How running into an old batchmate helped Tredence co-founders close their first client

By Shannon Tellis

Scoring a major client when you’re grappling with potentially shutting shop can be a roller-coaster of emotions for any entrepreneur. More so, when the client in question has been on top of the Fortune 500 list for six years.

Shashank Dubey, co-founder of analytics services and solutions company Tredence, recalled the turbulent period in their early days. “We were a small company — barely 15 people — working out of a small apartment,” he said. “We had limited credentials and just enough money to pay our employees for another month or so.”


Having foregone their own salaries, Dubey and the co-founders, Sumit Mehra and Shub Bhowmick, were burning the candle at both ends to turn things around. They were gearing up to pitch to the Kantar Group (a US-based market research firm) when they ran into an old batchmate, Amit Gupta.

“He knew an executive from Kantar and he played an instrumental role in guiding us through the pitch,” said Dubey, adding that Gupta even joined in for the final presentation. That pitch was instrumental in helping them land their first client — the Fortune 500 company.

Fortune favours the bold
But the race wasn’t over yet. By February 2014, Tredence was running out of money and even landing a big client couldn’t change their bottom-line.

“There was a sense of relief but a little bit of fear too. That company had a system where they cleared the payment three months after the completion of the project. So, we were looking at maybe 120 days before we would see any cash,” said Dubey.

But luck was on their side. “Their [the company’s] financial cycle was turning over and they had some extra budget so they issued us an advance cheque.

We spent that first cheque on the employees’ salaries and improvements around the office like a better broadband connection and a refrigerator.

It was a huge saviour for us and couldn’t have come at a better time,” Dubey said.