Meeting Title: Brainforge x Stackblitz Weekly Check Date: 2025-03-14 Meeting participants: Mitchell Wright, Uttam Kumaran


WEBVTT

1 00:01:54.920 00:01:56.290 Mitchell Wright: Hey? What’s up? Utah?

2 00:01:56.290 00:01:57.890 Uttam Kumaran: Hey! How are you?

3 00:01:58.300 00:02:05.940 Mitchell Wright: Good sorry about yesterday. My wife just was having some some health stuff I had to like runner, so I I couldn’t end up being on the.

4 00:02:05.940 00:02:08.320 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, man, I’m sorry. Dude. I hope everything’s okay.

5 00:02:08.320 00:02:15.696 Mitchell Wright: No, no, it’s we’re we’re good. It was just yeah. I didn’t. I didn’t realize we were like going over like the whole thing. I thought we were just gonna chat. So

6 00:02:15.920 00:02:16.890 Uttam Kumaran: All good.

7 00:02:17.140 00:02:19.280 Mitchell Wright: Anyway. So I just wanted to kinda like chat.

8 00:02:19.280 00:02:19.890 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.

9 00:02:19.910 00:02:25.869 Mitchell Wright: Because I felt like I didn’t get the full thing, you know.

10 00:02:25.870 00:02:26.550 Uttam Kumaran: Sure.

11 00:02:26.830 00:02:35.700 Mitchell Wright: So yeah. So a quick, quick rundown, I think where we landed is like we’ll just add on like another month.

12 00:02:35.860 00:02:40.320 Mitchell Wright: for now and then will.

13 00:02:41.100 00:02:45.080 Uttam Kumaran: See? Whenever, yeah, when the new people get there, basically exactly.

14 00:02:45.490 00:02:52.740 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, okay, cool. So do we need to. I, I can’t remember what the contract, if it allows us to just go like month to month, or if.

15 00:02:52.740 00:02:57.789 Uttam Kumaran: I am. Gonna send another one that’ll just be the dates shifted.

16 00:02:59.300 00:03:01.420 Uttam Kumaran: Is that easy enough?

17 00:03:01.420 00:03:02.130 Mitchell Wright: Yep.

18 00:03:02.130 00:03:12.510 Uttam Kumaran: I think you have a good idea. Maybe I should, for future contracts just do something around that. And yeah, really. So to keep. Also, maybe I should give you a little bit of update, even like on our company side. Cause I feel like

19 00:03:13.090 00:03:14.600 Uttam Kumaran: dude stuff is like.

20 00:03:14.850 00:03:24.379 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, you guys are going. I don’t need to tell you about growing really fast. We are like, like we are growing fast for it. Which for me is even like.

21 00:03:24.380 00:03:24.960 Mitchell Wright: Really, fast.

22 00:03:24.960 00:03:28.670 Uttam Kumaran: So I mean, I I so like again, I started this

23 00:03:29.070 00:03:37.849 Uttam Kumaran: trying to do this. In 2023 we we brought on Luke. It was our 1st employee. Actually, I was I mean, 1st employee is just me and and him.

24 00:03:37.850 00:03:39.110 Mitchell Wright: Is he based out of the Philip.

25 00:03:39.110 00:03:40.409 Uttam Kumaran: He’s in the Philippines.

26 00:03:40.410 00:03:41.000 Mitchell Wright: Okay. Yeah.

27 00:03:41.000 00:03:44.899 Uttam Kumaran: And we have sort of team globally, like I. I found him off the dbt.

28 00:03:45.130 00:03:48.959 Uttam Kumaran: Dude. I found a bunch of people off like Dbt slack. And I just like find

29 00:03:49.140 00:04:00.440 Uttam Kumaran: cause. I just want to work with really good people. Us is tough, like, you know, to get all people, but also get people that aren’t really lazy do like the consulting kind of grind.

30 00:04:00.700 00:04:03.889 Uttam Kumaran: So yeah, it was like me and him until, like about

31 00:04:04.050 00:04:19.890 Uttam Kumaran: so he I hired him in December of 2023, and it was basically me and him, until, like April of 24. Then I hired one person, and then in September, I another person. And now we’ve been onboarding almost like one person for the one or 2 people for every week for the last 6 weeks.

32 00:04:20.089 00:04:22.790 Uttam Kumaran: Basically. So we went from.

33 00:04:23.220 00:04:27.930 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, we went from around 3 clients. And now we have about 7 clients right now.

34 00:04:28.120 00:04:36.559 Uttam Kumaran: and we just had our. We just had a week, where we sent out 3 3 more proposals. In in addition to you know, your renewal contract.

35 00:04:36.560 00:04:36.920 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

36 00:04:36.920 00:04:40.983 Uttam Kumaran: And it’s just like it’s like a legit enterprise.

37 00:04:41.490 00:04:47.920 Mitchell Wright: Are you guys doing? Are you guys doing mainly like fixed length projects or staff augmentation? Or what.

38 00:04:47.920 00:05:03.530 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So so really, where I wanted to focus. And a key change that we made is moving towards project like project based pricing like monthly fee based pricing we were when I started a business of did it this stuff on hourly. It’s just one. It’s some of our clients

39 00:05:03.620 00:05:18.710 Uttam Kumaran: they want to see some sort of standardization. And then for us, like we, I need to just know that we’re gonna have clients that I can staff and make some longer term decisions beyond the even beyond, like a week. And so we moved a lot of our clients to like

40 00:05:18.710 00:05:41.409 Uttam Kumaran: more. Like, yeah, like 3 month engagements. Ideally, I mean, there’s folks like like you and folks that I’m like, Okay, if I would like to move towards that. And that’s that’s like our motion. If we can’t, it’s fine. But I actually think, even for those we end up, actually, our net hourly rate to our clients actually goes down like we end up typically doing more work. Because I don’t cause at that point. I there’s sort of 2 things. There’s 1

41 00:05:41.640 00:05:52.929 Uttam Kumaran: we sort of try to price it based on like, okay, how many work streams can we take on? And then I can staff that and just staff towards the work stream. Internally, I sort of optimize, like, what is our average billable.

