Q1. What is Cloud Accelerator Funding and how it is going to help Startups and SMBs?
While the COVID-19 pandemic has affected almost every industry, when it comes to the SMB space, even a 2 or 3 months of drop in revenues ensures so much of struggle for their very existence. The Cloud Accelerator Funding is brought in order to actually help them ride through the economic downtime which the pandemic has brought. This is a strategic investment which is large when it starts, and it is a monthly investment into the technology of the SMBs. It is aligned across the next 2-3 years ensuring that the SMB is able to run through the difficult times and eventually become stronger over a period of time. This funding is not only going to help Startups and SMBs with financial assistance but is also going to assist them in terms of expanding their market reach. As an investor into these Startups and SMBs, G7 CR will ensure we help them with our own market reach in order to increase their revenues and also reduce their costs.
Q2. What makes you different from Investors backed by major banks?
One of the biggest differentiators of Cloud Accelerator Funding is that, these fund offerings are not necessarily against equity. They could also be related to the long-term business relationships. In this way, SMBs do not need to part with equity but they will be able to leverage this fund during these hard times and in the long run over a couple of years. The returns can be a part of the ROI and it comes completely as interest free with absolutely no commitments in terms of returns and no equity exchange.
Q3. What kind of companies do you have in your portfolio or you are looking to add?
Currently, we are looking at Technology startups. They will be our primary portfolio. We are also specifically interested in healthcare startups. However, the funding is indeed expanded and open to all Tech companies where technology is a very important part of their business for the applying startups and SMBs.
Q4. How do you think your Fund can help startups or SMBs?
As per the current scenario, Indian startup and SMB sector is very much impacted by COVID-19 pandemic. As stated by various studies, 9 out of every 10 startups are registering a decline in revenues and several SMBs are halting operations temporarily if not permanently. But our Cloud Accelerator Funding will help these Startups and SMBs to keep their businesses running through these tough times. G7 CR will help them to ensure they have monthly fundings, increase market reach and thus market share which in turn increases their revenues and simultaneously reduce their costs.
Q5. How you are selecting a Startup for investment, what are the basic criteria? And if someone wants to apply for your fund how they can do it?
We have an online application. One of our basic criteria is understanding the business model of the startup and its sustainability. For us to basically invest into the business, it is very important that the business be sustainable for the next 3-5 years. Also, a part of our strategy is that we can expand the startup’s reach, help them increase their revenues and reduce their cost. So, normally our criteria will be selecting sectors which we are strong in where we can ensure we help them grow along with us.
Q6. Do you think this kind of investment will be a boost to take the SMEs to the next level?
While this is a technology investment very specifically, this investment basically helps boost the SMEs automation capabilities, reducing costs and it brings with it not only the funding part but it also the entire technology expertise of G7 CR which can be leveraged by the SMEs. Along with this, it also brings along with it the GTM capabilities in order to expand the market reach not only in India but also over and above in countries like Middle East and Africa as well as UK where we will try to ensure that these products reach all these markets and expand their footprints.
Q7. How do you speculate the Cloud accelerator market growth in the coming months for the COVID-19 pandemic?
The most instant growth or the emergency growth is already over because the technology and cloud were the immediate enablers. Most of this happened in the first 30days indeed after the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Today we look at a growth which is more organic. We are looking at people who are strategically moving out of the traditional Data Centers and looking towards Cloud infrastructure. We do see the acceleration still but however with the economic factors becoming an aspect as well, the acceleration has become slower now as they are taking the time out to make the right decisions and move to the right cloud which basically gives them the best returns on investment and also at lowest price. So, in recent times we have seen customers taking elaborate times before taking decisions. So, what we speculate is that the growth will continue though slowly, with a more price sensitive market.
