The Catapult Code

Qapita

A podcast designed exclusively for builders navigating the turbulence between current traction and the next orbit. For founders and leaders who are serious about expanding their impact and building enduring companies.

Episódios

  1. há 4 dias

    Zach Goldstein: The Hard Pivot From Growth to Profitable Growth | The Catapult Code by Qapita | EP 6

    Every restaurant has the same blind spot: a customer can walk in, spend money and walk out without ever saying who they are. Zach Goldstein has spent nearly fifteen years fixing that — and was told he was wrong for most of them. In Episode 6 of The Catapult Code by Qapita, Ravi Ravulaparthi (Co-founder & CEO, Qapita) and Brendan Marshall sit down with Zach Goldstein, Founder & CEO of Thanx, to talk about what it costs to be right early. In 2019 he published "The Four Horsemen of the Restaurant Apocalypse," warning operators that DoorDash, Uber Eats, Grubhub and Postmates were quietly taking ownership of their customers. Restaurants told him the revenue was incremental and he was being negative. He kept saying it. Years later that essay is one of the most valuable assets his company owns. The harder call came next. Thanx had raised a Series A led by Sequoia on a vision of serving every vertical and every size of customer. Zach walked away from it — right-sizing the team, right-sizing the capital structure, narrowing to restaurants, choosing profitability over the growth curve. It felt like failure. The business has since put together 17 straight quarters of year-over-year bookings growth. CHAPTERS(00:00) Cold open (01:31) Welcome to The Catapult Code (02:00) The blind spot every offline business has (02:55) Inside a $1.5 trillion industry (04:16) How Covid moved dining off-premise (06:08) The Four Horsemen of the Restaurant Apocalypse (07:04) Telling customers a truth they didn't want to hear (16:13) Building empathy for a customer you've never been (18:07) The Sequoia round and the grand vision (19:21) Right-sizing the team, the capital and the mission (20:12) Why narrowing focus accelerated growth (22:43) 17 straight quarters — and the metric that came first (23:42) Proving you're not a flash in the pan (26:27) Behavioural interviewing, hiring without résumés (27:35) Hire for slope, not intercept (29:25) How the journey changed him as a leader (31:22) Giving people room to struggle (32:18) Riding the AI wave as a smaller company (33:43) When customers aren't asking for AI at all (35:34) Why refusing to build cheap software paid off (36:47) Who actually owns the customer data (39:14) When an AI agent decides what you eat (42:17) Loyalty beyond $5 off (45:39) The black box problem, and earning trust (51:04) The North Star metric, and what onboarding predicts (53:15) The Loyalty Unconference, and giving up control (57:00) Closing thoughts ABOUT ZACH GOLDSTEINZach Goldstein is Founder & CEO of Thanx, the guest engagement and loyalty platform he started in 2011 to help restaurants own their customer relationships and grow lifetime value. Before Thanx he spent five years at Bain & Company on retention and loyalty strategy. He holds a BA from Dartmouth and an MBA from Stanford GSB, and is among the most outspoken voices in restaurant tech. CONNECT WITH ZACHLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zgoldsteinThanx: https://www.thanx.com ABOUT THE CATAPULT CODEThe Catapult Code is a podcast designed exclusively for builders navigating the turbulence between current traction and the next orbit. For founders and leaders who are serious about expanding their impact and building enduring companies. Hosted by Ravi Ravulaparthi (Co-founder & CEO, Qapita) and Brendan Marshall. ABOUT QAPITAQapita is a global private markets infrastructure platform offering equity management, fund administration and liquidity solutions. From cap table management and Stock Options administration to valuations, fund management, and structured liquidity, Qapita brings everything onto a single, audit-ready platform - trusted by companies across US, India, Southeast Asia, and beyond. Learn more at https://www.qapita.com

  2. 13 de ago.

