 Hi everyone, this is Sonali. Thank you all for carving out some time for attending today's webinar on keeping your business afloat during COVID-19 crisis. To all the attendees out there, please type in any questions you might have in the Q&A section and we'll try to answer as many as possible at the end of the session. Request you to keep the questions within the scope of today's discussion and not to your personal business queries. I would now like to introduce our speaker. We have with us Nandini Shankar, founder at Topic, India's first and only 360 degree equity and cash management platform. Nandini has over two decades of experience in the financial markets. First with the legendary hedge fund, long-term capital management and then as a founding employee and later Asia Pacific head and CEO of fund administrator Globov. Nandini played a key role in Globov's success in APAC and its billion dollar acquisition by SS and C. Interestingly, Nandini has had a front-receive to two of the biggest financial crisis in the last two decades and has picked up some lessons on how to stay afloat during tough times. Today, she applies these learnings as she stares her startup through the COVID-19 crisis and is keen to share them with you. With this, I hand it over to Nandini. Okay, great. Thank you so much, Anali, for this opportunity and for that lovely introduction. And thank you all of the participants. I know there have been a slew of webinars, so I'm quite grateful that we have a bunch of attendees and hopefully I'll make this session useful for you as well. So let me start off with a bit of history, a personal history from myself that will give you a sense for why I have a different lens with which I view this crisis and how my own experiences have helped me kind of figure out how we can navigate our way through the current crisis as well. So I was 24 years old and my first job was with a very, very secretive hedge fund called Long-Term Capital Management. And it was a fund that I had raised about $4 billion and you could call it a startup in its own way because at that time, Wall Street had really large trading, proprietary trading desks, but very, very few people had actually gone out at that time and started their own funds. So not only were they very secretive, they were also very unique. And it was a very, very exciting time to be with them. You had some very renowned people who were a part of the fund, for example, Myron Scholes, who was one of the people who wrote the Brad Scholes model list and has won a Nobel Prize in economics, was one of the founding partners of Long-Term Capital and it had some of the most story traders on Wall Street. So obviously, when you're 24 years old and it's your first job, you're like, oh my God, I'm on the greatest place on earth, right? And it was exactly that for me. But I will say what I learned from Long-Term was not its successes, what I learned from Long-Term was having this front row seat to failure. And that failure was tremendous. Long-Term lost $3.5 billion in 15 days. And because I ran what is called Collateral Management for them, I was one of the first people within the firm to even realize that the fund was losing money. Now, what does that mean? Basically, hedge fund leverages its assets. That means if you give it 100 rupees to trade, the actual balance sheet of that hedge fund may be as much as 500 rupees because they have invested in futures or they have invested in derivatives that ask you to put in very little money in the beginning when you make the trade and a lot of the money is actually given when the trade is settled, which might be a year from now, three years from now. But what happens during that period is any time that the trade loses money, the counterparty on the trade, the person who's on the other side of the trade is going to come and tell you that I need you to pay margin. And so a very, very big part of figuring out a fund's liquidity is figuring out how much margin you need. Now, if suddenly all of your trades start losing money, that means everybody on the street is coming to you and saying I want margin. And margin is typically maybe 10 or 20% of your working capital, right? But if for every single trade that you put on the market, people are coming back and saying you need to pay up, you run out of liquid cash to be able to pay them. And that's exactly what happened to long-term. They did not have enough liquid cash or liquid treasuries or T bonds that they could sell very quickly in their portfolio to be able to meet their margin calls. And what ended up happening with long-term is that the street recognized two things. One was long-term was too big to fail. If they failed, then they would have taken down Goldman, they could have taken down Best Turns, they would have taken down Merrill Lynch, and the Fed came in and decided that that is not good for the financial markets and it's better for them to have a bailout. And 13 banks came in and they put in all of the money that was needed to maintain all of their margin payments. And they also said that we are now the new investors in the fund. So people came in, people put in money and the story ends on a good note because after three years, long-term returned 30 to 32% back to those investors, which means that the trades were good. They just needed the amount of time to be able to keep the trades alive, which again, I'm going to bring it back to the startup world and show you how that's relevant for startups as well. Now, similarly, Lehman went through a similar liquidity crisis. theirs was slightly different. It was brought upon by the mortgage and the credit crunch that you had in 2008. And in Lehman's scenario, what was really going on at that time was the market had already woken up to the fact that if Lehman fails, there will be other firms that also fail. And as a result, the government really, really pushed. The regulators pushed for a merger as opposed to a bailout and you had Nomura who came in and bought Lehman at rock bottom prices, but they got access to, I think brilliant talent and some amazing infrastructure. And Nomura as a firm is a much, much stronger firm. So I think the lessons that I learned from both long-term and Lehman is, yes, these are tough times, but if you're truly an innovative company and if you can convince people that it's worth, you have value, you have value to give people, it's worth keeping you alive and keeping you around for the long-term, then it makes sense to do anything possible in your arsenal to keep going. And then ultimately, I think the most innovative and the most disruptive companies will face less competition and they will emerge as winners. So I have a little bit of a cyclical graph here that I want to show as to what actually happens in a market during a crisis and how does it affect startups as well? So