CIO & LEADER-Issue-01-April 2018 (1)

Cover Story
Collaborating with a start-up, if the business can
show the value of INR 5 crore, it can get a budget
allocation of INR 1 crore
Niki.ai is not the bank’s first
engagement with a start-up. The
bank started recruiting start-ups
three years ago and has a clear
selection framework in place that
makes it easier to weed out solutions
that don’t fit the bill.
“We regularly reach out to new
and innovative start-ups via referrals,
technology forums, incubators and
summits. Every year, we invite over 50
start-ups to a technology theme-based
Innovation Summit. Niki.ai along
with 10 other start-ups, was chosen
through a multi-layered selection
process,” said Nitin Chugh, headdigital
banking at HDFC Bank.
“We have implemented another
chatbot for employees, on our website,
and these chabots have offered us
great customer insights and learning
experiences. With OnChat, we thought
if customers are spending more time
on Facebook messenger, can the bank
be there?” added Chugh.
The chatbot implementation with
Niki.ai isn’t a one-time engagement.
The start-up will continue to relevant
insurance, banking, and stock broker
use cases to strengthen its natural
language processing capabilities
that will help in cross-selling and
up-selling to their customers.
Last year, Niki.ai released a
Software Development Kit (SDK) for
businesses to enable conversational
commerce on their mobile and web
apps. Since then, the start-up has
garnered a lot of interest from
multiple enterprises.
According to Sachin Jaiswal,
Co-founder and CEO, Niki.ai, “HDFC
is a progressive organization. Any
kind of validation that a client gives
to its service provider is a big deal
because it builds credibility and
builds our business."
Especially, if the service provider is
a start-up.
It is true that enterprises aren’t
comfortable with sharing names of
the start-ups that they work with
– until after the implementation.
Understandably, most organizations
would rather share a success story
Working with
large enterprises
requires start-ups to
have a better cash
flow and ensure that
their product quality
is great, especially
when you are trying
to scale
Sachin Jaiswal
Co-founder and CEO, Niki.ai
rather than a failed implementation.
In 2017, the start-up mortality rate was
20% to 25%., with a majority of them
closing down within 1.6 to 1.9 years
of inception.
The last three years have taught
Jaiswal a few lessons too.
He said, "before you interact with
the client, a start-up must ensure:
Whether you understand the market
Whether there is a need for the
product
Timeline, effort, cost estimate, mark
up client is willing to pay."
“Most start-up players go with an
open mind. However, it helps to be
confident about the maturity of their
product before you approach a large
scale organization. There will be
companies willing to experiment with
a less than mature start-up, but the
probability will be lesser,” he added.
“Working with large enterprises
requires start-ups to have a better
cash flow management process and
ensure that their product quality is
impeccable if, as a start-up, you are
trying to scale. That fundamental
hasn't changed. You have to realize
that what is the market that you are
after and you have to cater to that
market,” said Jaiswal.
Additionally, Jaiswal said that
start-ups you must have a clear cut
understanding of what their business
model is. “If you are a client servicing
business, you will latch on to every
opportunity that will add to your
top-line but if you are a technology
provider, then you must know when to
exit the conversation.”
The truth is, it is the people
18 CIO&LEADER | April 2018