0:00

And based on our own experience , we are about 65-70%

0:03

of the market share in 2-3 note charging today

0:05

.

0:07

Jyoti and Mohit came back with a number

0:09

and that's basically . Maybe

0:12

. We put 10% more as a buffer and

0:14

invested and said , okay , let's keep this company

0:16

going because they had something unique

0:18

, but it was still far from being

0:20

a business .

0:24

We want to convert . We want to build a product

0:27

, technology and also a company which

0:29

will enable every parking lot to be a potential

0:31

charging company .

0:43

Great . I have with me the co-founder

0:45

of Bolt , Jyoti . Jyoti and

0:47

Mohit are two founders of Bolt on Earth and

0:50

we met Jyoti

0:52

the first time just before the pandemic and

0:55

he came and showed me a fancy scooter

0:57

that had all kinds of remote control . It could go fast

1:00

, slow you know , without having almost

1:02

like a driver-less scooter , except it

1:04

obviously needed a human being to sit on it , and

1:07

it was fascinating . And then of course the pandemic

1:09

hit and we started trying to figure out what

1:11

this beast called Zoom was and how we could work

1:14

together and things like that . But we're very

1:16

fortunate to have invested

1:18

in the company at that time and it's

1:20

been quite an exciting journey . Businesses

1:22

expanded many fold . Of course there

1:24

have been a lot of challenges as well in the business

1:26

. Jyoti , welcome to the show

1:28

, and I'd like to start

1:31

probably by if you could

1:33

tell us a little bit about how

1:35

you and Mohit conceived Bolt

1:37

and what the early days were like I

1:39

guess the company was called RevOS at the time

1:41

and the early days , and then

1:43

we'll get into sort of the lines of business

1:45

and how the team was built and things like that

1:48

.

1:49

Thank you , sanjay , first for inviting me

1:51

to this podcast and

1:54

thank you for your trust in

1:56

worldearth and previously

1:58

, the OS . So I

2:00

think the first time we met was

2:02

, I think , 2019 summer

2:04

or towards the end of

2:07

2019 , in the winter . I

2:09

remember it vaguely . We were demonstrating

2:12

, like you correctly pointed out , we had

2:14

a bike . We were showing what are the capabilities

2:16

of EV is , and I

2:19

think it was still too early

2:21

. All the names in

2:23

the EV industry were not present that time . We

2:26

got that by imported

2:28

from China , where we were working since

2:31

2017 when we started the company

2:33

, and I think it

2:35

kind of showed the

2:37

power of how software

2:39

is going to basically play

2:42

a pretty important role in EVs and

2:45

what is the ecosystem which had to be

2:47

at that point of time built for

2:49

EVs to kind of succeed in the

2:51

country . And a lot

2:53

of the learnings also come for

2:56

us from selling software

2:58

and services to a lot

3:00

of the Chinese manufacturers . That time

3:02

, and that time itself , china was

3:04

already a leader in the EV space . Today

3:07

it is also leading the world essentially in EV adoption

3:09

and I think a glimpse

3:11

into the future there has just built

3:14

what we have built in India till

3:16

now .

3:17

So actually , one of the things that struck me even at that

3:19

time sorry to interrupt was , if

3:21

you all talk about , oh , this is important from China

3:24

and you know there's obviously a lot of , you

3:26

know , reduction , I mean a lot of questions

3:29

are how much one imports from there , but

3:31

you actually sell software to the

3:33

Chinese OEMs , and the first thing that I

3:35

found interesting was oh , here's a young startup

3:37

here that actually has people working

3:39

in China and actually helping

3:41

build , you know , integrate our

3:43

software into their devices , so

3:46

to speak . Right , so your

3:48

origins were kind of different . It was almost the world

3:50

turned upside down in some ways .