first, you have a market reaction to a crisis, right? The first people who react to anything that happens is the stock market. And we've already seen that there was a huge liquidity crunch, cash, people were selling anything that they had. In the beginning, they stole the US dollar, then they started selling gold, then they started selling treasury bonds, then they started selling all of their triple A rated bronze and the reason they were doing this was because they had to raise money for the margins. Now what happens when you have this liquidity crunch is you actually have an irrational selling of assets. So you know that the asset, for example, gold is an asset that you know it will hold its value, but I'm sure all of you noticed that gold dipped tremendously and it has now started climbing back up. Why has it started climbing back up? Because what people have noticed is you have a widening of spreads. That means the relative value of what gold should have in the market does not match its current value. So let's say gold is trading at 32,000 rupees and making up these numbers because I don't want to use real numbers and you know that the value of gold should be 50,000. The investors who have cash in the portfolio start buying up gold and they say that, yeah, I know this is an asset that will hold value. The spread has widened to a point where it doesn't, it's not sustainable for gold and we know that gold will catch up. That means you also have arbitrage opportunities. What do we mean by arbitrage opportunities? I think a liquid asset and an illiquid asset that are very similar to each other will have a spread that is okay in the market. And what do I mean by that? Let's say you have Coke and you have Pepsi. Generally people are agnostic towards Coke and Pepsi. It's possible maybe in India people like Pepsi a little bit better than Coke. So the price of Pepsi is a little higher than Coke. But if suddenly the price of Coke falls dramatically and the price of Pepsi rises dramatically, then you know that something is wrong, right? You know that ultimately it has to converge. So then what do you start doing? You start buying Coke and you start selling Pepsi in the hope that they will converge. So this is what we mean by arbitrage opportunities. Now what does that mean in terms of startup? How does it relate to you as to what happens during periods like this? So when you have a liquidity crunch, obviously as a startup, I'm sure all of you have also seen it that cash is something that is top of everybody's mind, either you have to preserve cash by cutting down expenses or you have investors who promised you money, but they're either saying I want to wait for some more time before I give you money or this straight out backing out of their term sheets and people are in a soup, right? Where you're saying that I have to figure out how long I can keep my company running with the amount of cash that they haven't had. So that's one thing that almost everybody is taking a look at. And then similarly, once you start realizing that your cash runway has shortened dramatically, what you're also trying to figure out is how do I raise money as quickly as possible? And what do I need to do? How do I attract more investors? What do I need to do to convince them that I am a viable startup that you should invest in? So how do you do that? What worked for both long-term and even where one of them got a bailout and the other one got into a successful merger? The first thing is clarity and transparency. What was amazing about I think both the firms is that they had incredible infrastructure. Even though the firm went through a terrible crisis, not once did either firm miss a margin call, not once did their technology infrastructure not hold up. So they were able to convince investors that they had an operational backbone that you could trust. If they were telling you that I have 100 positions, this is their current value right now, this is not a expect value to be three years right now, you were able to trust that data. And when you were able to trust that data, you were able to make a timely decision with respect to giving them money, right? You did not need to say, I don't know, I have to do a lot more due diligence. I have to have an auditor come in and take a look at it. And only after that I can give you money. If all of that starts happening, then it's too late, right? So you have to be able to show that you have clarity and transparency in order to be able to take a timely decision. Then the third thing that worked for both firms is you got rid of your ego. I think it is difficult, right? All of startup founders, we have pride, right? We believe in our product, we believe in the value of the product. And if suddenly somebody comes to you and says that I'm gonna value you at a down round or I'm gonna give you a 50% haircut on money that I thought I would give you, it is time to kind of say, you know what, I am in this situation where I cannot let my ego prevent me from taking decisions that I may not like to take. So accept a bailout, accept something because you have to do whatever it takes to keep your company afloat. It's really, really important. So as long as you feel that it is a relatively rational decision and somebody is not trying to take undue advantage of you and you are able to come to a fair compromise, it is important that you recognize that in this particular scenario, your old metrics and your old parameters that you used to value your company or that you used to deliver forward projections may not work and both of you figure out a way to meet midway. It's very, very important. It's very important to nurture those relationships. These are investors who have trusted in you before. You want to keep them with you for as long as possible and try to work with them to come to some of these agreements. And then finally, to hit a home run, you have to cross all four bases, right? You cannot go from first base to home run and I know this is a baseball analogy that I'm using in India but I'm hoping a lot of people get it, right? So once you take their money, you have to think about what are metrics and milestones that I want to show them so that you can measure them and you continue to have the trust and confidence in me that you know that I will ultimately hit the home run and keep that in mind. Don't just take their money and run. Make sure that you keep them informed. Make sure that you continue to build that trust that they have with you so that if you do end up in a situation where you have to go back to them and say that you need more money or you go back to them and say, look, I made a couple of risky decisions and they didn't work out and I need to pivot or I need to change and I need you to continue to stay with me. They're able to do that. So I would say it's clarity and transparency