ETSA 2023 Bootstrap Champ Winner | We work for customer validation, not investor validation: Gameberry Labs founders
This is part of a series of interviews with the winners of The Economic Times Startup Awards 2023.
Govind Agarwal and Afsar Ahmad, cofounders of online gaming firm Gameberry Labs that won the Bootstrap Champ category in The Economic Times Startup Awards 2023, said the company is focussed on growing steadily without any external funding. The Bengaluru-based startup, in fact, is considering acquisitions as profit piles up.
While the online gaming sector has seen active investor interest in India, Ahmad, an IIT-Kharagpur alumnus, said Gameberry was averse to raising capital right from the beginning.
Elevate Your Tech Prowess with High-Value Skill Courses
Offering CollegeCourseWebsiteIndian School of BusinessISB Digital TransformationVisitIndian School of BusinessISB Product ManagementVisitNorthwestern UniversityKellogg Post Graduate Certificate in Product ManagementVisitNorthwestern UniversityKellogg Post Graduate Certificate in Digital MarketingVisit “Around 2014, I had experienced the venture funding industry with my previous company, Halfteaspoon (a do-it-yourself recipe box service)… Gameberry was making money from the third month of its existence, which eliminated the need for external capital. The scale brought in by venture capital now would not benefit the company," he said. “We need the focus required to build one great game a year, and not make ten games of which only one will be a hit.”
“There is a lot of FOMO (fear of missing out) because venture investments help derisk and provide attractive exit opportunities for founders. But we are happy with the money we make, and it helps us focus on customer validation, and not VC validation,” Ahmad added.
Agarwal and Ahmad, who set up Gamebery in 2017, said the company
