Jai Relan

A cliché question whichever child is asked is what they want to be when they grow up. This is when most children would answer with a response in the league of ‘marine biologist’ (based on the movie Sharks), ‘dolphin trader’, ‘author’, ‘YouTuber’ and the likes. But when I was a 5-year-old, I was adamant that I wanted to become a ‘professional problem solver’. On hearing this response, the first question I would get asked was if I meant… a scientist or an engineer or a mathematician? I was sure that I wanted to become a professional problem solver. From a young age, I’ve enjoyed the problems. Most people ask me to narrow down which problems I like to solve, but I live off the thrill of solving a problem. For me, I achieve a thrill out of battling with a problem, regardless of whether it be a coding problem, a mathematics or physics problem, a social issue… My first startup was at the age of 14 (Jan of 2020). I teamed up with Jasraaj Puri, Tejas Mehta and Sâra Kothari to start WhyQ. When we initially started, we presented this idea in a few Business Planning Competitions, and we won. But we wouldn’t stop there… Our goal was to become THE Ne Plus Ultra for shopping during the pandemic. It was tough to get such a distinctive product out in the market at first as a bootstrapped startup being managed by teenagers. Still, it once managed to get a few industry experts onboards as mentors and investors, Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc. Our whole team lives by the idea of Occam’s Razor and Malum consilium quod mutari non-potest, we believe that the simplest solution is the best solution. Instead of creating an app, an approach taken by most companies, we decided to start working on an app that everyone in India uses - WhatsApp. 98% of India uses WhatsApp a daily, so we decided to build an AI-powered chatbot. In India, organised sources of retail (Amazon, Bigbasket and the likes) control only 2% of the market share. That leaves 98% of the market in the hands of Kirana stores. Yet, Amazon employees are not the ones not making a living, local grocery stores are. Kirana store owners were forced to take their own lives because they couldn't bring back bread for their family… It's crazy. I agree, but I'm a naive kid, out in the big world, so it's worth a try… But one word of caution for you- Finis coronat opus. Feel free to reach out and say ‘hi’. I’m one of those talkative folks who love meeting new people and learning something from them. Cheers, J Aut viam inveniam aut faciam.