Introducing Vidai: Organic and Bootstrapped

StrengthsFinder, Cloudflare, Netlify, Claude, Bubble.io, GitHub, introducing momos to my Mexican nephew and niece, DNS entries, nameservers, HTML, CSS and JavaScript, sledging in sunny Flumserberg, designing gigs for a candidate, USD pricing from Coimbatore, a romantic lunch date under 25 francs on a dirty city bench, freemium limits, unsubscribe, subscribe, gratitude note to my sister‑in‑law, reverse interview, the traditional green‑cake moment on my teenager’s birthday, mobile subscriptions, yfinance and EODHD libraries for Python, payroll laws in India, Kingdomality profiles

Since I handed my badge in two weeks back, I have had complete freedom to explore. That is precisely what I did, and the above list is just a snapshot of things I zoomed into as I embraced that freedom. It sounds like a lot, but in reality it has led to one important insight: full control over one’s time feels awesome, and we live in a moment when self‑skilling has never felt easier. The toolkit that allows us to explore technology and improve our efficiency has never been as accessible nor as friendly. Yet there is more need than ever to stop, think, recharge, aim and then fire serve.

Now it is time to show what I see the risk spectrum I am working on looks like.

By leaving the corporate job that I was pretty good at, I have started travelling left on the above spectrum. The identity I assume now, will be my primary professional identity. It replaces the corporate employee identity I held for 27 years. It is quite different from the side-hustles for a majority of this time, whether it is equity investments, angel investments, or the SME succession search I actively pursued.

The key question as I plunge full-time is: Do I want to be a technology entrepreneur? Technology has been a critical part of my research in the last two weeks. It was also pivotal in my second leg of my corporate career that lasted well over a decade. I got into technology when cloud based software-as-a-service was attracting most corporate investments. Although today technology still attracts financial capital, if human talent is simply directed behind financial capital, we will leave behind a world that is worse off than when we began (Case in point: Addictive Social Media). For this reason, I remove hockey stick startup from my options. And since corporate job is something I prefer not going back to (although a very attractive option), my zoomed in spectrum looks like this.

At the sametime, I commit that I will be unafraid of technology and will upskill myself to face every technology change as an opportunity and invest significant time on it. So will I be an entrepreneur? Yes. Will I be a technology entrepreneur? No.

Now Let me move on to another axis of my thought process that has sharpened. There are many ways to make money and pay the bills. I choose autonomy by becoming an entrepreneur. I would rather work on an organic Idea doing that. I take the example of planting a seed. The seed needs water, some protection as a young sapling, sunlight, good soil and maybe some fertilizer and protection from grazing. But it has the potential to grow naturally. The one investment that is needed that is more critical than capital is time intelligence from the entrepreneur for the seed to grow into a tree that serves those around it. If the values are right and the intent and faith exists, the growth will arrive and the entrepreneurs role is that of enabling. Yes occasionally inorganic actions might be needed but action in alignment with nature will take us further.

As the war broke out in the last weeks, it has pained me to see how small businesses in India have suffered. Especially restaurants. They were already squeezed out by the mega-trend of delivery businesses who take large cuts. Now the lack of liquified petroleum gas to run the kitchen has simply brought the business to a stand-still. I wonder what would have happened if our local investors a decade back pushed for more dependence on solar power to fuel the kitchens. Such technology already existed when I was a kid. Organic, slow but sustainable. Maybe we can begin now.

So about Vidai, seed in Tamil, I will start as the one person who will go around looking for partners who are willing to plant seeds and wait patiently for the fruits to bear. Allowing time to answer the question if the fruits will be sweet or sour. We will care for the seed and the saplings, protect it from predators and keep being creative about our time to support nature rather than lead it. We will also spend our time restoring natural flows and taking advantage of all the technologies. We will start with a world where we will show up at work not because we have time but because we have values, and are committed to learning and growth. We are very aware of the capital stock whether it is money, friends, tea or joy that we can collect that will come in handy. We will handle storms and droughts with the same grace as sunshine, water and partners.