that helps you make a timely decision. Get rid of your ego, accept all the help that you can from friends, from family, from investors who have helped you before and then once you've accepted that help, make sure that you build metrics and milestones so that they are able to evaluate you and they're able to continue to build on that trust. What will work now? Cash is king. It is really, really important to track everything down to the penny right now. You have to have a very, very good handle on working capital. You have to know where you're spending the money first before you figure out that expense makes sense. It should not be a surprise to you that you had a contract. For example, that had a 10% escalation in May. That is not something that should suddenly hit you in May and then you're like, oh my God, I have a 10% escalation. What do I do now? So it's important to know what cash you have in hand. It's important to know what your projected cash balance is going to be based on your known expenses and your known revenues. Similarly, patience is the world. This is not the time to make knee-jerk reactions. Be calm, be collected. Take more time for yourself to think through situations before you react to something. It's really, really important. I think what was amazing for me at long-term when I was there was if you walked onto the trading floor the day after they lost, I would say, they lost $1.25 billion on a Wednesday. But if you went to the trading floor, nobody would know that. They continue to focus on trading. They continue to remain calm and collected and that helped them make decisions that ensure that they stayed alive for as long as possible. So it's important. Take deep breaths, take time for yourself. Spend more time thinking than reacting. And they say, fool's Russian, right? Don't do that, don't do that. If you feel that, for example, you had this run on the Fidelity funds, right? Where all the investors started liquidating or started redeeming the funds sooner. But from my perspective, that was an irrational decision. The underlying assets that Fidelity had held value. There was no reason for you to get out right now. And you got out at a value that was really, really bad. Instead, if you had figured out a way to keep your assets within the fund, don't have this run on this AUM Fidelity, I promise would have returned to profitability and would have actually given you a return on that investment. So it's important. It's important to take calm and collected decision. It's important not to have a herd mentality. In these days of WhatsApp messages, you read a lot of stuff that has not been verified, where sometimes the source is not as transparent as you want it to be. Then you're making decisions that are based on incorrect data. Don't do that. Take the time to make sure that the data that you're making the decisions makes sense to you and you're able to live with it. You're able to live with the decision that you're making as well. And then go back to basics, right? You wear a startup one day, even if you were a funded startup and you started saying, I'll give free coffee to all of my employees, for example. It's time to go back. It's time to go back and say that this is what I can do and be transparent about these decisions. I think we ask a lot from our employees during the good times. During the good times, we have no problem going to our employee and saying, listen, I need you to work an extra four hours today because I have a very, very important demo tomorrow, right? And the employee steps up and the employee says, yes, I will do it for you. Then you've got to stand by them now and say that at a time when you are hurting, one, I will be transparent about your decisions. Two, I will give you as much of a heads up when I'm trying to make a decision that might not be good for you, for example, I'll take a salary cut and be fair about it and say that I'm doing it for everybody. And lead by example, right? It's not fair to say that all of my employees get a 25% salary cut, but I, and I too will take a 25%. As a founder, sometimes it's important to lead by example and say, I'll take double the salary cut. I'll take 50%, right? If you guys are taking 25%. So that's really important. Take a look and be brutal about reducing bloats. Sometimes we have contracts with friends, for example, right? That we may feel uncomfortable talking to them and saying that, listen, I know you and I have a contract and I'm supposed to pay you this, but can you do something about it? And go everywhere. Look at every look and corner that you can use two-year advantage to reduce expenses. And then the most important thing that I feel that a lot of people are not doing, right? This is a time of extreme disruption. And when you couple it with the fact that we have social distancing, digital assets have become really, really important. It is paper does not work, right? Something that needs a signature does not work. Face-to-face meetings do not work. A complicated Excel spreadsheet that you need to explain to someone over two hours does not work because people do not have the time. So this is the time to go and look for applications and tools that make it easier for you to operate in a world that is increasingly becoming more and more digital. And this is especially true of India. I think we stick to paper, we stick to Excel, we stick to tried and true methods of doing things, but it's no longer, we can't do that anymore. And we have to figure out if there is a more digital way to do something, you have to be open to it. And you have to look out for those tools that are going to ultimately reward you because one, you are an early adopter to those tools. You will figure out how to use them more effectively. And ultimately you look much, much more professional than somebody else who has not made that change to using digital assets to their advantage. And then finally added the promise you some jokes because I think what is going to get us through these times is humor, it's our family, it's our friends and maybe our vices, like a beer. So keep your chin up, keep smiling, take time out for yourself and know that there is a light at the end of every tunnel. We will get through it. And I think what will be very, very interesting in this time is it will be a time of great innovation. Disruption is difficult to do when everything is going well. Because when everything is going well, you do not want to get off the treadmill, right? Everything is working. You're like, why do I need to make a change? But when nothing is going and everything is uncertain, what actually happens is that people are much, much more open to disruption. So I do think companies that are able to take advantage of it are able to show innovation, are able to build trust, both in their investors and in their customers will be