    India's Private Credit Market Is 30 Yrs Behind. He's Fixing It | Vineet Sukumar | Catapult Code Ep.5

    What does it take to build one of India's most influential private credit businesses from scratch? Ravi Ravulaparthi (CEO, Qapita) and Brendan Marshall sit down with Vineet Sukumar, Founder & Managing Director of Vivriti Group, to unpack the journey behind one of India's most ambitious financial infrastructure companies. From walking away from a prestigious banking career to taking an 80% pay cut, investing $2 million of his own money, and betting everything on a problem almost nobody wanted to solve — this is a story of conviction, capital, and building markets before they exist. Vineet shares why India's debt markets were fundamentally broken, why founders underestimate private credit, what investors consistently get wrong, and why building institutions requires thinking decades ahead. Whether you're a founder, investor, operator, finance professional, or simply curious about how India's financial ecosystem is evolving, this conversation offers rare insight from someone who has helped shape it from the inside. CHAPTERS (00:00) India's missing debt market (01:29) Welcome to The Catapult Code (02:15) Standard Chartered to a life's mission (06:20) Walking away from a dream banking job (07:09) If I left, would anyone notice? (08:00) India had no real private credit market (08:46) Why small firms couldn't access debt (09:22) The opportunity in a broken market (10:44) From selling capital to picking founders (13:47) Why he left again to build Vivriti (14:50) The gap everyone saw, nobody built (16:23) Was starting Vivriti terrifying? (17:05) An 80% pay cut and a new city (18:02) Betting $2M of their own money (18:51) Product-market fit in seven days (20:06) Why success came faster than expected (21:22) Bootstrapped, then a fundraising error (25:10) India is 30 years behind on credit (27:30) Building trust in financial markets (33:00) What makes a company investable (51:20) Financial services is a scale business (1:00:40) Private credit over the next decade (1:05:00) AI in lending, and human judgment (1:16:40) Advice for first-time entrepreneurs (1:24:50) You cannot be a cute player (1:28:00) Scale is the only real moat (1:30:20) What Vivriti does better than anyone (1:33:00) Final advice for long-term founders ABOUT VINEET SUKUMAR Vineet Sukumar is the Founder & Managing Director of the Vivriti Group. An alumnus of IIT Kharagpur and IIM Bangalore, he previously held leadership roles at Standard Chartered Bank and IFMR before founding Vivriti in 2017. Under his leadership, Vivriti has built one of India's leading private credit platforms focused on enabling debt access for mid-market enterprises, serving hundreds of businesses across financial services, healthcare, renewable energy, manufacturing and infrastructure. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vineetsukumar Vivriti Group: https://www.vivriticapital.com Vivriti Asset Management: https://www.vivritiamc.com ABOUT THE CATAPULT CODE A podcast for builders navigating the turbulence between current traction and the next orbit. From the Indus Valley to Silicon Valley — founders and operators who have built enduring companies in India and the US. Hosted by Ravi Ravulaparthi (Co-founder & CEO, Qapita) and Brendan Marshall (serial founder, investor and operator in Silicon Valley). ABOUT QAPITA Qapita is a global private markets platform for equity management, fund administration and liquidity — from cap tables and ESOPs to valuations, all on one audit-ready platform. Learn more at https://www.qapita.com Subscribe for more founder stories — and tell us your biggest takeaway below.

  3. 6 de ago.