3:52

Yeah , so thanks for pointing that out

3:54

. So when we started , actually we wanted

3:56

to . The broader vision

3:58

was to create an ecosystem

4:00

around EVs and not build the

4:03

EVs . Okay , and this

4:05

at a time in India when

4:08

EVs were still

4:10

basically not on the roads , on

4:12

the paper or newspaper or startup . Raising

4:15

fund here and there no products on the road

4:17

was kind of difficult

4:19

for a young company like us , but

4:22

glad that we took that bet at that point of

4:24

time and we went to China

4:26

. We found a few customers . We

4:28

were delivering software and

4:30

products and that kind of helped

4:32

us understand not only

4:35

the EV ecosystem but

4:37

supply chain generally in

4:39

the world and specially electronics . Now

4:42

today India is , as

4:45

you know , is climbing up the ladder

4:47

in terms of EV manufacturing . But

4:49

before COVID the things were very different

4:52

, right , and I think currently

4:55

in India 99% of the phones we

4:57

use are manufactured in India . Also , before

4:59

COVID 99% of the

5:01

phones we used were

5:03

imported from China . So

5:05

that has been changed . But that kind

5:07

of gave a glimpse into how manufacturing

5:10

electronics and everything worked

5:13

there and that helped us

5:15

to define our own path

5:18

post COVID , especially

5:20

for making in India and

5:22

building for the world as well .

5:25

So I recall you

5:29

know prime . We have

5:31

several companies that are in the IoT space

5:33

, are relatively comfortable with something that has

5:35

a bit of a hardware element , and I remember

5:37

when we were talking with Jyoti , we

5:40

had not yet signed a term sheet , we were still evaluating

5:42

the company and all of a sudden COVID hit

5:44

and he called

5:47

me one day and he said I'm

5:49

talking January In India . We sort of understood

5:51

what it meant , probably in March

5:54

, and he said well , my engineers

5:56

who are in China are getting a little scared

5:58

, they want to come home and

6:00

things are not going to go to plan for some

6:02

time and it's a very tough thing for a founder

6:05

to have with an early stage investor . At

6:08

that time I recall we said well , what's

6:10

the minimum amount of money you're going to need to make

6:13

it through the next six , nine months ? And very

6:16

studiously , he and Mohit came back with

6:18

a number and that's basically

6:21

maybe . We put 10% more as a buffer and

6:23

invested and said , ok , let's keep this company

6:25

going because they had something unique

6:27

, but it was still far from being

6:29

a business . But

6:32

during those nine months and

6:34

of course the world was completely in turmoil

6:36

they made phenomenal progress

6:39

. They brought out the charging product and

6:42

there's not a company that could be worked from home all

6:44

the time , because you had this physicality

6:46

of devices and labs and stuff like

6:48

that . But tell us a

6:50

little bit about that phase of the company where

6:54

the whole world was sitting at home but you guys had to actually

6:56

build hardware together and software

6:58

together .