companies that will come out of the smiling and perhaps will be some of the major companies that we have in 2021. So we had 1998, which is when I started seeing failures. I saw a bunch of other failures. I was in New York during 9-11. I saw how the city responded to that crisis. There were a lot of lessons that I learned from there as well. It's basically when the going gets tough, the tough they're going. It's really, really important. And I do think all of us will become stronger in 2020, which means that we will approach 2021 with a smile. So thank you, everyone. That was a very, very quick overview for all of you. And I think I would love to make it an interactive session. So I'll open it up for questions. Thank you so much, Nandini, for your session. It was really insightful. To all our attendees, we want to make it a more interactive session. So if you have any kind of questions that you would like to ask Ms. Nandini, please put them down in the Q&A section. And we would love to answer all of those questions. Let's just pause for the next two minutes until we get some more questions for us. Hi, Siddharth. I see that you're, are you trying to type in a question? I think that's a good question. Liquidity is cyclical and liquidity is very relative. So I do think that once you go from liquidity to spreads to arbitrage, what will happen is you will start seeing a lot more liquidity in the market because the reality is nobody wants to stuff their cash under the mattress, right? Nobody wants to do that. The minute investors start saying that I have way too much cash in hand, they are going to look for opportunities to invest. So you will see liquidity rush back into the market. Anytime there's good news, you see that markets react to it pretty much immediately, right? And that is just another term for saying cash has gone back into the market. On top of that, you're also seeing governments respond. And you're seeing governments saying that we are going to inject liquidity into the market. So I do think that you will see cycles. You will see cycles of crunch. You will see cycles when cash comes into the market, the companies that get the cash at that time are going to be some of the winners. And but every time there is bad news, it is possible that people will retreat. And it's impossible to say how long that will last. But I do think that it will not be a straight slope on the illiquid line for a long time. You have to look at it as it will go up, it will come down. And it's important for you to grab the advantage at that time when it is going up. Sure, thanks, Raj Shekhar, for that question. To be very honest, right now it is a period of very, very high uncertainty and volatility, right? And I think people are finding it very, very difficult to predict when the crisis will end, which is what is leading to uncertainty. You also have every country responding to the crisis differently, right? You have a Sweden, for example, which has had a very different approach to the crisis. And you've had India, right? Which has had another extreme approach to the crisis as well. So the first thing that will have to happen from a global standpoint is ultimately people will find a balance in these approaches, right? And every country will come to that standard, will agree on a set of protections that perhaps the entire population has to have to be able to deal with the crisis. And that is when you will start seeing the baby steps that the economy is going to take to build itself back. And we are much, much more integrated right now. We are much, much more networked. So people are realizing that having a supply chain that was completely dependent on one or two countries perhaps was not the way to go. So you will see that there is a lot of diversity in terms of supply chain management. There is a lot of diversity with respect to both selling as well as buying. And all of that will help the economy get back on track. So to me, it feels like it's concentric circles, right? First, a little place will get back on track. They will figure out how that small village got back in track. They will use those lessons to bring it to a city. They will use those lessons to bring that to a country. And slowly that circle just becomes larger and larger. And it will envelope both India and the global world from the network effect. And we will all kind of hobble back together. But it's difficult to predict how long it will take for. Thank you, I hope that helped. And we're waiting for another question. I did want to answer something that I thought of a question even for myself, right? Is what do I need to change as a startup to be able to attract investors? I think that's a very relevant question for a lot of startups. So a couple of things that we need to keep in mind. I think that the seed round and early stage round startups will face the biggest brunt, right? Because most of these guys are funded by individual investors or angel investors. And their risk appetites and their risk profiles are changing dramatically. In a gold rush type of market, everybody wants to be in the market, right? But now everybody is retreating from the market. And first, very, very low risk assets. We'll see investors jump back in. And then it will move to higher risk assets. And unfortunately, startups are at that end of the spectrum, right? Where you are one of the riskier type of assets that an investor owns in their portfolio. So I do think that early and seed stage startups, what they need to figure out with respect to funding, is going to be a little bit different than what an institutionally funded startup needs to figure out. So why don't I deal with those two answers separately? What does an early and seed stage type startup do? I think you have to go back to people who will trust you and who will value you a little bit more easily. That means you will have to turn to friends and family. And you will have to hold your hat out and say, help me out. And you will also have to nurture relationships with people who have already invested in you once. Keep make sure that they are informed. Make sure that you're as transparent as possible with them so that you continue to build that trust. You continue to show value, accept a down round so that you can do anything that you can to keep your company afloat. And the other thing that I tell early and seed stage startups is that look for merger opportunities. Look for somebody who complements your skills. Competition will dry up. Take advantage of that. Maybe if you have a particular product and a similar startup was building a product that you knew was similar but perhaps a little bit more different, start talking to them and start telling them, listen, I will bring A and B to the table. If you bring C and D to the table, maybe we're off to the races. And maybe both of us can raise funding