42 00:05:52.930 00:05:53.380 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

43 00:05:53.380 00:06:04.459 Uttam Kumaran: This is where, like I don’t want. I didn’t want to take on stuff where we didn’t. We didn’t have the relationship with the client like staff, pure staff Aug, or like where there was like many ladders. And I also

44 00:06:04.600 00:06:13.279 Uttam Kumaran: in my business dude. It’s like, naturally, that’s naturally more people just want to turn into like a sweatshop, because that’s like the way it goes. And I don’t like that either. Right?

45 00:06:13.960 00:06:16.400 Uttam Kumaran: So I have like ethical and just like, I don’t like

46 00:06:16.810 00:06:21.770 Uttam Kumaran: those types of businesses I want to build like a consulting company. But

47 00:06:21.870 00:06:30.120 Uttam Kumaran: I just want to build like an engineering firm where like it’s not like people are just isolated from where they they don’t get to work cross functionally. It’s like an actual org.

48 00:06:30.120 00:06:30.690 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

49 00:06:30.690 00:06:39.920 Uttam Kumaran: So yeah, we’ve we’ve kind of worked in the last like 2 months. We now have a sort of pod structure where we have, like a Pm, we have like a product owner. And we have like engineering. And

50 00:06:40.260 00:06:43.230 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, it’s it’s like becoming more and more legit.

51 00:06:43.560 00:06:47.229 Mitchell Wright: That’s sweet. And so who’s so you? Said Robert.

52 00:06:47.230 00:06:54.116 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. So Robert, who was on the call, he’s a he’s my business partner. We actually just merged our companies together.

53 00:06:54.430 00:06:55.330 Mitchell Wright: And back 2 months ago.

54 00:06:56.062 00:07:16.579 Uttam Kumaran: So he was actually. So I was mainly doing snowflake Dbt modeling stuff. He was doing a lot of stuff in mixed panel segment, post hog amplitude, world like optimizing those tools, building dashboards from them. But but we met through a mutual friend, and he brought me on to 2 of his clients where

55 00:07:16.680 00:07:24.399 Uttam Kumaran: cause he didn’t have much room to expand beyond there. And those are like 5 k like 8 k deals. And I’m like.

56 00:07:24.580 00:07:38.709 Uttam Kumaran: and then he’s like, it’s like such a rat race every day, because all marketing analytics I’m like dude. You should try to get into Dbt world and like. Naturally, your scope should increase to try to doing more analysis across the business. We did 2 or 3 deals together, and then it was clear that.

57 00:07:39.000 00:07:41.990 Uttam Kumaran: like both. We mesh lies like people. But also

58 00:07:42.200 00:07:51.970 Uttam Kumaran: our Venn diagram of skills worked out really well, like he’s actually really much better and much more motivated on the sales side than I am like. I’m I love the engineering work. I love

59 00:07:52.150 00:07:57.930 Uttam Kumaran: building the data team and like finding the best tools and recruiting people. And so.

60 00:07:57.930 00:07:58.530 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

61 00:07:58.860 00:08:03.129 Uttam Kumaran: It worked out. And then, yeah, we sort of teamed up like merged the books of business. And

62 00:08:03.250 00:08:05.589 Uttam Kumaran: it’s been getting. It’s been getting a lot better.

63 00:08:06.120 00:08:12.969 Mitchell Wright: Dang dude that’s awesome. So what? What do you feel like? Your target is for revenue for this year?

64 00:08:12.970 00:08:23.999 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I mean, so our Okr for this quarter on the sales side was to hit 83 per month and and invoice. And so we will hit it this month in March.

65 00:08:24.260 00:08:25.279 Mitchell Wright: Dang, which is.

66 00:08:25.280 00:08:28.970 Uttam Kumaran: Insane. I mean, it’s it’s not yeah. It’s like

67 00:08:29.880 00:08:33.911 Uttam Kumaran: I like. It’s insane to even say out loud,

68 00:08:35.510 00:08:36.140 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

69 00:08:36.140 00:08:57.469 Mitchell Wright: whenever whenever Sri was out here skiing this year, or it was like December. Was it? I don’t even remember now, but he was like, he’s like, yeah, like, cause I had mentioned, I was like, I think I’m gonna like Getam to like help us with some stuff he’s like, he’s like, yeah, like, I feel like, Utam’s doing really well with his business, like, it’s it’s really kind of growing. I was like, that’s awesome, like.

70 00:08:57.470 00:08:59.110 Mitchell Wright: yeah, realize. It was like.

71 00:08:59.520 00:09:00.529 Uttam Kumaran: No, I mean, I’ve also been.

72 00:09:00.530 00:09:01.090 Mitchell Wright: It’s good, though.

73 00:09:01.090 00:09:19.900 Uttam Kumaran: Dude. I’ve been working so hard that, like I haven’t even had time to. I don’t do. I haven’t done any like promotion, but also, I haven’t even like gone and connected with a lot of people in a while. So even Sri, I texted him the other day because he said they just closed like another big bunny round on Atticus, and I was like dude. Don’t get rich without me like

74 00:09:20.890 00:09:22.730 Uttam Kumaran: getting there, but.

75 00:09:22.730 00:09:25.069 Mitchell Wright: I mean, consultancies are great and.

76 00:09:25.070 00:09:26.559 Uttam Kumaran: It’s hard, it’s hard, it, you know. It’s.

77 00:09:26.560 00:09:27.010 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

78 00:09:27.010 00:09:30.520 Uttam Kumaran: For me. I always got into it because I knew that I didn’t want to get it. You could stack

79 00:09:30.630 00:09:34.470 Uttam Kumaran: 3 clients and make like 2030 KA month. But life is hell.

