Novel way of building a fast growing SaaS in the $400B Contact Center Market with Swapnil Jain of Observe.ai

After landing a dream internship at Google while studying at IIT
Delhi, Swapnil Jain moved to San Francisco to work with Twitter
for 3 years. His startup journey, according to him, was a result
of FOMO. Seeing his contemporaries back in India starting their
own companies with the influx of venture capital in India,
Swapnil decided to move back to India and start Observe.ai. 


In 2022, Observe.ai raised $125 Million in its Series C Funding
led by SoftBank. Observe.AI is an Intelligent Workforce Platform
that transforms contact centers by embedding AI into customer
conversations, optimizing agent performance, and automating
repeatable processes that drive revenue and retention.


Tune in to listen to his journey from being an engineer to first
getting rejected and then getting accepted by Y Combinator and
the challenges of running a multinational organization, with
offices in the US and in India. 


Key Takeaways: 


1:47 - What is Observe.ai?


5:43 - Moving from Google to Twitter and starting Observe.ai


6:40 - How Swapnil came up with the idea for Oberserve.ai? 


10:04 - Swapnil’s initial days of shifting from the US to India,
seeking inspiration for a business idea 


11:55 - How Swapnil found his co-founders?


14:48 - Tips on how co-founders negotiate ownership and
equity? 


19:23 - How did they choose the name Observe.ai and how did they
navigate the challenges around copyrights? 


22:06 - Swapnil’s journey with Y Combinator


25:08 - Insights on the funding journey of the organization 


27:19 - What do pre-seed investors bet on? 


28:13 - Benchmarks of investments for SaaS startups 


31:07 - What is the difference between seed and pre-seed
funding? 


32:40 - How does the leadership manage a multinational team and
what is the role distribution between the US and India? 


36:53 - What was Swapnil’s process for hiring C-Suite and
VP-level leadership?


39:11 - Swapnil shares with the SaaSBooMi community the names of
C-Suite agencies he’s worked with in the US to hire for
leadership  


40:47 - What are the costs of working with these agencies in the
US?


43:33 - How does Observe.ai stand out in the market?


45:31 - Why collaboration rather than competition worked for
Observe.ai in the market? 


46:35 - Hiring and retention during The Great Resignation 


49:57 - How did they build culture as the foundation of
everything at Observe.ai?


53:34 - Swapnil’s invitation to the SaaSBooMi community 


Happy Listening!