    100 Million Americans Have No Doctor. He's Fixing That | KJ Dhaliwal, Lotus AI | The Catapult Code Ep. 4

    KJ Dhaliwal sold his last company for $50 million. Most founders would take that and coast. He did the opposite - he went looking for the single hardest problem he could find, and landed on US primary healthcare. That instinct runs through his whole story. As a kid, he translated doctor's visits for his immigrant parents and watched them fight the American health insurance maze. At 18, a sports injury left him bedridden for a month, carrying a physical binder of his own medical records from specialist to specialist. The seed was planted then: there has to be a way to put all of this in one place and give a person real agency over their health. Years later - after building Dil Mil, the mobile-first dating app for the South Asian diaspora that helped millions find love, scaling the parent company past $500M in revenue, and prepping an IPO that Covid ultimately killed - he started Lotus AI: a free, AI-powered primary care experience that keeps a real doctor in the loop, aggregates the health data trapped in hospital silos, and aligns its incentives entirely with the patient. KJ sits down with Ravi Ravulaparthi and Brendan Marshall for a wide-ranging conversation on building across two very different industries, why "you only get 2 or 3 big swings in life," and the counterintuitive economics of giving a healthcare product away for free. CHAPTERS (00:00) The $50M exit and the hardest problem (01:11) Access for the excluded (01:42) Translating doctor visits as a kid (03:27) Why he picked the hardest problem (05:40) You only get 2 or 3 big swings (06:18) Punjabi roots and naming Dil Mil (08:12) I was never employable (09:04) From selling gum to eBay power seller (11:36) Dil Mil: team, capital, moving to SF (14:01) Why timing makes or breaks a company (16:19) Starting vs selling a business (17:56) A cold LinkedIn message, then an exit (21:05) Building Lotus AI: what carries over (23:35) A $5T market bigger than India's GDP (25:32) The three-party problem in healthcare (27:28) Pitching a free product to investors (31:37) Keeping the doctor in the loop (33:06) Uber today, Waymo tomorrow (35:55) Patient agency and health data (40:12) Choosing Kleiner Perkins and CRV (44:20) Don't pick the wrong investor (46:57) Building an AI-native team (49:52) Why code is no longer the hard part (52:47) Aligning doctors and engineers (54:58) From fear of failure to fear of success (57:00) Why he walked away from coasting ABOUT THE GUEST KJ Dhaliwal is Founder and CEO of Lotus AI, building free, world-class primary care powered by AI and real clinicians. Born in Punjab and raised in New York, he previously founded and sold Dil Mil, the leading dating app for the South Asian diaspora. He is a Y Combinator alum. Lotus AI is backed by Kleiner Perkins and CRV. X: https://x.com/kjdhaliwal Lotus AI: https://lotus.ai ABOUT THE CATAPULT CODE A podcast for builders navigating the turbulence between current traction and the next orbit. From the Indus Valley to Silicon Valley - founders and operators who have built enduring companies in India and the US. Hosted by Ravi Ravulaparthi (Co-founder & CEO, Qapita) and Brendan Marshall (serial founder, investor and operator in Silicon Valley). ABOUT QAPITA Qapita is a global private markets platform for equity management, fund administration and liquidity - from cap tables and ESOPs to valuations, all on one audit-ready platform. Learn more at https://www.qapita.com Subscribe for more founder stories - and tell us your biggest takeaway below.

  4. 30 de jul.

    The Impactful Couple Who Helped Build Indian Venture Capital | The Catapult Code Ep. 3