80 00:09:34.470 00:09:34.960 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

81 00:09:35.160 00:09:49.030 Uttam Kumaran: To cross that chasm like you have to then put all of your profits back in to basically hire yourself out that window. It’s really literally been since last March. I’ve been chasing where we are now.

82 00:09:49.030 00:09:49.560 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

83 00:09:49.560 00:09:56.945 Uttam Kumaran: Which is like you have to reinvest the people. They’re not as good as you. You don’t have. You don’t have the the 30 K. Doesn’t go to you.

84 00:09:57.200 00:09:58.060 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

85 00:09:58.240 00:10:04.429 Uttam Kumaran: But we’re finally like eclipsing a little bit of that motion. So it’s it’s really, really cool.

86 00:10:04.610 00:10:13.369 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, well, and agencies like, I mean, like, I have a friend who he sold his agency and like you get it big enough the multiples. It’s not a tech multiple, but like

87 00:10:13.490 00:10:18.760 Mitchell Wright: it’s a lot easier to grow a significant number. And.

88 00:10:18.950 00:10:20.659 Uttam Kumaran: What industry was was he in.

89 00:10:20.870 00:10:46.740 Mitchell Wright: Is a marketing agency. So they basically did lead Gen, and they had a couple of very specific verticals that they worked in made mainly like legal and mortgages, and you know he he was able to exit for like 5 million, and so for him it was like great. So then he took a bunch of time off and then started another agency. But with like everything he learned there now, his new agency, like

90 00:10:47.280 00:10:55.610 Mitchell Wright: he he’s pro he’s trying to sell. Probably next year, he said, just depending on how everything goes, and he’ll probably like 20 million from this one.

91 00:10:55.610 00:10:56.320 Uttam Kumaran: Wow!

92 00:10:56.320 00:10:58.400 Mitchell Wright: Like he just learned.

93 00:10:58.400 00:11:12.429 Uttam Kumaran: I’ll send you this so the other thing is we I’ll send you this deck because we’re we also got put it. We? We joined this ex tech service accelerator. That’s actually been like extremely helpful.

94 00:11:12.930 00:11:29.480 Uttam Kumaran: it’s called vixel.com. I just sent it to you on on slack, too. And and basically they are like they they market themselves like Y combinator for tech services. And the positioning was so niche. And these guys sold a company to Ntt data, ntt, data is like.

95 00:11:30.030 00:11:37.439 Uttam Kumaran: probably top 5. They’re literally like you would never know them unless you’re in consulting game. But they’re like top 5 biggest data consulting companies.

96 00:11:37.879 00:11:46.269 Uttam Kumaran: and they sold a company into them, and they took the proceeds. And we’re like we should. Why isn’t there like a accelerator just for like it, service

97 00:11:46.920 00:11:47.880 Uttam Kumaran: startups?

98 00:11:48.130 00:12:08.949 Uttam Kumaran: And then they started this they’ve been doing like this is like their 6 or 7 cohort and it’s been incredibly helpful, like they just help you think about like the revenue model, the positioning everything, and they sort of force you to do a couple of things. But I I’m sharing this deck that I got because I went to. They. They have some seekers. Come. They have this one woman come who who’s in tech service, M and A.

99 00:12:09.290 00:12:31.720 Uttam Kumaran: And I was like dude. This is like gold. I can’t wait like this is the best presentation ever, because it basically gave us like, very clear sense of like what we need to hit one. It sort of validated, which is like we’re doing a lot of data stuff. We’re also starting to do AI like, we’re build AI agents for folks. And so I’m like cool. We’re in like in the right field, and people are getting 3 to 5 x multiples, which on on these.

100 00:12:31.720 00:12:33.399 Mitchell Wright: It’s actually, really good.

101 00:12:33.400 00:12:34.810 Uttam Kumaran: Just way higher than I thought.

102 00:12:34.810 00:12:35.820 Mitchell Wright: And half, yeah.

103 00:12:35.820 00:12:45.339 Uttam Kumaran: I thought it was one to 2. I saw this, and I was like gonna cry, I’m like no way. But of course these are like, these are really good businesses, like they. They have 40

104 00:12:45.700 00:12:47.030 Uttam Kumaran: gross margin.

105 00:12:47.610 00:12:55.477 Uttam Kumaran: And they’re make that, he, she said. Basically like 20,000,040% gross margin is like the sweet spot. If you go to like slide

106 00:12:56.360 00:12:58.579 Uttam Kumaran: slide 8 in that Pdf.

107 00:12:58.580 00:12:59.370 Mitchell Wright: Okay.

108 00:13:00.275 00:13:02.714 Uttam Kumaran: And it was really interesting talking to her.

109 00:13:03.420 00:13:09.599 Uttam Kumaran: because cause I was like I was like is the brand necessary like, what are the nuances she’s like, literally.

110 00:13:09.600 00:13:12.650 Mitchell Wright: 15 to 40% trailing 12 month growth.

111 00:13:12.650 00:13:18.780 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, she’s like, she’s like, you just have to hit hit 20 million and hit 40 it. Nothing else really matters.

112 00:13:19.770 00:13:20.550 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

113 00:13:20.550 00:13:22.010 Uttam Kumaran: But like 20 million is.

114 00:13:22.010 00:13:25.089 Mitchell Wright: Slide is like crazy like.

115 00:13:25.770 00:13:27.503 Uttam Kumaran: Is this like so dense.

116 00:13:27.850 00:13:33.320 Mitchell Wright: But the just. That one slide, though, is so good as far as like. If you can get to these numbers like.

117 00:13:33.320 00:13:55.040 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly. And let me tell you, this business is a pure calculation, but like there’s no there is art, and like that is, that is the advantage, like, for example, like we invested a lot in in some brand and like trying to do design, but because ultimately I believe that company like ours at the highest end, is just a broker, for, like the best talent, and like complicated problems.

118 00:13:55.040 00:13:55.579 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, so.