together. So look for partners, look for collaborators, look for people who complement your skill set and that will tremendously help you get out of this crisis. Now, if you are an institutionally funded investor, I think very honestly, you have been spoiled by investors and you have to recognize that. You have to recognize that valuations where inflated, valuations did not get as much scrutiny because people always felt that it doesn't really matter. It's going to go up anyways. And you will have to accept a down round with some grace and humility. I speak to a lot of investors right now and they say that they sit on really contentious calls with the startups. And you have to remember that they will remember this. Institutions have memory. So you can never take back what you said. So if you become the kind of startup that people find it really, really difficult to work with, you put yourself in a very bad position. So show grace, show humility, show that you're willing to meet them halfway and they will remember that. So this is the advice that I would give people who are dealing with institutional investors. Thank you. And I'll take another question. Nandini, so we have quite a few questions lined up. Most of them are related to startup funding and investment only. So you have answered quite a few already. So I'll just read out the questions and you can just let me know if that has been included in the previous answers or if you would like to add something to that as well. Okay, sure. Okay, so Saurabh Gaurd says, is it a good time for seeking funding from investors? Will they be keen on investing at this time? Can you hear me, Nandini? Yeah, I'm sorry, I was on mute. So it depends on the risk profile of the investor and it depends on your relationship with the investor. So I don't think people are rushing to fund anybody right now, but if you do find somebody who has the appetite, then seek to build trust with them, seek to show them value, seek to show them that you will be a partner for them, that you will build metrics and milestones and that will help you get funding. The other type of funding that I think will help people is what we call trans-based funding. So let's say you need a million dollars over the next 10 months, don't go and try to raise a million dollars right now, right? Put them into buckets and say, okay, go to the investor and say, you know, put in 10,000 right now, let me give you metrics and measure, that things that you can measure me by, let me give you milestones that I will have to meet and once I meet the milestone, I will draw down in an additional 10,000 and keep doing that stage by stage as opposed to saying that I need a million right now. That's another way to do it as well. Or ask for a line of credit, for example, say that perhaps you're not comfortable with equity, why don't I offer you debt and look for debt-based funding? So that's what I would start doing with investors now. Great. So the next question comes from Sanya Malutra. She says, from a fund management perspective, how should a startup orient their approach to maintain growth? So I actually think that growth is no longer as important as showing that you can hold on to the revenues that you've already managed to get. What do I mean by that? Customer retention is much, much more important than customer acquisition. So if you do want to have growth for most startups, this may not be true for everybody, but for most startups, it's better to get a larger share of an existing customer's wallet than trying to go and get new customers because new customers have also been spoiled, right? They want freebies, they want to say that I want to test this product for some time before I start paying for it and you don't have the time to do that. It is better to build deeper and deeper relationships with your existing customers, show your investors that they are sticky, show your investors that you're able to grow from them. All right. So the next question is, how to manage our cash flows and pay our employees when there's no revenue coming in the business at this time? Absolutely, right? This is something that I give, I think gives every startup founder sleepless nights right now. And the way we did it at our own startup is, I have a startup that has about 19 employees and we were just transparent with them, right? And I said that, look, these are the expenses that I have coming up. This is the amount of cash that we have on hand. We recognize that every individual's situation is different. So please come back to us and say, what is the maximum amount of impact or maximum amount of cut that you think that you can take in your salary and come back to us with those numbers? And it will be amazing to find how generous your employees are. Because if you are a true partner to them, they are a true partner to you as well. And they stick by you through times. So many of them came back and they came back with such large percentages that they were able to go back and say, we don't need to do that right now. We can do smaller salary cuts. At the same time, all of us recognize, especially companies that have been in business for a long time, you have bloat in your employee workforce, right? You have to be ruthless about it. If you know that you are not going to get value from a certain type of business or a certain employee profile, it is better to just cut the cord right now and get rid of that employee and save the employees that you want to keep. That's really important. If you are unable to pay them at all, then try to see if you can do something in a rears. Try and say, can I give you an IOU, right? Or can I give you a stipend for some time so that I'm giving you the least amount possible? And then whenever I'm able to get back on my feet, I make you hold it up. Great. So the next question is from Rishiti Sen Gupta. And this has pretty much been uncovered in the previous questions, but I would still like to say it out if you want to add anything to it. So she says, what is your advice to startups struggling to raise money during the COVID-19 situation? So, I mean, I'll add a few more points. One is if previously you were trying to reach out to 10 investors, now you have to go and reach out to 100 investors. You know, you just have to do that. You have to go to as many people as you possibly can, make your net as wide as possible. Once you've done that, right? And once there are some people who show interest, try and figure out what is common about those investors who are showing interest. What is that value proposition that they're responding to and build on that value proposition? And then reduce it. Then you don't have to go to 100 anymore. You figure out that there are 20 who all react to this one value proposition really positively. Then push that, push that, push that and see if you can convince