Spend your life. So, you know F1 cars accelerate to you know, zero to hundred miles per hour and less than three seconds Or so three seconds probably. Yeah. So, you know, I believe you've applied the same speed controls to your business So from 47 lakh Revenue to I guess 20 crore and now I heard you saying somewhere, you know, it would be 20x this year So what gives you that optimism and what are the strategy that you have adopted to do so? Yeah, as I told you, you know, the Opportunity for the sector we are in it's very very large You're talking about, you know, 11 million units per annum So we have a large, you know, large market out there And we're pretty unique in the things we are doing so we believe the growth will also be quite substantial and You know, we have The most important aspect of this is to get the support of the entire ecosystem, which we have managed to do There are a lot of I would say in this space, you know, there are a lot of other players who are so who are there so we're all starting off in a You know, level playing field, I would I would say but I think we have the right ingredients to To to grow this business and as you said, we've had quite a lot of growth Possibly because of the tailwinds of COVID as well But yeah, we are quite confident that, you know, we're going to keep growing as fast as I drive So, you know, we had both. I mean we had Secondhand, you know, online market places for cars, two-wheelers and we had subscription model also probably not for bikes But for cars we had, you've combined the both. How do you differentiate yourself from the other players that are there in the So in four-wheelers, there are, you know, established players right now, many of them in fact and You know, the model end of the day is quite similar but Then, you know, being a satellite, you know, doing so many other things which We were able to do I think makes a difference huge difference so Yeah, and we've combined both the the subscription and the sale model on a platform So it gives the customer an opportunity to kind of choose the package he likes And you know, we've had a lot of traction in Tf5 places as well It's, you know, we found a lot of aspirations which, you know, in terms of biking, you know, fulfilled by our platform So we, you know, we feel that the opportunities are growing in other You know smaller Towns and cities and I think we'll focus there as well quite similar to You know tier one and yeah, and two-wheelers make more sense for tier two, tier three, tier five, I would believe Yeah, from a unit economics point of view, it makes a lot more sense for us and we've kind of You know Going by the way things are going because of the BS6 standards which have come in the affordability for and the The the market for these vehicles are growing All right, so, you know, you recently got invested by TVS, you know, it's a leading company So and you know, I remember reading that one instance in your life where you could not secure enough You know support to be on the F1 track So, you know, I'm sure that you had learnings from that and now so, you know How does this feel? I mean what like if you can tell us the importance of having that correct, you know Sponsored correct, you know funding backing you at the right time to take your dreams to the next level Yeah, trust me sponsorship was a lot easier than finding funding for a platform But you know, you're you're picked up, you know, you've seen as a you've seen, you know They see you as a startup and of course Once kind of your you they understand the business It's easy to say that, you know, you may you're you're similar to another business of a similar kind but then Once the investors understood of what we're trying to do Then, you know, it kind of the interest grew and then December we got a seed round And 2021 and then we just as you said closed around series around the last four weeks ago. So We have really chuffed about it and you know, we feel we've done the right strategy All right, so let and so we all know you, you know as the first in the iPhone driver But you know the struggles remain little known for people, you know when I was Reading about you. I saw that how much you have shuttle between India London Japan everywhere to you know establish yourself, obviously So, you know, they would they would have been losses rejections So what they have? What have they taught you which you are able to implement in your, you know, business today when you're an entrepreneur And if you can help us explain this with an anecdote possibly Well, my success is a lot of my success It was because of the great team of people that were behind me and similarly in our business a Team that is supportive and a team which is, you know, very knowledgeable is what we're trying to build and that's what will bring us the success for sure and Motor motor racing is a team sport and similarly you have a lot of similarities a lot of similarities between Formula one is a very complex business. It has, you know, it is all about cutting-edge technology In agility innovation and so on and so forth. So similarly, you know, we we can I can relate very closely to what I'm doing in Terms of our digital platform So, yeah, a lot of good learnings for you know, it's a very very tough world motor racing Especially Formula one. So I've learned a lot over these do these nearly three decades of racing and Yeah, so I think all the experiences and Connect with our automobile ecosystem will definitely fuel our ambitions So tell us what you learned from your public outpouring with the Sebastian Whittle where you had a little accident where he was blocked to something Well, it's either he's an incredible driver, but in 2012 I think I had a much slower car that year and he I think he cut across me and He had a puncture so in that in the rage. He said something and it became, you know, I Responded towards it and then it became a whole lot of you know, just you know, BBC had headlines saying whatever I said at that time and Yeah, it was I mean, he's a great driver end of the day So I'm sure you won't you won't be doing that again in business now Entrepreneur as an entrepreneur if someone comes up and say something like that because sporting is different probably Yeah, I'm still learning to be an entrepreneur. You never know, but yeah, we'll keep it calm Yeah, so we'll keep our keep our eye out for headlines probably. All right So, you know, then your father and accomplished, you know rally driver himself. I was an influence for you To dream about possibly about racing Though I think he wanted you to do something else, but you made your choice very clear So, you know, and do you have anyone similar whom you follow in business? You know in entrepreneurship tell us both about your father and if there is anyone you fall on Yeah, I mean first of all my parents I'm talking early 90s. Let me do what I wanted to do. They you know, the only thing I asked them for was for you know Enrollment in a racing school in France. I did that they did that for me, obviously and you know, the after which I got a scholarship and Since then I've been, you know, lucky to be supported by the Tata group until today, you know, I work with them and Developing their road cars and so on and so forth. So I think them, you know, Mr. Tata's vision of kind of, you know putting a Formula One driver out there and him being very interested in In in cars and automobiles helped me, you know, and I really count myself lucky to have done what I've done and Yeah, for me, of course, you know, my role model is Mr. Tata, for sure Everyone respected. So before I open the floor for questions Just one last question that I have for you is that we just saw one season of F1 in India We had so much of investment going in but it could not happen very unfortunate What's your views? I mean, we cannot, can't we, you know, host such a mega event in India? We're not equipped enough Yeah, I think we can host mega events for sure, you know, cricket, you see how big they are. I mean, we are the you know, largest, I mean, one of the best, you know, events that go around the world, but Having said that, Formula One ran in India in 2011, 12 and 13, three years But then it was for completely other reasons that it had to, you know, not only that, a few other reasons And and so that was the end of that, unfortunately, but the facility is a great facility And hopefully We know something happens in the future. All right. All right. Thank you, Narendra