119 00:13:55.580 00:14:00.000 Uttam Kumaran: At that point, what do we have except for just brands and relationships?

120 00:14:00.150 00:14:16.360 Uttam Kumaran: So I, I invested trying to get us to have like a. We have a we have a small marketing and design folks on the team. But also like this is this, these are business have been done before. What I feel like is our advantage, though, is to to leverage AI leverage the shit out of AI and.

121 00:14:16.580 00:14:21.339 Mitchell Wright: That gets your. And if you’re doing project based stuff that that’s where you get your blended, hourly building.

122 00:14:21.340 00:14:22.030 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly.

123 00:14:22.030 00:14:22.400 Mitchell Wright: Bye.

124 00:14:22.400 00:14:50.289 Uttam Kumaran: 100. And you know you, you can. You can. Also, you know, sort of basically, this is why people want to optimize for one of these, and it’s not every you don’t have to hit all of these, but for me, I’m like, I think I can keep cogs pretty low in a couple of ways. One try to, of course, try to use AI to not hire as much, but 2. Also, like, I’ve built data teams. So I’m gonna hire people wherever they are, in the leveling and sort of like, I will level them up, basically like, you know, and turn them into like pretty good. And

125 00:14:50.510 00:15:17.270 Uttam Kumaran: they we don’t have to pay what they’re now worth. And also, like, you just run a good data company like, we have really interesting problems. I think people do appreciate working for us because they have to work on like multiple clients and sort of try to be like, hey guys, if we get this to be a win, I’ll try to do right by everyone. But it’s that’s the fun part is like trying to be like, Okay, I read a bunch of books on how to run these kind of companies. What is the art that I can bring, you know, and I’m not an Mba. Like, I’m

126 00:15:17.590 00:15:18.979 Uttam Kumaran: I’m a data person.

127 00:15:18.980 00:15:20.090 Mitchell Wright: You don’t need to be an Mba.

128 00:15:20.090 00:15:22.400 Uttam Kumaran: But like, I don’t think, yeah, I mean, I don’t.

129 00:15:22.700 00:15:25.080 Uttam Kumaran: Those guys don’t. They’re never gonna yeah, yeah.

130 00:15:25.080 00:15:36.650 Mitchell Wright: So if you so if say you’re shooting for 20 million, right, it feels like the 1st couple of years. Maybe you’re you’re aiming for higher percentage growth, but then eventually.

131 00:15:36.650 00:15:39.960 Uttam Kumaran: Let me give you the math. So like we’re at a million.

132 00:15:40.690 00:15:42.830 Uttam Kumaran: Let’s say we do a million this year.

133 00:15:42.830 00:15:43.280 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

134 00:15:43.280 00:15:46.279 Uttam Kumaran: At 50% growth. It’s about 7 turns at the wheel.

135 00:15:46.280 00:15:47.070 Mitchell Wright: Okay.

136 00:15:47.590 00:15:50.519 Uttam Kumaran: At 100% goats, but 3 turns at the wheel.

137 00:15:50.720 00:15:51.350 Mitchell Wright: Okay.

138 00:15:51.350 00:15:57.449 Uttam Kumaran: So, but for me, like we will, we are like, I feel like we are a couple. We’re basically

139 00:15:57.720 00:16:00.129 Uttam Kumaran: like we. We don’t have any sales team

140 00:16:00.550 00:16:03.559 Uttam Kumaran: we’ve like. It’s just me and and Robert doing all sales

141 00:16:03.740 00:16:09.450 Uttam Kumaran: we don’t have. We didn’t have any sort of key engineering leadership. We didn’t have project managers until 2 weeks ago.

142 00:16:09.450 00:16:10.060 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

143 00:16:10.060 00:16:15.030 Uttam Kumaran: So we got it to here with, and I didn’t raise any money like it’s just pure savings.

144 00:16:15.190 00:16:15.570 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

145 00:16:15.570 00:16:20.790 Uttam Kumaran: And so now it’s like, Okay, now that we have a couple of pieces, I think it’ll be easy for us to

146 00:16:20.930 00:16:25.729 Uttam Kumaran: to start to grow the revenue base. What is hard is gonna be

147 00:16:26.210 00:16:31.989 Uttam Kumaran: keeping the cost of goods on the talent low. This is the the tough part about this business is finding

148 00:16:32.130 00:16:38.930 Uttam Kumaran: talent, not like being like you could do what all these people do is like. Let’s go to Ukraine and get a bunch of the cheapest people. But like

149 00:16:39.440 00:16:57.469 Uttam Kumaran: you also, don’t. Those people never grow into the business, so your acquisition targets will look at you and be like, oh, you’re just a bunch of contractors. There’s no like cohesion. We can’t buy this, or you’re like going through some like other firms for talent like those you don’t own any of those. And so that’s 1 thing. And also like, I really do think

150 00:16:57.780 00:17:04.290 Uttam Kumaran: we can layer on. AI beat up a lot of our the things that we do, and data. And

151 00:17:04.460 00:17:09.270 Uttam Kumaran: I just nurture a rock star team of like super senior people and then

152 00:17:09.430 00:17:16.929 Uttam Kumaran: like sort of, and then try to drive things through better profit incentives and things like that stuff that other agencies don’t do because they’re kind of greedy.

153 00:17:17.250 00:17:17.740 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

154 00:17:17.740 00:17:18.260 Uttam Kumaran: No

155 00:17:18.790 00:17:30.110 Uttam Kumaran: 20 million 20 million is a lot the blended hourly I feel like we could accomplish and the gross margin I feel like we’re we’re near that or close to that right now. The problem is.

156 00:17:30.350 00:17:39.330 Uttam Kumaran: we have like our fixed expenses. I don’t think we’ll grow like we pay. We? We don’t have any equipment, I mean, I guess I probably should start buying people laptops at some point, but like we don’t have any equipment.

157 00:17:39.330 00:17:41.450 Mitchell Wright: Is everyone using their own laptops?