    Before there was an Indian startup ecosystem, there were people willing to bet it could exist. Anjali Bansal and Sandeep Singhal returned to India around 1999, when venture capital barely existed. They believed founders—not just business families—could build great companies with institutional backing, and helped create the playbook as they went. The conversation explores what makes founders endure, the line between resilience and delusion, why Indian founders should think globally, and why the next wave of innovation will be driven by physical industries, sustainability and deep tech—not just software. CHAPTERS (00:00) Resilience, R&D and San Francisco (02:14) Coming home in 1999 when everyone else stayed (05:34) Sandeep's ISRO detour: the dream of space (09:19) Chairing a troubled bank, the riskiest bet (10:04) Starting a VC when the category barely existed (13:57) "We hired a search firm to find our founders" (14:24) MakeMyTrip: surviving when rivals died (16:57) What makes an enduring founder? (19:34) Anjali on agility and knowing what you don't know (22:39) Why the podcast is called The Catapult Code (23:19) Orbit shifts: Lenskart and farm-to-market pivots (33:59) Same founder traits, very different ecosystems (37:35) Policy work and India's deep-tech engine (43:52) Persistence vs. delusion, the board's real job (46:32) The Avaana thesis: physical and sustainable (53:26) Building in India, selling to the world (59:37) The confidence gap founders still carry (01:05:06) Gender, EQ, and reading the room (01:09:57) Human agency in the age of AI agents 🎙️ABOUT THE GUESTS Anjali Bansal and Sandeep Singhal aren't just two of the people who built Indian venture capital, they have spent 25 years taking turns backing each other's risks. Whenever one started something new, the other held the stable ground. Anjali is the Founding Partner of Avaana Capital, backing tech and innovation-led startups across energy, supply chains, mobility, and agriculture. Appointed by the Government of India as Non-Executive Chairperson of Dena Bank, she steered its resolution and merger with Bank of Baroda, and has backed Delhivery, Urban Company, Nykaa, and Lenskart. Sandeep co-founded Nexus Venture Partners in 2006 and, before that, eVentures India in 1999, one of the earliest Indian VC funds, which catalyzed MakeMyTrip. 🔗 CONNECT Anjali Bansal — LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/anjali-bansal-8489091 Sandeep Singhal — LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/sandeep-singhal-4467b · X: @aaasandeep Avaana Capital — avaanacapital.com · X: @avaanacapital 🎙️ ABOUT THE CATAPULT CODE The Catapult Code is a podcast designed exclusively for builders navigating the turbulence between current traction and the next orbit. For founders and leaders who are serious about expanding their impact and building enduring companies. From the Indus Valley to Silicon Valley: The Catapult Code to bring voices from founders and operators who have built enduring companies from both India and across the US. Hosted by Ravi Ravulaparthi (Co-founder & CEO, Qapita — 17 years working closely with high-growth founders, now managing equity for 2,700+ companies including half of India's unicorns) and Brendan Marshall (serial founder, investor, and operator from Silicon Valley who has supported hundreds of startups). 🏢 ABOUT QAPITA Qapita is a global private markets infrastructure platform offering equity management, fund administration and liquidity solutions, helping founders, employees, and investors unlock the power of ownership. From cap table management and Stock Options administration to valuations, fund management, and structured liquidity, Qapita brings everything onto a single, audit-ready platform - trusted by companies across US, India, Southeast Asia, and beyond. 👉 Like this conversation? Subscribe for more episodes of The Catapult Code and hit the 🔔 so you never miss a founder story. 🔗Learn more at https://www.qapita.com Full episode on YT: https://youtu.be/TDxR9sLYhIQ

  5. 23 de jul.

    From Spanish Facebook to $2.6B: Base10's AI Bet on Economy | Adeyemi Ajao | The Catapult Code Ep. 2

    Hopefully when you call founders in our portfolio, they say that we show up when it matters. I'd rather take that than any other compliment. Adeyemi Ajao taught himself to code in southern Spain in the 90s, taking two buses to a library to borrow COBOL and C++ manuals before returning home to a computer without a hard drive. Twenty-one years later, he's the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Base10 Partners, one of the world's largest Black-led venture firms, managing $2.6B in assets after an $850M raise. He was also the first Black investor named to the Forbes Midas List. This conversation isn't about overnight success. It's about two decades of rejection, conviction, and changing your mind. Ade shares why he was once told "Applied AI" wasn't a real category, why he underestimated scaling laws, and why admitting you were wrong is often the best sign you're learning. Ade argues that intelligence is no longer the bottleneck-adoption is. The challenge isn't the last mile between research and products; it's the last 50 miles between technology and organizations that can meaningfully use it. Drawing from Base10's own experience building internal AI systems, and from conversations with small business owners, he explains why even the best technology often fails to reach the real economy. ⏱️ CHAPTERS (00:00) We show up when it matters (01:28) Being an outsider before it's a superpower (04:22) Discovering technology (06:12) Learning to code in southern Spain (06:53) Building Tuenti ("Spanish Facebook") (08:19)What defines a founder? (11:19) Twenty-one years of hearing "no" (12:32) Why "Applied AI" mattered (16:18) Becoming an investor (17:01) The 50% carry pledge (18:01) Building a $2.6B platform (20:43) The changing quality of founders (26:19) Showing up when it matters (26:45) The hardest founder decisions (30:31) Talent vs. compute (33:31) The last 50 miles of AI adoption (38:03) The haircut test (40:00) Being wrong about scaling laws (40:50) World models & physical labour (41:43) Advice for founders without networks About the Guest Adeyemi "Ade" Ajao is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Base10 Partners, investing in automation for the real economy. Before Base10, he co-founded Tuenti (acquired by Telefónica) and Identified (acquired by Workday), and was an early member of Cabify. Base10's portfolio includes companies such as Nubank, Figma, Instacart and Brex, while donating 50% of carried interest to scholarships for underrepresented students. About The Catapult Code The Catapult Code is a podcast for founders building enduring companies. Hosted by Ravi Ravulaparthi (Co-Founder & CEO of Qapita) and Brendan Marshall (founder, investor and operator from Silicon Valley), the show brings together founders, operators and investors from India and the US to unpack the decisions that shape exceptional businesses. About Qapita Qapita is a global private markets infrastructure platform helping founders, employees and investors manage ownership through equity management, fund administration and liquidity solutions. Learn more: https://www.qapita.com Youtube Link: https://youtu.be/braQZIfOiKA What was your biggest takeaway from this conversation?

