Ruchi Kalra is an Indian entrepreneur, who is known to build a startup that reached the valuation of $1 billion, known as a unicorn.
Wiki/Biography
Ruchi Kalra is a 39-year-old (as of 2022) female entrepreneur. She is based out of Delhi. She did her schooling at General Raj’s School, Delhi. She completed her BTech in chemical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi in 2004. In 2007, she completed her MBA from the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad.
Physical Appearance
Height (approx.): 5′ 5″
Hair Colour: Black
Eye Colour: Black
Ruchi Kalra in a black and white outfit
Family
Husband & Children
Ruchi’s husband, Asish Mohapatra, is also an Indian entrepreneur, a co-founder, and a CEO of a unicorn startup just like Ruchi. They both met while they were working at McKinsey. The couple has a daughter, Khushi.
Asish Mohapatra with his daughter, Khushi
Career
As an Employee
Ruchi started her career as a senior business analyst at Evalueserve post doing chemical engineering. After working for approx 1.5 years as a business analyst, she went to Hyderabad to pursue MBA. She got a job opportunity to work at McKinsey & Company through college placement. She spent approx. 9 years working in the financial services sector, especially in insurance and retail banking. In the later years of her work duration at McKinsey, she worked her way up to become a partner.
As an Entrepreneur
In an interview, Ruchi revealed that by the end of 2015, she, along with a team of 7 other individuals including her husband, Asish, decided to join hands for their fintech startup, OfBusiness, which is a B2B company that provides financing services to small and medium enterprises.
The first OfBusiness session, circa Aug 2015
Leaving behind her long-held job and partnership at McKinsey & Company, Ruchi said in an interview,
We both had an itch to go out and build something.”
The company came into existence in 2016 and soon became a unicorn when it was backed by the Japanese multinational conglomerate, SoftBank Group Corp. Ruchi was the co-founder and the CFO of the company.
Co-founders of OfBusiness including Ruchi Kalra
In 2017, she came up with an offshoot of her previous startup, OfBusiness jointly with her husband and a few other members of her team. In an interview, she said that they named it Oxyzo, a blend of the words oxygen and ozone. Ruchi is the co-founder and CFO of Oxyzo Financial Services Pvt. Ltd. which is a fintech that provides purchase financing to small and medium businesses, giving out cash-flow-based loans for assistance in working capital and operating costs.
The Oxyzo team (5th from left in the back row is Ruchi Kalra)
Ruchi is the whole-time director of the company and focuses on finance control, accounts and audit, compliance – legal and secretarial, and capital management. This startup became a unicorn in 2022 when it raised $200 million in its first fundraising round led by Alpha Wave Global, Tiger Global Management, Norwest Venture Partners, Matrix Partners, and Creation Investments, which was the largest series-A funding ever for an Indian startup.
Indian startup unicorns in 2022 (Oxyzo at 13th place)
Facts/Trivia
- In 2017, she was named a contender to the BW Disrupt 40 Under 40 list.
- In July 2019, Kalra represented OfBusiness as a speaker at the Unifi Alternative Finance round table conference, where four of India’s cutting-edge fintech companies presented their business cases, tech methodology, and risk management practices.
- Norwest, one of the investors of Oxyzo described Ruchi as the ‘first female founder in India of a profitable, fintech unicorn.’
- Upon being asked about her success mantra in an interview, Ruchi said,
Perseverance. Perseverance is not giving up. It is persistence and tenacity, the effort required to do something and keep doing it until the end, even if it’s hard. And I believe that sooner or later perseverance gets rewarded.”
- Ruchi was an elected member of the student body during her college days. In an interview, she said,
For me, in addition to the curriculum, there was a lot more to do as an elected member of the Student Body. This gave me an opportunity to explore my full potential and, also a recognition from the institute as a Young Leader.”
- Upon being asked about her inspiration in an interview, Ruchi said,
In my life, my husband, Asish, has played a pivotal role as a professional coach and as a leader from whom I learn every day.