158 00:17:41.830 00:17:46.759 Uttam Kumaran: And then. But we have people like everything is now Mfa. And stuff like that. And then. Now I’m gonna start getting.

159 00:17:46.760 00:17:47.310 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

160 00:17:47.310 00:17:48.250 Uttam Kumaran: Everybody.

161 00:17:48.730 00:17:58.929 Uttam Kumaran: you know, but like those are the investments that we have to make. But I don’t see a fixed. This isn’t a high fixed cost business. But it’s a billable like so getting as many people to become billable, and things like that.

162 00:17:59.752 00:18:04.199 Mitchell Wright: This is interesting. So so is your goal, then to get to that

163 00:18:04.620 00:18:07.370 Mitchell Wright: 20 million mark and then try and sell it.

164 00:18:08.050 00:18:10.939 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I guess I didn’t. Until this presentation.

165 00:18:11.130 00:18:18.879 Uttam Kumaran: I really did not take a sec to think about what the what the revenue goal was, I think, between me and Robert, we definitely are like

166 00:18:19.050 00:18:21.220 Uttam Kumaran: we wanted. We want to sell this business.

167 00:18:21.220 00:18:21.580 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

168 00:18:22.159 00:18:23.319 Uttam Kumaran: But I

169 00:18:23.460 00:18:30.030 Uttam Kumaran: I was like, it’s so hard to spend any time thinking about that, because I just have, like, tomorrow, I have to wake up tomorrow.

170 00:18:30.030 00:18:30.395 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

171 00:18:30.760 00:18:35.890 Uttam Kumaran: So I so I really like, I purposely didn’t I? I do have that in the mind, but I didn’t like

172 00:18:36.170 00:18:42.140 Uttam Kumaran: put any notes to it, because, like, where’s whatever it could be, you could say 50, I’d be like, all right. We’ll try to get there.

173 00:18:42.140 00:18:43.350 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, but this, this does.

174 00:18:43.350 00:18:45.819 Uttam Kumaran: Seem accomplishable, and for the margins

175 00:18:46.180 00:18:52.679 Uttam Kumaran: I feel for the for the multiples. I feel really good that we could probably do it at a lower revenue as long as we’re growing high.

176 00:18:53.190 00:18:54.939 Uttam Kumaran: growing at a high rate.

177 00:18:55.260 00:19:01.626 Uttam Kumaran: And the other slide here that that’s kind of interesting to look at is is slide

178 00:19:04.020 00:19:05.286 Uttam Kumaran: it’s about

179 00:19:09.700 00:19:15.749 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, like, slide 5 is pretty interesting, because.

180 00:19:15.750 00:19:17.220 Mitchell Wright: Oh, wow, there’s basically.

181 00:19:17.940 00:19:24.819 Uttam Kumaran: Basically a a type of acquisition that’s sponsored or sponsor backed or strategic meaning.

182 00:19:25.250 00:19:32.940 Uttam Kumaran: Some people accenture will buy someone just to say, we want to get into Snowflake. Let’s buy one of the snow leading Snowflake people to start a platform.

183 00:19:33.220 00:19:33.710 Mitchell Wright: Got it.

184 00:19:33.710 00:19:40.589 Uttam Kumaran: Other people will buy it to add to their platform strategic. So sponsor is like when a PE firm comes in.

185 00:19:41.060 00:19:43.789 Uttam Kumaran: buys it. Then they’re trying to flip it. Basically.

186 00:19:43.830 00:19:44.620 Mitchell Wright: Yes.

187 00:19:44.620 00:19:45.659 Uttam Kumaran: You know.

188 00:19:46.420 00:19:51.839 Uttam Kumaran: and as you see, on on the left side of Slide 5, it’s like, what are the capabilities they’re acquiring?

189 00:19:52.516 00:20:00.489 Uttam Kumaran: But it’s really like a healthy. There is a lot, especially in data analytics. I mean, Brooklyn data got bought recently. Ph, data

190 00:20:00.680 00:20:02.850 Uttam Kumaran: like, there is activity.

191 00:20:03.080 00:20:03.900 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

192 00:20:04.070 00:20:04.650 Uttam Kumaran: And

193 00:20:06.830 00:20:08.350 Uttam Kumaran: But dude, I mean, like

194 00:20:08.590 00:20:20.170 Uttam Kumaran: like this slide is is so great. But we’re we’re we are literally are just at the point where, like cool, let’s move from like 4 of us to like 20 people and like actually build like client pod structures

195 00:20:20.320 00:20:27.790 Uttam Kumaran: have. But the nice thing is for me. I don’t run it like every client is like one person is there? And then you’re sort of a company of like, just like

196 00:20:27.950 00:20:34.099 Uttam Kumaran: tentacles. It’s like I, we have horizontal functions. Like, I run an analytics engineering meeting. We have like 5 aes.

197 00:20:34.200 00:20:44.179 Uttam Kumaran: And I love to be like, okay, what are we doing on a platform basis like, How are you modeling? Dbt for everybody establishing naming conventions? Same thing for the analysts, same thing for the project manager. So

198 00:20:44.630 00:20:49.570 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know something about my background. And I’ve kind of done all these jobs just help to sort of like.

199 00:20:50.410 00:20:56.289 Uttam Kumaran: get the right people. And then, of course, I think data people ultimately, like, just want to work on like cool data stuff.

200 00:20:56.560 00:20:56.970 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

201 00:20:56.970 00:20:57.485 Uttam Kumaran: And

202 00:20:58.700 00:21:04.040 Uttam Kumaran: it’s recruiting has come easier because I I have a background in data. So they’re not like getting called by.

203 00:21:04.470 00:21:06.665 Uttam Kumaran: you’re not getting called by like an mba.

204 00:21:06.940 00:21:13.069 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, yeah, it’s like someone who actually knows. And and probably also makes hiring a lot easier, because, you know, if someone is good or not.

205 00:21:13.070 00:21:14.310 Uttam Kumaran: Totally. Yeah.