  6. 16 de jul.

    3 Startups, 2 Exits, 1 Passion: 0 to1 Challenge | Jay Srinivasan, Stitchflow | The Catapult Code Ep1

    He sold his first company to Google and his second to Okta — then walked away to build a third from scratch. In Episode 1 of The Catapult Code by Qapita, Jay Srinivasan (CEO, Stitchflow) joins host Ravi Ravulaparthi (CEO, Qapita) and Brendan Marshall (Advisor, Qapita) to unpack what really happens inside the 0-to-1 journey — the part most founders romanticize and almost nobody explains honestly. From pricing virtual cows at Zynga to two Silicon Valley exits, to now building from India, Jay breaks down why there's "no secret sauce," how he picks which problem to solve, what real product-market fit looks like, how to choose (and part ways with) a co-founder, when to sell, and why he just pivoted his entire company using AI agents. ⏱️ CHAPTERS (0:00) - There is no secret sauce. It's luck every time. (1:06) - Meet Jay Srinivasan: the 3X founder (1:36) - From IIT to a PhD to McKinsey (2:45) - "Corona on the beach": quitting consulting (4:30) - Zynga, Farmville & the price of virtual cows (5:02) - Selling to Google & Okta — the pull of 0-to-1 (6:32) - Is there an algorithm for picking the next problem? (8:20) - The atSpoke method: mining billion-dollar markets (11:22) - What "getting to one" really means (real PMF) (14:38) - The 0-to-1 playbook: launch fast, assume you'll fail (16:33) - "Thrashing" vs. conviction: reading signals earlier (18:34) - The toughest decisions are always about people (20:16) - How to choose a co-founder (23:57) - The one filter: can you fight and not hold a grudge? (24:09) - Cap tables & parting ways with co-founders (25:31) - When to sell: local maxima vs. global maxima (27:35) - Why the Google exit was a "global max" (30:16) - Strong opinions, loosely held: his framework (31:05) - Building teams & the trait he hires for (33:56) - Screening for defensiveness & radical candor (40:36) - "There can only be one CEO": the tiebreaker rule (43:23) - The Stitchflow story: solving SaaS sprawl (46:39) - When Claude Code changed everything: the AI pivot (52:38) - Choosing investors & "nobody cares — figure it out" (1:04:00) - Building in India: culture, deadlines & whole selves (1:09:34) - Risk tolerance & why Indian talent stays (1:12:24) - Talent density vs. "polish" vs. the Valley (1:14:17) - The pitch: agent amplification of founder-led marketing (1:17:35) - Closing thoughts 📌 ABOUT THE GUEST Jay Srinivasan is a 3X founder and CEO of Stitchflow. He previously founded Appurify (acquired by Google, folded into Firebase Test Lab) and atSpoke (acquired by Okta, where he led Okta Identity Governance). An IIT Madras grad with a PhD in Computer Science, his earlier stops include McKinsey and Zynga. He's now building his third company — with a team in India. 🎙️ ABOUT THE CATAPULT CODE A podcast for builders navigating the turbulence between current traction and the next orbit — founders and leaders serious about building enduring companies. From the Indus Valley to Silicon Valley, it brings voices from founders and operators who've built across India and the US. Hosted by Ravi Ravulaparthi (Co-founder & CEO, Qapita — 17 years alongside high-growth founders, now managing equity for 2,700+ companies, including half of India's unicorns) and Brendan Marshall (serial founder, investor, and operator from Silicon Valley who has backed hundreds of startups). 🏢 ABOUT QAPITA Qapita is a global private markets infrastructure platform for equity management, fund administration, and liquidity — helping founders, employees, and investors unlock the power of ownership. From cap tables and stock option administration to valuations, fund management, and structured liquidity, it's all on one audit-ready platform, trusted by companies across the US, India, Southeast Asia, and beyond. 👉 Subscribe for more episodes and hit the 🔔 so you never miss a founder story YT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkM1O_TwfK4 🔗 https://www.qapita.com | LinkedIn: Qapita #TheCatapultCode #Qapita #JaySrinivasan #Stitchflow #Startups #Founders