6:59

Yeah , I think that was

7:01

quite a learning experience

7:03

for us coming

7:05

out of COVID , which is

7:07

like once a century kind of event which

7:09

happened in 2020 . And

7:12

some of our engineers were basically working

7:14

out of China that time and they got stuck and

7:16

they called me saying , hey , we were

7:19

supposed to come back , but seems like all the international

7:21

flights are getting canceled . So they

7:23

had to chat some way . They had to travel like four

7:25

or five countries to reach India . In between

7:28

, all flights are canceling , countries

7:30

shutting down borders , a lot

7:32

of things like that happening , and

7:35

I think at that point of time we realized

7:37

that there is something which is going to happen which

7:39

nobody has seen till now and probably

7:41

plan . And that is where I gave

7:43

the call to you . But thanks to you and

7:46

I would also like to add ITI

7:48

fund , growth fund , I think both of you

7:50

put in some money at that point of time and

7:52

that helped us kind of refocus

7:55

what we had done . And we

7:57

realized very early I think in January

7:59

, before , like India had the wave

8:02

in March , april , or the lockdowns were

8:04

announced that this is going to be

8:06

completely different and everybody is going

8:08

to be impacted and we had to chart a new

8:10

path for us , for India

8:12

market , because traveling internationally

8:14

would become very difficult for

8:17

the next few months , two years

8:19

, essentially right , and the next

8:21

time at least the team or me also

8:23

traveled to China was in 2022 , next

8:26

. So , and that

8:28

kind of gave us the understanding that , okay

8:31

, what is it that we really need to fix for

8:33

Indian ecosystem for EVs to take

8:35

off ? And we realized that

8:37

all of the , with all of the learnings and the

8:39

products and the services we are providing in China

8:42

, that charging has to come up

8:44

and has to be done in a very

8:46

, very different way than

8:48

what has been done in the West or

8:50

other countries for India to

8:53

adopt EVs . And that was , I

8:55

think , a very good insight

8:57

, if I look back at it . And we launched

8:59

a charger at , I think , about 3000

9:01

rupees that time Still

9:03

the cheapest charger around the world . Essentially

9:06

, it could charge a two-wheeler , three-wheeler

9:08

and a four-wheeler and the best

9:10

part is , anybody can set

9:12

up a charging point right . So

9:14

there was all this concern that time okay

9:17

, ola is launching bike , ather is launching bike

9:19

, but where will I charge ? And I

9:21

think that was the product suited

9:24

for that exact point of time and

9:26

a lot of people kind of

9:28

understood the pain point , especially

9:31

people who are buying EVs or selling EVs

9:33

at that point of time , and we had

9:35

our first few customers and after

9:37

that I think we have gotten

9:39

USB on horizons , also on board

9:41

, and the rest is kind of

9:44

history yeah still early days

9:46

though , yeah , but yeah

9:48

, it's been quite a ride to you know , from literally

9:50

pre-product to 30,000

9:53

chargers across the country , the largest network

9:55

.

9:57

So you know , obviously there's a lot

9:59

of new technology here . And how

10:01

have you built the team ? You know , on the product

10:03

side , engineering side , because you have an operating

10:06

system , product which is sold to the OEMs , you

10:08

have a charging network and

10:10

a charger device that is sold . You know , and

10:13

you know L1 , l2 , l3 chargers , so there's

10:15

a lot of technology as well . So

10:17

how is the team structured and

10:20

what have been some of the challenges as an

10:22

entrepreneur building the team ?