them to give you money. Again, you know, raise cash, cash in tranches. Make the check as small as possible so that it is easier for the investor to make the decision. Great. So the next question comes from R.T. Veerwani. She says, after COVID has ravaged our businesses, how do we make our business viable for investment? Is this something specific that investors are looking for in companies post COVID? So I will say that if you are a company in an industry that has been directly hit by the crisis, what do I mean by that? If you're in the hospitality industry, if you're in the travel industry, it's very frankly, it is impossible. I think those industries are going to take very, very long time to give investors a roadmap on how they're going to get back on track because they don't know themselves. And investors will struggle to figure out a reason to invest in that. So either they will have to pivot or they will have to figure out how they can use perhaps some variables to their advantage in this crisis and be able to go from there. But if you are a company that is not directly affected by the crisis, if you're a company that can show that, yes, once the lockdown is over, this is how I will build your business, then the first thing that you have to show is you have to show that. You have to show that to investors. What is your plan? And what is your milestone-based plan? Show them if you were before, people ask for yearly financial projections. Don't do yearly anymore. Do monthly financial projections. Make the bites of the cookie that they have to take as small as possible. And that is the best way to raise money from investors right now. Okay. So the next question is on similar lines. It's from Mr. Rohan. And he says, is there a shift in the investor sentiment? What kind of clarity are investors seeking in financial transactions before making any decisions? I mean, the risk, the investor sentiment is obviously risk appetite, right? Risk appetite has moved tremendously. The biggest clarity that people are seeking for is what are you doing with my money? Where are you spending my money? Are you spending it on things that have the maximum ROI? And so if you can show transparency into working capital, transparency into burn rate, transparency into your cash runway, you go a long way into earning the trusted investor. So that is what I would focus on. Great. So the next question is from Mr. Ashish. He says, at this stage of corona running throughout the world and effective globally, can we see flow as before again and sustainability on proper stage in the coming months? It's difficult to say, like I said, it's cyclical, right? I think you will have liquidity, the markets will go up, people will come back and try to get to their normal life as soon as possible. But then you don't know, right? You may have another wave where the virus hits you, perhaps it is mutated and something else may happen. So it's very difficult to say it, but I think it will be cyclical. And whenever there is optimism in the market, that is when you kind of rush in and try to gain as much market share as possible. So the next question is, what area is ideal for diversification amid or post COVID-19? So I think innovation and disruption, great companies are actually built during times of extreme market stress. So if you are able to really sit down and think about what will the world look like post COVID and what is the world going to be looking for and you offer solutions to that world, then you're going to have investors respond to you or even if you don't have investors, then you're going to have the building blocks of a company that will work in the post COVID time. So what does this mean? Obviously, we've already seen that EdTech, for example, is an obvious winner, right? Post COVID, but what are other winners? Drone-based delivery are winners, ways to do fitness and wellness online will be winners. Even restaurants could figure out to be a winner by saying that let me switch to a delivery model or let me switch to a model where I send most of the ingredients and I do one-on-one cooking sessions with people to help them get the meal from start to finish, things like that. So I think what people have to do is recognize that the world is not going to be the same again, recognize very candidly what things will not work, that used to work in the pre COVID world, that will not work anymore. And do not be afraid to take the steps that will help you pivot, right? Do not be afraid to do something that is disruptive, to do something that you never did before, but you feel that is going to be important in the post COVID world and that will help you. For example, for example, even for topic, right? One of the things that we do is we give transparency to investors on how they use, how the startup is using their cash. When we used to demo this product to both startups and investors in November of 2019, people used to tell us, you're mad. They said nobody will open up their books and records. In fact, they said startups keep two books and records. One to show investors and one that is reality. This is how India operates. But that is not true anymore, right? Now you can no longer afford to be not be transparent and this has become something that has become the biggest ask from investors in the post COVID world. So that's what I'm trying to tell people, right? Ways that you did business earlier may have worked for you, but I do not think they will work in the, going forward if you cannot build trust and show value. Those are the two things that you have to focus on. Right. So the next question is, do you see migrants returning to base states in the near future? Why and how? This is a critical part. So just want to hear your perspective on this. Fair enough. I mean, so, I mean, it may seem like it's not a question that's relevant, but it's actually a question that's very relevant, right? Because migrants form the foundation of our economy. So if you're not going to find people to be construction workers, then how is the real estate industry going to get back on track, for example? So the government does need to recognize that, you know, there is, you know, I had this tweet that I said, you can raise our taxes by 40% if you want to, but 40% of zero is zero, right? You have to give us a way to make money first, only then we can start contributing to the economy. So at some point, I do think that the government will take a look back at jumpstarting the economy, and you will have to do it from the bottom to the top, and you will have to find ways where the smallest worker, domestic worker, the household maid is able to start coming back, the construction worker is able to start coming back to work, and the CEO is able to start coming back to work, right? They will have to address all of that. Right, so the next question is, how