  7. Trailer da temporada 1

    The Catapult Code — Trailer

    The Catapult Code - Trailer is live 🎙️ The Catapult Code is a new podcast bringing you unfiltered conversations with founders and founders-turned-investors from two of the world's biggest startup ecosystems - Silicon Valley (USA) and the Indus Valley (India). Every conversation in this trailer left our host with something he wished he'd known earlier - back when he started building Qapita. These are practical insights, straight from founders and investors who've navigated startup pivots, near-death moments, and career-defining bets - not once, but multiple times over. Built to be useful for founders, startup operators, and early-stage investors everywhere. This trailer features conversations with some of the most respected names in startups and venture capital: Brendan Marshall, Jay Srinivasan, Adeyemi Ajao, Anjali Bansal, Sandeep Singhal, KJ Dhaliwal, Zachary Goldstein, Fernando Fabre, Eric Kinariwala, Vineet Sukumar, Vamsee Mohan, and Lakshman Gupta. Together, they share the real stories behind building - the moments that never make headlines, the decisions that shaped their companies, and the lessons that only come with hindsight. Watch the trailer. The guests speak for themselves. First episode drops this Thursday. From Team Qapita - to every founder, operator, and investor building in startup ecosystems worldwide. Topics covered: startup founders, founder-to-investor journeys, venture capital, early-stage investing, startup pivots, Silicon Valley, Indian startup ecosystem, building a company from scratch, entrepreneurship, startup community.

  8. 15 de jul. ·  Bônus

    The Catapult Code — Teaser

    The Catapult Code brings you real, unfiltered conversations with Founders and Founders-turned-Investors from two of the world's most dynamic startup ecosystems — Silicon Valley (USA) and the Indus Valley (India). In this teaser, host Ravi Ravulaparthi — Co-founder of Qapita — sits down with Brendan Marshall, Advisor to Qapita, opening a series that goes beyond the headlines. Expect honest stories about the pivots, the near-death moments, and the bets that quietly changed everything for the people building today's biggest companies. These are the conversations founders wish someone had shared with them earlier. Trailer dropping soon. First full episode releases this Thursday. From Team Qapita and Brendan — to every founder, operator, and investor building in startup ecosystems around the world. Topics covered: startup founders, founder-to-investor journeys, venture capital, early-stage investing, startup pivots, Silicon Valley, Indian startup ecosystem, building a company from scratch.

Trailer

Sobre

A podcast designed exclusively for builders navigating the turbulence between current traction and the next orbit. For founders and leaders who are serious about expanding their impact and building enduring companies.

Informações

  • Criado por
    Qapita
  • Anos de atividade
    2026
  • Episódios
    8
  • Classificação
    Livre
  • Copyright
    © Qapita
  • Site do podcast
    The Catapult Code