10:24

So of course , like challenges , also come

10:26

in stages and different times

10:28

and different rate of

10:30

adoption by the customers also

10:32

. So initially the challenge

10:34

was probably finding the product market

10:37

fit and making sure

10:39

that the product is stable enough it

10:41

is working on the field

10:43

. Those were the challenges in the first

10:45

stage till we reached , I think , about 100 odd

10:47

chargers across India and

10:49

, like we had to kind of keep our

10:51

teams very small . That

10:53

time we were , I think , about

10:56

20 , 25 odd people working

10:58

out of , I think , apartment in

11:00

HSR layout and all of us

11:03

, like you correctly pointed out , were working together

11:05

day and night trying to ship

11:07

the chargers . I think that was the phase . For

11:09

the next one year we scaled

11:11

relatively slowly , I think

11:13

till 2021 , when we

11:16

were , I think , about 70 , 80 odd people

11:18

, and then we had to kind

11:20

of scale very fast because

11:22

the market wanted some solution and

11:25

we had to be the first mover in

11:27

this space and we

11:29

hired a lot of people on the tech

11:31

side , on the sales side , on the deployment

11:34

side , operation side , because in

11:36

a charging business if you want to be successful

11:39

you're at least in the initial few

11:41

years you had to give a full stack solution also

11:43

, so you could not just make the software

11:46

or you could not just make the hardware or you could not just

11:48

install the chargers . So

11:50

that is where we had built a full stack solution

11:52

essentially , and we were doing

11:54

all of it and that's why we reached

11:56

a critical mass of , I think , 10,000 in less

11:59

than a year and a half of launching

12:01

the product into the market , and

12:03

after that our focus was the stage

12:06

two was to now that

12:08

there is chargers see what is the utilization

12:10

and the EV adoption has been

12:13

where we have deployed chargers . So

12:15

glad to point it out to you that when we

12:17

deployed chargers there were in most of the

12:19

apartments . So we have closed over to 2500

12:22

or departments where we have deployed EV chargers

12:24

today and the EV adoption

12:26

was less than one EV in an

12:28

apartment and today we

12:31

have more than five users

12:33

using chargers in

12:35

each of the apartments and like

12:37

that shows that when you put

12:39

a charger , people do buy

12:41

EVs , they get more comfortable in terms

12:43

of buying EVs , right . So the team

12:45

also had to be kind of transformed over the

12:47

last two , three years to figure out

12:49

what are the issues with scale

12:51

Like . Even in India today , the closest

12:54

competitor is , like , I think , about 60

12:56

, 70% lesser than what we are

12:58

, so probably 20 , 30% of what we are today

13:00

in terms of this sheer number of chargers

13:03

and the scale . So when you hit

13:05

a scale of like 10,000 devices or

13:07

10,000 people using your products every day

13:09

, you understand the different side

13:11

of the problem . Also , it's more about

13:14

building trust , more about getting

13:16

the service done right , more about

13:18

issue addressing the issues

13:20

which the customers are facing . So the team has kind

13:23

of grown to that . We have open

13:25

customer care centers . We have

13:27

provided , now started providing 24

13:30

seven customer service . So a lot of

13:32

things change as more and more people adopt

13:34

the system and , of course , like

13:37

now , I think we have crossed

13:39

the threshold , at least in my view

13:41

, in the EV adoption in two and three

13:43

wheeler space , which is where we are

13:45

the leaders . As per some reports we have seen

13:47

and are based on our own experience , we are

13:49

about 65 , 70% of the market

13:51

share in two and three wheeler charging today , and

13:54

in apartments also , we are the largest essentially

13:56

, and now

13:59

is the time when we are seeing enterprises

14:01

, builders and other basically

14:04

real estate players Almost

14:06

every parking lot is opportunity to charging

14:08

, to probably put a charging point there , and

14:11

that was the goal when we started , also that we

14:13

want to convert . You want to build a product technology

14:15

and also a company which will enable

14:17

every parking lot to be a potential charging

14:20

point . We do not , frankly

14:22

, believe that we people like

14:24

to go to petrol monks . First

14:26

of all , you spend a lot of money there and

14:28

it's a detour from wherever you are going . It's not a place

14:31

where you are going and you are feeling happy about

14:33

yourself , right , and our aim

14:35

is to focus on the consumer , to give the most convenience

14:38

, and for that

14:40

you don't have to change your habit . The

14:42

product technology has to evolve that

14:44

, wherever you are parking your car today , that

14:46

is the place where

14:48

you should be Usually fueling , recharging , I guess

14:51

Recharging this case Great , great

14:53

.

14:54

So in terms of the technologies

14:57

itself right One of the things you

14:59

had also told me in terms of we have both

15:01

the operating system product as well as the charging

15:04

product and the charging one . I think

15:06

it's quite a nuanced product

15:08

but conceptually very easy for people to understand

15:10

, right ? So the average Consumer

15:12

knows that I refuel my car . If

15:14

it's an electric car , I need to recharge it . Electricity

15:18

is everywhere . Therefore I can have this potentially

15:20

at home or at work or wherever I have parked

15:22

, but I may have to pay

15:24

a fee if it's somebody else's device

15:26

or a-or-or-or . But when it comes

15:29

to the operating system business , which

15:31

was this whole enablement of

15:33

smart TVs this

15:35

is a new concept because it doesn't exist in

15:38

certainly two and three wheelers today . There's

15:40

maybe a little bit of a fancy

15:42

dashboard in a luxury

15:44

car , in a four-wheeler , but it's still relatively

15:47

dumb in that sense . But you can

15:49

plug in your phone , then you get a carplay or Android

15:51

Auto or something like that . So tell me

15:54

a little bit about the thinking behind

15:56

smart TVs for

15:58

two and three wheeler in particular , and

16:01

how you're seeing it being adopted in

16:03

India .

