We’re not trying to become profitable in a hurry: Policybazaar chairman

PB Fintech Ltd, the parent of online insurance aggregator Policybazaar, has narrowed its losses to ₹187 crore in the September quarter. In an interview, Yashish Dahiya, chairman and chief executive officer, said it is choosing growth over profit. A year after it was listed on the bourses, the stock has fallen by over 50% from its listing price. Dahiya talked about investor interest in the sector and growth levers for the company. Edited excerpts:

Stronger unit economics is key. Everyone’s focusing on it and some startups are scaling down new initiatives to contain the burn rate. How do you look at it? 

We started our new initiatives after the market started focusing on profitability. We are not reducing our new initiatives or killing them. We are only getting a little more efficient, which is exactly what we would do anyway. We’re not trying to become profitable. To be profitable is an automatic outcome of growth. Our aim is to have ₹1,000 crore in profits by FY26-27.

Going by how some new age company stocks listed last year have performed, do you think investors have been a little too critical of these tech stocks? 

 Investors invest their own money to make money. If they think they will lose money, they will sell; if they think they’re going to gain, they will buy. I don’t think they’re trying to badger any sector. They might not believe in the tech companies. That’s their choice. I am also an investor. I’m the largest individual investor in Policybazaar. In a way, we all make up our own minds about what we think will create future value. People believing tech companies are good or bad, are just waves. You cannot make a business decisions based on waves. We’re not trying to become profitable in a hurry or race towards profitability. Becoming profitable is inevitable for us. What we have to focus on is growth and various other pieces and that’s what we continue to do. We grew 105% year on year. That’s not a small growth at our scale.

We’ve seen many companies, with funding crunch and softening valuations, becoming very attractive acquisition targets. What are your inorganic plans? 

 Zero. We’re not looking to acquire. We prefer build over buy.. we have a great team, we prefer that.

Many founders prioritise growth over stronger unit economics. Is this the case with Policybazaar?

Our profit depends on growth. We are not reducing costs. You can become profitable sooner by slowing down growth, but that and the business will not last.