206 00:21:15.250 00:21:18.350 Mitchell Wright: Dang, this is, yeah, this is super interesting. Man.

207 00:21:19.825 00:21:22.520 Uttam Kumaran: Dude. Don’t quit your job. Don’t quit.

208 00:21:25.420 00:21:29.760 Mitchell Wright: Well, I the well, it’s funny, cause you know, you look at that. And I’m like, huh! Like

209 00:21:29.950 00:21:37.540 Mitchell Wright: my potential outcome here, even if we like 10 X arr is like, okay. You know.

210 00:21:38.280 00:21:52.339 Mitchell Wright: I I could make like 10 million, like, probably like best case scenario coming out of here with dilution stuff. Maybe it’s more like, you know, we’re like 8 or something. But but that’s like, if we 10 x our valuation from here and there’s a liquidity event.

211 00:21:52.340 00:21:53.599 Uttam Kumaran: And there’s a liquidity, event.

212 00:21:53.600 00:21:59.859 Mitchell Wright: Right exactly cause like for sell, right? Like, I’m sitting on 7 figures of stock there, but I can’t do shit about it.

213 00:21:59.860 00:22:01.150 Uttam Kumaran: That’s insane. Dude.

214 00:22:01.150 00:22:01.990 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

215 00:22:02.620 00:22:05.380 Mitchell Wright: And and who knows how long? Right like, from what I’ve heard.

216 00:22:05.380 00:22:07.900 Uttam Kumaran: Can I give you a good example? My friend works at Stripe.

217 00:22:08.210 00:22:11.080 Mitchell Wright: Oh, yeah. Well, I mean they do. Liquidity, events.

218 00:22:11.080 00:22:24.639 Uttam Kumaran: They did some, but you know what they just did. They? They do promotions, they do, they do stock, they do rsu offerings or options. I forgot what they do. And basically they just hit 90. And they waited until right after to do the

219 00:22:25.080 00:22:26.050 Uttam Kumaran: grants.

220 00:22:26.220 00:22:27.260 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, so it’s like

221 00:22:27.260 00:22:31.490 Uttam Kumaran: 30% haircut. But those guys, too, like they you could. They buy some of it back.

222 00:22:31.690 00:22:39.289 Uttam Kumaran: But I like, when I was at we work. It was the same problem. So there’s kind of a phase like, probably between now and like your next 2 rounds, maybe someone

223 00:22:39.740 00:22:41.340 Uttam Kumaran: or like picks you all up.

224 00:22:41.470 00:22:47.159 Uttam Kumaran: After that it’s like the mayor. It’s like the Marathon, and that’s also why. For me, I don’t like. I don’t know, Dude, I’m not.

225 00:22:47.510 00:22:51.069 Uttam Kumaran: I’m not interested in the marathon, not because I don’t like to do hard things.

226 00:22:51.070 00:22:51.820 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

227 00:22:51.820 00:22:53.000 Uttam Kumaran: I like.

228 00:22:53.000 00:22:54.420 Mitchell Wright: Control. That’s the problem.

229 00:22:54.420 00:23:00.320 Uttam Kumaran: Control, and like within, like my life, like within, like some semblance of like 20 years.

230 00:23:00.320 00:23:00.760 Mitchell Wright: Hey!

231 00:23:00.760 00:23:02.879 Uttam Kumaran: Years like God, I’m like.

232 00:23:03.270 00:23:30.639 Uttam Kumaran: So it’s and it’s not like a, you know, these are hard businesses to build. But like I, I also want this to be meaningful for the employees like, I don’t want to hire people. A bunch of people who are like come to brain forge and then dip in 2 years and sort of resume. I tell everybody on the call, I’m like my job is to make you as much money as I’m very clear with that, and I will start to incentivize people to stay longer. And then, if there’s an outcome, I want to make these folks as rich as I can like. I’m so serious about that, because

233 00:23:30.840 00:23:37.929 Uttam Kumaran: they’ll come work on the next thing, and like I don’t know. I just feel really good about that I don’t feel greed in that way.

234 00:23:37.930 00:23:38.430 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

235 00:23:38.777 00:23:46.080 Uttam Kumaran: But it’s it’s consulting. Business is hard product. Business is hard because you need the capital like this. Yeah, it’s like

236 00:23:46.470 00:23:51.850 Uttam Kumaran: enough to get cash in cash out and that thing but product business, you have to invest a lot upfront.

237 00:23:52.500 00:23:59.119 Uttam Kumaran: It’s hard for different reasons. But I hear you dude like. I wanted to try to see an outcome within like 5 to 7 years.

238 00:23:59.500 00:24:01.050 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, no, I, exactly.

239 00:24:01.050 00:24:02.029 Uttam Kumaran: Out of it.

240 00:24:02.030 00:24:04.710 Mitchell Wright: That that’s the thing I always come back to is like

241 00:24:05.970 00:24:20.320 Mitchell Wright: consulting like you. You can get the cash quick, and actually like I I didn’t. I mean, I like my friend sold his agency, and it’s like, Okay, like, you can make some money doing it. But the multiples aren’t as good, and, like, you know, it was a slog for him. The first.st

242 00:24:20.320 00:24:21.700 Uttam Kumaran: Want to be in tech

243 00:24:21.840 00:24:31.380 Uttam Kumaran: service like the lead Gen. Marketing agencies. The competition is so fierce, and they are. Have a very hard time getting any contract links

244 00:24:31.580 00:24:33.490 Uttam Kumaran: like it takes a long time.

245 00:24:33.490 00:24:54.040 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, the way they did it. And this is also kind of a a con. But they had, like one really large customer who they had, like they were the only provider of leads for that to that customer, which was great, because then they had this reliable contract. But at the same time it was like that represented like 60% of their.

246 00:24:54.040 00:24:55.540 Uttam Kumaran: Well, you know, on that slide there’s a.