16:04

OK , so actually going back to

16:06

where we started , our name was Revoise for

16:08

a reason which was revolutionary

16:11

electric vehicle operating stack Quite

16:13

a mouthful , I know , but our

16:15

aim was always to build OS , essentially

16:18

, and the ecosystem around it . So

16:20

the thing is this OS

16:23

essentially . We looked at all the

16:25

previous evolution of hardware

16:27

and software and we realized there

16:30

will always be a vertically integrated solution

16:32

and there will be a solution in each

16:34

of the ecosystems which is kind

16:37

of portable and is something like

16:39

Android . So that's what we wanted to kind of

16:41

tell ourselves that we are the Android for

16:43

EVs , so there is the iPhones , there

16:45

is the Mac OS , but there is the Windows

16:47

and there is the Android .

16:49

And for an emerging and for the iPhone . You mean

16:51

something like an Ola or an Aether versus

16:53

a Tesla or a Tesla .

16:56

In cars . Now we have Tesla , but

16:58

in case of EVs , we wanted

17:01

to be the Android for EVs , essentially

17:03

, and that too , for two and three wheelers , because

17:05

what we realized was that there is already Android

17:07

for cars , by the way , but nobody was

17:10

focusing on two and three wheelers , because most

17:12

of the technologies and everything for

17:14

cars are probably

17:16

developed in the Western markets or now

17:19

increasingly in China , but for

17:21

two and three wheelers , most of the technologies

17:23

still had to be innovated

17:25

. There is still no standardization

17:27

of charging like . Government is releasing white

17:29

paper and standards and stuff

17:32

, but still there is everybody following

17:34

different connector today . So we thought

17:36

that this is a white paper and this is where

17:39

I think we could make a mark and we

17:41

wanted to build something for India scale

17:43

. So if you look at India scale , india

17:46

currently sells about 3

17:48

million odd cars a year and about 20

17:50

, 25 million bikes . So that

17:52

is the market we wanted to go after and this

17:54

is the same proportion . If you go to any of the

17:56

Southeast Asia you go to Vietnam , thailand , indonesia

17:59

, you go to Africa All of the

18:01

emerging markets behave the same way as India . So

18:03

our aim was to basically build for the masses

18:06

here and make sure

18:08

that we make the product in a way

18:10

that can be adopted across India . So

18:13

that is what we kind of started

18:15

to build out with the OS , and

18:18

our thesis also was that everybody

18:21

who's focusing on being vertically

18:23

integrated will have limitations , will

18:26

have a lot of cost associated with it

18:28

, and we wanted to

18:30

provide something which could be used off

18:32

the self , just like Windows

18:34

, which all of us , when we were kids , were

18:36

putting inside our PCs .

18:38

Just like Android . I won't talk about when

18:40

I was excited about those things , but

18:42

yeah .

18:43

But I think all the millennial

18:45

sentgencies would

18:47

associate with the feeling of building

18:50

your own PCs and installing

18:52

Windows in your laptops or desktops

18:54

that time . And a similar

18:56

thing for Android . Whether you use Xiaomi or

18:58

Povevo Lenovo , you use

19:00

Android , which is basically built by

19:02

Google . So we wanted to

19:04

create some similar kind of OS for

19:07

every two-wheeler and three-wheeler

19:09

, to be smart , safe and connected and

19:11

give a host of services to

19:13

the end consumers , whether

19:15

it is navigation , call notification

19:17

, driving alerts , a lot of stuff like that . And

19:21

we realized that most of the OEMs would not

19:23

be able to build this in-house and

19:25

even if they build , the maintenance of this OS

19:27

is going to be a nightmare . So initially

19:30

, some of them would try and basically understand

19:33

the cost behind it and we

19:35

here would be able to service 10 , 20

19:37

OEMs , which we have already started

19:39

doing to some extent , and our cost

19:41

will basically our incremental cost will

19:43

reduce dramatically . So that is

19:45

what we basically focused on and

19:48

I think this is a white space still and

19:50

we are evolving as a business . In this particular

19:52

basically

19:55

operating stack business , our

19:58

first go-to market was through hardware

20:00

. Now we have understood

20:02

that through hardware the reach is

20:04

being limited and as we

20:07

are activating the phase two , which is basically just

20:09

licensing out the software

20:11

to all of our partners in India

20:13

and in China . So that is what we

20:15

are seeing today and we are seeing forward

20:17

in the next one to two years .