is it going to help perfect supply chain during COVID-19? So I think single stream supply chains, you're not going to see that anymore, right? When you have a dependence on a single supplier, you're going to recognize that you have to have diversification. So now from a global standpoint, what happened? There was too much dependence on China, and people have already started moving their supply to other Asian countries or to India, things like that. So I think the first thing that they're going to see in supply chain is diversification of suppliers. Then you're going to see diversification of distributors, right, because it is possible that one pizza delivery guy in Domino's falls sick. That means that entire chain is now shut down, right? Until they can test every pizza delivery guy that that particular sector had. So you will need to have both diversification of suppliers and diversification of distributors, which is not something that you had before. That means companies that help you manage that diversified list of suppliers and distributors. What do I mean by that? Every supplier may have different payment terms. How do you manage that? Every distributor may have different ways of distributing or different timelines to distribute. How do you manage that? So if you're sitting and managing that on an Excel spreadsheet and trying to make sense of it, things are going to fall down. So companies that realize that and build tools that will help you manage it are also going to be companies that will do well in these scenarios. Right, so the next question is, after COVID has ravaged our businesses, how do we make our business viable for investment? Is this something specific that investors are looking for in companies post COVID? So I think investors are looking for one maturity of the startup founder. First they're looking for attitude. They used to say this before, but actually it didn't really matter to them. It didn't matter to them that there was a 24 year old kid who said that, listen, I know how to disrupt this economy and I will do whatever it takes. Now they are looking for maturity. They are looking for experience. They are looking for people who have proven to you that they can react to these unprecedented times in a calm way, in a calm way that shows people a way out. So age has actually become something that has become a valuable commodity. So I would say that show that, if you're able to show that maturity, if you're able to show that I am able to, I am not egoistic, I will be a partner that you can work with. I will learn to pivot and I will learn to learn from my mistakes. If you can show that attitude shift to investors, then I do think that they will at least be open to taking another look at your business model and help you and help you with it and say, okay, then this is what I think you need to do and let me think about investing with you. But the number one thing is going to be attitude. So the next question is very interesting. It is how do you see real estate growth in the next one or two years in metro cities if we assume most NRIs would not be preferring other countries and can we see capital flowing into the sector? Yeah, I think it's actually a great question. So are we going to start seeing people wanting to return home? I mean, family has become so important. I think it has become a starkly, it's become stark reality to people who said that I was not okay that I lived away from my elderly parents at a time when they needed help like this, right? So I do think that, you know, Trump said I'm not going to issue any more green cards. I actually think he may not need to issue any more green cards, right? People are going to say I want to come back home. And yes, I think that means you're going to have a huge influx of talent that is going to come back into the country. You're also going to have people who are going to bring in new ways of thinking, disruptive ways of thinking, things that they have been exposed to that perhaps they will try and see if you can make it work in India. So it's going to be really, really exciting times for that. Now I do think it is the time for the tier three, the tier two, three and four cities to rise, right? It's become obvious that you can work offline, work from home, it's going to get more and more traction. Then if you can work from home, then why do you need to work about Mumbai? I can work, I can work from Nasik if I want to and be able to deliver the same value and the same quality. So you will see an exodus out of cities, I think. So hopefully the people who are coming back with California with big houses don't need to live in cramped Mumbai apartments anymore. And they will actually be able to get a house in the country and still be able to contribute to the economy. So real estate sector need not fall down. If they figure this out and if they say that, yeah, I don't need to focus only on metro cities, I can offer options for people to live comfortably and comfortably in other places as well. But again, that means infrastructure has to hold up, right? You can't just go to places that do not have schools, that do not have hospitals. So you will see a lot of build out or a lot of investment in these kinds of subsidiary infrastructure that people need to live a good life. Also go from just the metro cities to tier two, three and four cities as well. That said, I do think that, I do not think that it is going to be work from home for everybody. I do think that there is tremendous value on people working in an office, working together, being able to do face-to-face meetings. So, trying to say 75% of my workforce will work from home doesn't feel like a very viable proposition to me. I think I would rather put it at a percentage anywhere from 30 to 50%. Great. So we do not have any further questions for now. If anybody wants to ask any other questions, please do that right now. So, okay, we just got another question. It says, how do you see the retail trend for non-essentials, unfolding, shops opening, people going out and buying, especially in metros? So I think what is essential to you and what is essential to me are two very different things. So one is somebody said this morning to me, it's not social distancing, it's societal distancing. So, if you have been inconstant in your condo and you've had AC has been running, Wi-Fi has been running, grocery has been working, the first thing that you are going to look for when they say that I'm giving you essential goods may not be what the government thinks of as essential, right? And I will be very candid and say the first thing I'm going to go and look for is wine. So you may not say that's essential, but it's essential to me. So I think slotting things as essential as non-essential is very, very relative and to some people, scented candles may be the most important thing