247 00:24:55.540 00:24:55.930 Mitchell Wright: Do you think?

248 00:24:55.930 00:25:01.129 Uttam Kumaran: If I caught yeah, which when they said it, I was like, but yeah, it’s just like this

249 00:25:01.130 00:25:09.880 Uttam Kumaran: slide is like, but I’m gonna print it out. I’m gonna print. I’m gonna I actually thought the other, I’m like, I gotta buy a printer because this is the thing I want to print and like literally put up here.

250 00:25:09.880 00:25:12.229 Mitchell Wright: Every week. Check your metrics against those.

251 00:25:12.230 00:25:13.740 Uttam Kumaran: Totally, totally.

252 00:25:13.740 00:25:25.910 Mitchell Wright: That’s crazy. But yeah, but that was the that was the thing of like because they were so big in that vertical, and because they supplied all the leads to that one company. Eventually that one company bought them because they were.

253 00:25:26.620 00:25:27.330 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

254 00:25:27.330 00:25:42.749 Mitchell Wright: We can’t take the risk of having such a large part of our business controlled by a 3rd party. So we’re gonna buy you guys. And so that was how he sold the 1st one and then after his non compete expired. He basically has been building up another one in the exact same vertical.

255 00:25:42.750 00:25:43.400 Uttam Kumaran: Wow!

256 00:25:43.400 00:25:54.769 Mitchell Wright: Now he’s spread it across. So all the big players, so he hasn’t committed to any one company, which is why he’s gotten bigger scale at this point, so interesting to see him play that can I.

257 00:25:54.770 00:25:59.463 Uttam Kumaran: I tell you another kind of interesting thing that I saw. I don’t know if if I

258 00:25:59.950 00:26:02.840 Uttam Kumaran: like, I don’t know if I have the link for this.

259 00:26:03.750 00:26:07.590 Uttam Kumaran: But we someone messaged us from inside partners.

260 00:26:08.287 00:26:12.960 Uttam Kumaran: And basically what like I, they messaged me, too. And

261 00:26:13.120 00:26:19.360 Uttam Kumaran: I’m like, I’m not talking like I don’t. I don’t. I don’t do well with cold dms where it’s like, hey? We’d like to talk. I’m like.

262 00:26:19.620 00:26:21.499 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t work for you. So you pick you

263 00:26:21.640 00:26:23.519 Uttam Kumaran: because I can consult for y’all.

264 00:26:24.240 00:26:34.170 Uttam Kumaran: But then my business partner, he’s like he’s like, Oh, I took the call, and I’m like dude. Sorry I ghosted them. And he said, they’re building an investment strategy into tech enabled services.

265 00:26:34.450 00:26:36.390 Uttam Kumaran: And they’re basically yeah.

266 00:26:36.390 00:26:54.589 Mitchell Wright: There’s a company that we’ve been talking to called Growth X, and their whole thing is like SEO. They’re an SEO agency slash Growth Agency. But they’re like tech enabled. And so they took investment from Madrona recently. I don’t remember how much they raised, but.

267 00:26:54.590 00:26:55.110 Uttam Kumaran: Okay.

268 00:26:55.110 00:26:59.039 Mitchell Wright: That that’s kind of like their whole place. So I think there’s gonna be this new wave of.

269 00:26:59.040 00:26:59.610 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

270 00:26:59.610 00:27:04.359 Mitchell Wright: Enabled agencies where they’re really relying heavily on AI to.

271 00:27:04.360 00:27:05.010 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

272 00:27:05.010 00:27:08.460 Mitchell Wright: To get better, better margins, essentially.

273 00:27:08.460 00:27:16.730 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, and one of the things. But but, he said, they’re looking for people with 60 to 70% margins. I’m like dude. That’s that’s like really hard to do.

274 00:27:16.920 00:27:20.890 Uttam Kumaran: And and then he was like, Yeah, I think they’re they’re really early. The other thing, he said, is

275 00:27:21.030 00:27:33.650 Uttam Kumaran: they? They they learned a little bit. Us he’s like, Oh, you guys are like 4 deployed, he said. Your AI enabled forward deployed data engineers. And I was like dude, you know where to forward deployed is coming from, because everyone’s palantir.

276 00:27:33.650 00:27:39.589 Mitchell Wright: Yes. Well, and that’s exactly like this guy in the pitch to us. The SEO guy was like.

277 00:27:39.590 00:27:40.089 Uttam Kumaran: Is that what he said.

278 00:27:40.090 00:27:44.729 Mitchell Wright: Like we have this forward deployed AI engineer that’ll work with you guys to do your programmatic.

279 00:27:45.045 00:27:47.250 Uttam Kumaran: Rebranding all our people. By the way.

280 00:27:49.080 00:27:52.867 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know. It’s it’s it seems that it’s like, Hey, it it rings a bell, and

281 00:27:53.090 00:27:56.469 Mitchell Wright: It is like catnip for investors when they hear forward deployed.

282 00:27:56.470 00:28:08.271 Uttam Kumaran: I know, and I was like dude, you know why I always send you this article on Palantir. They called everyone for deployed. I’m like we’re I got literally. I went towards. I said, like we’re changing everybody’s title, though we’re all for deployed.

283 00:28:08.540 00:28:17.870 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, but that’s the thing is like that model works. And then and then, like, you’re talking about like, how do we then build platforms based on the work people are doing.

284 00:28:17.870 00:28:18.270 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.

285 00:28:18.270 00:28:20.350 Mitchell Wright: That we can just make people even.

286 00:28:20.350 00:28:39.331 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly so. It’s almost so. Part of the reusability is like reusable epics, reusable milestones, or like company, comes in. They have classic sows, they have shopify. Xyz. Let’s just immediately pair them in. It’s also like, Hey, we’re running Dbt across 10 people like, what can we benefit from reusable modeling layer things like that.