20:19

So the next time I go to Amsterdam

20:22

and say I want to rent a two-wheeler

20:25

Made by some Chinese

20:27

OEM and I fired it up , Am I going to see

20:29

bolt OS out there ?

20:32

Yeah , we also hope to be there when you

20:34

reach out , but

20:36

yeah , so I think what we basically

20:38

want to do is enable all of these experiences

20:41

, whether it is ride sharing , whether

20:43

it is the basically financing

20:46

of vehicles , whether it is the insurance , or

20:49

whether the end customer himself

20:51

Driving driving the vehicle and he wants to see

20:53

the direction to where he's going . Or you

20:55

are talking about TV , some of them would run

20:58

out of charge . You want to see your nearest charging

21:00

point , so which , again , we

21:02

manage . So we basically improve

21:04

the experience of the EV because

21:07

, unlike gasoline

21:09

vehicle , evs are much more Closer

21:12

to a smartphone , and one of the

21:14

reason why Tesla is widely successful

21:16

is because they have thought of a Of

21:19

the ecosystem as well , right , which

21:21

, unfortunately , most of the OEMs do

21:23

not think of today in the ice world

21:25

, and that is where we think

21:27

we have a play , essentially through us

21:29

in the ecosystem .

21:31

Got it . So the OS . Really , you're now

21:33

going to provide a bridge , much like Google

21:35

did with Android for , say , a Samsung

21:38

or some of the new brands that have emerged

21:40

. But Samsung was one that used to

21:42

make the feature phones in the past , and and

21:44

their foray into being

21:47

competitive with something like Apple involves

21:49

an operating system that they have licensed from

21:51

Google .

21:52

Yes , yes , yes . So that is what

21:54

we are doing currently . Got it got

21:56

it great .

21:57

Last question before we pause for today

21:59

, the next 12 , 18 months

22:01

, right , what keeps you excited

22:04

and yet up at night worrying about ?

22:07

so I think the Next

22:09

12 18 months are going to

22:11

be much more interesting

22:14

than the last 12 18 months , especially

22:16

in India . We have seen our

22:18

EVs from being

22:21

shown on ads

22:23

or hearing about EVs and news

22:25

to actually seeing them on the road and

22:28

probably one of our friends and

22:30

family buying EVs or

22:33

at least Considering buying a piece

22:35

. But in the next one to two

22:37

years you would find that

22:39

most of us would be owning

22:41

EVs . If we are buying a two-wheeler

22:43

, then definitely if we

22:45

are buying a four-wheeler , considering

22:47

at least seriously we should buy a EV

22:50

or not , and we would see charging

22:52

points potentially in all

22:54

of the places where we spend more

22:56

than two , three hours every day , whether

22:58

it is your apartment , whether it is office or a

23:01

mall , and this is

23:03

going to happen no matter what

23:05

happens . Essentially because this is

23:08

a trend which has happened and also

23:10

at the end of the customer , you are saving

23:12

Lacks of rupees potentially by

23:14

the OEMs numbers themselves every year

23:16

. Right , if you're driving so much , you

23:19

should shift to a EV . It

23:21

is much more Convenient

23:23

also because you don't have to think about again going

23:25

to the petrol monks . You can charge at your home or

23:27

at your office itself wonderful , I

23:30

have to say .

23:30

You know I won't disclose where the bolt office

23:32

is , but if you're ever in the area and you have an EV

23:34

, you can drive into their basement garage

23:37

and it's both Parking

23:39

and you can plug in and charge your vehicle

23:41

. I don't yet have an EV , I'm ashamed

23:43

to say so . Jyoti says I

23:45

have to park on the street when I visit him . But

23:47

thanks a lot , jyoti , great having you on the show

23:50

and all the best for the years ahead .

23:52

Thank you . Thank you , sanjay .

23:56

Dear listeners , thank you for listening

23:58

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24:01

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transcript , find the link in the show notes

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