‘The Indian startup ecosystem is respected all over the world’ – 20 quotes on the India business opportunity

Launched in 2014, StoryBites is a weekly feature from YourStory, featuring notable quotable quotes in our articles of this past week (see the previous edition here). Share these 20 gems and insights from the week of April 18-24 with your colleagues and networks, and check back to the original articles for more insights. See also our special compilation of quotes related to India’s coronavirus responses here.

See also our pick of Top Quotes of 2021 on Entrepreneurship, Investment, Digital Transformation, Storytelling, The India Opportunity, Pandemic Resilience, Failure Recovery, Design, and Art.

India has the unique opportunity to create a modern and world-class infrastructure and be the AI garage for the world. – Vishal Dhupar, NVIDIA

2021 was a watershed year for Indian SaaS – including exponential valuations, successful IPO debuts, a vast influx of VC investments, and an unprecedented number of unicorns. – Pari Natarajan, Zinnov

As Indian ecommerce grows, we see new-age brands building direct relationships with their customers. – Anand Lakshminarayanan, Flipkart

Today, India is one of the largest markets in the world for the subscription economy. – Rahul Kothari, Razorpay

One of the things that we always used to hear about earlier is that Indian businesses, especially the smaller ones, will not ever pay a subscription fee…they will not pay for SaaS products. And I think that is getting turned around on its head right now. – Akash Gehani, Instamojo

India has lots of innovation and some fabulous products. Good marketing can unlock the monetary potential. – Jessie Paul, ‘Marketing without Money’

Kids fashion is a $15 billion category in India. – Rahul Anand, Hopscotch

In India, you have more than a million college graduates every year who fail to get relevant employment opportunities, and yet there are thousands of companies struggling to find talent. – Siddharth Maheshwari, Newton School

The tech divide is a reality today. With voice, we cannot just transform the tech divide, but experiences as well. – Chirag Boonlia, Embassy Group

There is a lot that can be done in improving adventure in the Northeast as well as uplift rural tourism if the government participates in promoting tourism in rural and undiscovered regions. – Prasurjya Talukdar, Oddessemania

The EV industry in India is picking pace with 100 percent FDI, new manufacturing hubs, and an increased push to improve charging infrastructure. – Nimish Trivedi, Prakriti E-mobility

With a firm EV policy put forth by the Center in place, we feel this sector is ripe for exponential growth over the next few years. – Mihir Kapoor, IEG India

India’s leadership in technology and innovation creates an opportunity to accelerate its transition towards the Circular Economy, especially in light of greater cultural acceptance towards circular practices. – Kalaari Capital report

Over the last few years, the ecosystem has seen several founders generate some liquidity and many have allocated capital to venture debt, as part of their asset allocation. – Ashish Sharma, InnoVen Capital India Fund

The B2B BNPL offers a level playing field to the businesses who have been otherwise deprived of working capital and purchase financing. – Zaki Hasan, Affivo

Learning to invest in crypto and NFT will become a much smoother process with the government working towards formulating cryptocurrency guidelines and coming up with its own CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency). – Vishakha Singh, WazirX

There are over 100 million households that are already choosing to view Netflix. They love the service. We just got to get paid to some degree for them. – Greg Peters, Netflix

We need to push entrepreneurial thinking towards enabling the youth to work for our rural India and become climate warriors. – Manav Subodh,1M1B

India is aiming for a $5 trillion economy, poised to be third largest economy… but we are bleeding crazy levels of talent, capital, and enterprise, everyday. – Amit Ranjan, Slideshare

We have to inspire people to trust us. There’s a need to change certain mindsets, bring about behavioral changes, and break socio-economic taboos. – Natalia Vega, RoundGlass Foundation

People, especially in a semi-urban city in Haryana like mine, find it difficult to listen to a woman. – Vrinda Sharma, Me and My Human Foundation

We have the largest number of unicorns, and the speed at which unicorns are growing is huge. This reflects the energy technology is taking to drive investment. – Raghav Chandra, CUNSULT

Creating 250 companies with over $1 billion valuation by 2025 is an extremely achievable goal for Indian founders. – Anand Prasanna, Iron Pillar

Today, the Indian startup ecosystem is respected all over the world. We are today among the top three startup ecosystems in the world. – Ashwini Vaishnaw, Minister for IT and Communications

YourStory has also published the pocketbook ‘Proverbs and Quotes for Entrepreneurs: A World of Inspiration for Startups’ as a creative and motivational guide for innovators (downloadable as apps here: Apple, Android).