287 00:28:39.760 00:28:50.880 Uttam Kumaran: And then ultimately, like, I think we’re. If I just had more time I would have figured out like, how do we get more text to sequel writing AI using heavy having AI do have some of the heavy lifting

288 00:28:53.000 00:28:58.859 Uttam Kumaran: But but again, even if he was a good investment, like, what would their returns have to be, and where we?

289 00:28:59.240 00:29:03.350 Uttam Kumaran: This is why I have. No, I’m so. I have little interest in Vc. Because of

290 00:29:03.470 00:29:09.450 Uttam Kumaran: their mindset. And a lot of people I’ve talked to in consulting. They’re like, Yeah, we took money. And then they screwed us. They basically is like

291 00:29:09.670 00:29:14.159 Uttam Kumaran: they was like, we need this to grow. Xyz. And you need to do Xyz. And I’m like

292 00:29:14.580 00:29:15.750 Uttam Kumaran: fuck that like.

293 00:29:15.750 00:29:21.000 Mitchell Wright: I don’t see the I don’t see the venture scale return.

294 00:29:22.040 00:29:26.849 Mitchell Wright: and even if it is there, it’s like, do you really need their money like, you guys are growing just fine.

295 00:29:26.850 00:29:33.439 Uttam Kumaran: But I would rather just get like a credit line, or like, take out a loan or something like, how much money do we need.

296 00:29:33.730 00:29:40.849 Uttam Kumaran: It’s yeah. I don’t know. I think there definitely is a path towards doing things leaner, though, like, I mean, you guys are so lean.

297 00:29:41.050 00:29:42.559 Uttam Kumaran: I mean, there’s pros and cons.

298 00:29:42.560 00:29:43.800 Mitchell Wright: Really lean, though.

299 00:29:43.800 00:29:47.600 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, like, that’s what I’m saying, like, we were in the same boat we had, like.

300 00:29:47.600 00:29:59.760 Mitchell Wright: We’re almost 40 million arr. And we’ve got like 24 people at the company. It’s like, yeah, I mean, we’re closing in on like like 2 million in.

301 00:30:00.050 00:30:00.520 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

302 00:30:00.520 00:30:03.280 Mitchell Wright: Per employee, which is just a crazy number.

303 00:30:03.280 00:30:11.159 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, but that’s great. I mean, that’s that’s the best is like 1 million, right? And like, you know, I think about like Whatsapp. They were like 30 people they sold for like a billion dollars.

304 00:30:11.160 00:30:13.409 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, that’s what I think is like the elite.

305 00:30:13.580 00:30:25.130 Uttam Kumaran: You’re able to do something. But also, I don’t know. I feel like there’s so many different business models of playing where, if we just had, like 3 or 4 like people, and the rest run for contractors. Favors sort of figure it out.

306 00:30:25.820 00:30:29.829 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t know. I think there’s a lot of business models that can work with a lot less people.

307 00:30:29.830 00:30:30.410 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

308 00:30:30.410 00:30:32.899 Uttam Kumaran: You just need the nice Venn diagram of like

309 00:30:33.150 00:30:37.090 Uttam Kumaran: someone who’s figured out, X, someone who’s figured out YZ, and then

310 00:30:37.330 00:30:39.200 Uttam Kumaran: just do it with less people.

311 00:30:39.470 00:30:40.000 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

312 00:30:40.000 00:30:49.780 Uttam Kumaran: And but have an outcome in mind like that’s why. For me, I was really like, we’re selling this like that’s our goal. We’re not. This isn’t a 20 year old, like Ogilvy Company that’s gonna live for like.

313 00:30:49.780 00:30:50.340 Mitchell Wright: Yeah.

314 00:30:50.340 00:30:57.620 Uttam Kumaran: Get in. Try to do a great job and and get out because it’s hard business. It’s so hard. It’s such a people. Heavy business, you know.

315 00:30:57.620 00:31:05.320 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, Hank, and I’ve talked about this kind of thing before of like, what’s what’s a business we could run. That’s like 5 people just like

316 00:31:05.930 00:31:07.370 Uttam Kumaran: talk to Sri about this, too. I’m like.

317 00:31:07.370 00:31:08.149 Mitchell Wright: Go off, cash.

318 00:31:08.150 00:31:11.299 Uttam Kumaran: I just know dealing with the people is so hard I do love it.

319 00:31:11.540 00:31:21.369 Uttam Kumaran: But you really like it’s such a nice thing to work with someone who gets in. Just be like you. Go handle your thing over there. I’ll handle my thing over here. Let’s just like

320 00:31:21.590 00:31:23.350 Uttam Kumaran: run this business off slack.

321 00:31:23.620 00:31:24.550 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, exactly.

322 00:31:24.550 00:31:30.069 Mitchell Wright: Call it like, spit off either a bunch of cash or like grow fast and then flip it or.

323 00:31:30.070 00:31:30.850 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.

324 00:31:30.980 00:31:31.920 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

325 00:31:31.920 00:31:38.600 Mitchell Wright: Anyway, I gotta hop to another call. But dude, this is interesting. But yeah, send me over the contract and like we’ll sign that for.

326 00:31:38.600 00:31:39.020 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.

327 00:31:39.020 00:31:40.819 Mitchell Wright: For like at least another month, and then.

328 00:31:40.820 00:31:41.220 Uttam Kumaran: Well.

329 00:31:41.220 00:31:45.280 Mitchell Wright: We can get the other engineers in here, and we’ll talk about and try and get something.

330 00:31:45.280 00:31:50.199 Uttam Kumaran: If you get any thoughts about this slide, deck, or anything, let me know I’m happy.

331 00:31:50.200 00:31:53.690 Mitchell Wright: Yeah, I’m gonna look through that whole thing in more detail, because that’s super interesting.

332 00:31:53.690 00:31:54.340 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.

333 00:31:54.790 00:31:57.070 Mitchell Wright: Hey, dude, we’ll catch you have a good weekend.

334 00:31:57.070 00:31:58.009 Uttam Kumaran: You too, bye.