Bangalore: Sudha Kukreja, owner of six restaurants, including the Ploof and Blanco in New Delhi, took a decade and a half to nurture her eateries into a Rs12 crore a year, multi-cuisine business. Then came the itch. She wanted to go national.
“I want to move things faster now,” Kukreja said over the phone. “It took me 15 years to have a restaurant chain.”
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The chef-cum-restaurateur wanted to scale up her business and grow one of the eateries—Chilli Seasonss—into a food and beverage company with multiple formats. She didn’t know how and went scouting for an associate who would help set up the company and handle the key management functions of finance, marketing and strategy. That was in early 2008.
In October, Kukreja became a promoter of Chilli Seasonss Food and Beverage Pvt. Ltd, with Sheetal Bahl, a managing director at management consultancy Growx Ventures Pvt. Ltd, as its chief executive officer (CEO).
Growx, a New Delhi-based start-up, has a unique model: It will deploy executives such as Bahl to run entire businesses or manage specific functions in a company, typically a start-up or an early-stage firm, in return for monthly revenue-linked fees and substantial equity holding. When it’s time to exit the businesses, typically in three-five years, the executives return to Growx, but the equity holding stays.
There was no Growx when Kukreja started her hunt for an associate. Bahl was at the time consulting for Glue Design Pvt. Ltd, a retail space and product designer that was looking to float a furniture business.
Focus on expertise: Growx Ventures’ managing director and CEO Ashish Taneja (in the chair) with MD Sheetal Bahl. Taneja and Bahl started the consultancy firm to offer what they call ‘management capital’. Ramesh Pathania / Mint
And he was trying to persuade his friend Ashish Taneja, a former CEO of consulting and outsourcing firm
Vertex India, to head the start-up firm. When the restaurateur approached Bahl, it occurred to the two friends that they didn’t have to restrict themselves to one firm.
Bahl and Taneja started Growx Ventures in October to offer what they call “management capital”.
“The idea is to allow the promoters to focus on their core technical expertise, while we will take up specialized roles to start, scale up, transition or simply manage the venture’s operations,” said Taneja, Growx’s managing director and CEO.
Bahl, who had consulted food and beverage (F&B) firms earlier, became CEO of Chilli Seasonss. “I took over the reins of CSFB (Chilli Seasonss) as I know F&B business through my friends who are running such businesses,” he said.
Growx’s monthly fees can run up to 40% of a firm’s revenue. Its equity holding ranges from 5-30%, which will be vested over a three-five year contract period based on a pre-agreed performance criteria.