that they want and retail will come back with a vengeance. It will come back. So do people do not need to worry about that shortage anymore as long as the government doesn't restrict distribution and delivery. If it was important to you before, trust me, it's going to be important to you again. Right, so we are on to the last two questions of the session now. The second last question is, as per you in today's scenario, what makes interest for H&Is in India as well as abroad for investment generally? People who are able to show that they're able to respond to this crisis and develop products that are well suited for a post-COVID world. If you are able to make the argument that this is why I think this particular product or this particular process is something that is going to be used extensively in the post-COVID world, H&Is will invest. Like I said, there is only so much time that you can say, okay, I'll put my cash under the mattress and not do anything. You will look for value. So if you can show people that you have a value proposition, it's going to help. Great, so I'll just merge. We just got one more question. So I'll just merge both of them. One is, will e-commerce emerge as the new retail store according to you? And the second is, do you think healthcare, FMCG, Pharma, and agro industries are going to be the growth engines for the economy going forward? Okay, so one, e-commerce, yes. I think there is no two ways about it, right? E-commerce and digital methods of shopping and paying for things, people are just going to get used to it. And unless it is super, super important that you have to touch and feel something before you buy it, I don't think you're going to see, you're going to see a lot of, I think malls are dead, for example. You know, that is an industry that is absolutely going to go away. That's my perception. But what people have to do is then, how do you make it easier for somebody to buy, right? How do you offer better ways to return things? How do you offer better ways to actually take a look at things? Maybe for example, size charts, right? When you're buying clothing, it's damn irritating that somebody will say it is UK sizing, somebody will say it is US sizing. Most of the time people don't buy online because you don't know what you're going to buy is going to fit you, right? So if people can start figuring out how do I reduce the friction to e-commerce shopping, all of those retailers are going to do really, really well. But the truth is e-commerce is going to take off and in-person shopping will see a tremendous decline. Healthcare, pharma, absolutely, absolutely, absolutely, right? I think that we are recognizing a couple of things already, right? One, respect for just healthcare workers has gone up tremendously. Respect for people who do research, people who are looking for pures, people who are looking for vaccines. We are a value that we have started placing on it as opposed to celebrities. For example, has changed and I think that is not going to change back in the future. We are going to value these things more. We are going to give us support to these industries because we are going to recognize that it is a matter of life and death and we cannot ignore it anymore. So I do think these industries will do well. I also think that regulations in this industry will go through a change. Yes, you will still have areas where you will have to test a drug before it is brought to the market, but patent sharing, for example, may be relaxed, right? Because it may be much, much more important to have mass production of a vaccine than to say only the people with the patent can produce the vaccine, for example. So I do think that you will see a lot of disruption in healthcare, but for the better, hopefully. Would you quickly like to add IT industry, restaurants and beauty salons in this whole regime as well? Why not? So I think IT is different space, right? Because they are used to working in a digital world and I think their pivot is going to be much easier. Restaurants, if I have to put restaurant and beauty salons at restaurant, guys, I think we'll figure out a way out of this crisis a little bit faster because I do think it is possible. We've already seen instances in Hong Kong and some of the European countries, figuring out a way to have social distancing and still go out to eat. And I do think that, think about it, like when you order something for delivery, it is still a black box, right? You still don't know, you haven't seen the kitchen, you don't know what's going on in the kitchen. Then you have a delivery guy who's also delivering your stuff for you. I actually personally think it is much riskier to order something than actually go to a restaurant that I trust and eat from there because I know the chef, I know that he has the staff. If he can prove to me that he has tested it, I would rather that he cooks the food in front of me and gives it to me, right? So I do think the restaurants will come back and beauty salons, like how long, how long are we going to say it is okay that I don't get my hair colored or it's okay not to get my nails done, right? Again, here it is a matter of showing that you can keep us safe, right? If you can show that the food falls will fall, your number of people who can be in that particular place at any one point in time is going to fall, but I don't think it goes away. And as customers, I think we have to be willing to support them and we have to be willing to accept higher pricing as a result. If we are able to do that, then these industries will find a way to survive. I guess we'll wrap up the Q&A session now. Thank you so much, Nandini. Thank you so much for your time and being so patient while answering all the questions. And to all the attendees, thank you so much for your time as well and for participating very actively throughout the session. We hope you were able to add some value to your lives through this session. And please, if you still have any questions or if you have any feedbacks, please feel free to reach out to me and share that with me. I would love to pass on your questions to Ms. Nandini and I would also love to work on the feedback that you provide to us. So thank you so much. Would you like to say anything else, Nandini? No, I thought it was really great to get this interaction with the participants and I hope you got value out of it and it was a really great experience for me as well. Thank you, thank you. I know there are a lot of webinars, so thank you for spending this one hour with me. I appreciate it. Thank you so much. I guess we'll just wrap it up now. Thank you so much and we'll see you in our next webinar. If you have any questions, once again, please feel free to reach out to me. Thank you so much. Thank you, Nandini. Thank you, thank you everybody. I'll see you in the next webinar. Bye.