‘Blessed to not be spoilt by a lot of fundraising’: upGrad’s Ronnie Screwvala says too much funding corrupts people

Entrepreneur and investor Ronnie Screwvala is one of the notable names in the Indian ecosystem. Recently, he took a dig at some new-age companies that have raised significant amounts of funding, and said, “I have been blessed with keeping my feet on the ground. I have been blessed by not being spoiled with a lot of fundraising from time to time.”

He also said that too much funding corrupts people, their minds, businesses and many more things.  “I am blessed to be able to enjoy what I do,” he said in Nikhil Kamath’s latest podcast. 

Kamath has started a new podcast series titled ‘WTF is with Nikhil Kamath’. The fifth episode decoded the Indian edtech sector. Screwvala apart, it also featured Gaurav Munjal, Co-founder and CEO of Unacademy, and Jay Kotak (co-head of the digital bank Kotak811).

In the episode, Screwvala also spoke about his initial days. He was born and brought up in Mumbai. He shared that his father worked with the Tata group for a long time.

Screwvala also said he realised at a very young age that he wanted to be an entrepreneur. “At a young age I realised I may not be good at implementing someone else’s vision so I need to start off and do something of my own.”

He enrolled himself in a Master of Business Administration course in 1978. Screwvala said he always wanted to be an entrepreneur and never pursued any ‘plan B’. “If I had a Plan B, Plan A would have never worked out,” he said.

His journey in the media industry started with a cable TV company UTV. He sold the business five years later after encountering several copyright issues and other challenges. 

The businessman went on to produce several successful movies such as Kai Po Che, Uri: The Surgical Strike, and Chennai Express, among others. He is also the Chairperson and co-founder of upskilling edtech company upGrad.

When Kamath asked him what the biggest moment in his life was, he said, “There was never a big moment. Big moments are overplayed in life.”