'Investment is not just capital, but time, energy, and building relationships': Pranav Marwah, CEO, Marwah Sports Pvt Ltd & co-founder, thinQbate 

The sports sector in India has seen exponential growth and is considered to be the next big opportunity. Infrastructure acts as a sign of growth, and for sports in particular, the backbone of the sector. Sports tend to have an overall positive impact on the state of health, education, and the economy at large, as a large number of empirical studies have already found.

To understand more about this space, Sportskeeda caught up with Mr. Pranav Marwah, CEO of Marwah Sports and co-founder of Thinbate.

Pranav is a lawyer from a fourth-generation family business based out of Mumbai. Joining the family over a decade ago, Pranav has spearheaded the company's foray into multiple new categories - from sports and infrastructure to alternative asset class investing. Over the last six years, Pranav has built a portfolio of over 30 companies, ranging from MVP-stage steady-growth companies to consumer-facing high-growth companies.

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Pranav Marwah's thoughts on sports infrastructure, investment in NFT companies, thinQbate incubator, and use of technology in India

Q. Marwah Sports aims to be a leader in sports infrastructure. How is it achieving these targets and what is its vision for the next five years?

Pranav: The pandemic taught us a lot and put a spring in our step. We have a very clear belief that we want to be the leaders in recreational sporting infrastructure within the next 5-10 years.

Something that I learned from my grandfather was to always think two generations down the line. If you want a business to sustain long-term, you don’t think about your kid; you think about your grandchild, and that is what makes a company last 140 years rather than 70 years.

So every decision taken by the company has a long-term vision. We believe recreation and sport go hand in hand in general, and India is going to see a major boom in this department.

Quality control is going to be Marwah’s USP in achieving this long-term vision. The quality of turf over the quantity of turf will be on the agenda across the country.

Q. What are the key elements of a company that Marwah looks into when they want to invest?

Pranav: Kicka*s team. Nothing beats a kicka*s team. What we believe is the right person, in the right place, at the right time for the right industry. These four pillars help Marwah make decisions when investing in a company.

We invest in people who are building businesses and not people looking to build venture-funded companies - this is something that irks me. I believe businesses shouldn’t be made to raise money but be built to make money. If you raise money along the way, that will help your growth. These are the principles that Marwah and I live by. I am not justifying if this is right, but this is our belief.

To sum it up, investing in people in a market large enough for it to make a difference at the right time, and most importantly, if they are looking to build a business. If these principles match, then Marwah likes to invest its time and money into a business. Marwah will not teach the company how to do business but will be their shadow, devil’s advocate, or conscience sitting on their shoulders and asking questions that they perhaps may not ask themselves.

People are the most important, as products will change but people need to learn to adapt.

Q. Where and when did the idea of thinQbate come into being?

Pranav: I am a lawyer with a post-graduation in sports management who works in a family business doing commercial real estate and ended up working in investment and technology.

Back in 2012-13, I had an entrepreneur bug that led me to doing multiple things like selling golf simulators, starting a comedy company that used to do shows, etcetera. At the time, two young 20-year-old kids from Somaya College reached out to me through LinkedIn. They were, at the time, building a braille chess board. Back then, hardware in gaming was unheard of, but I met them and found their idea extremely interesting.

I then started working with them to help them build out some of their campaigns and help them with their kickstarter campaign. I worked with the kids for a few months and also invested in their business. With a small seed of 30 lakh rupees, those kids did a sale of $550,000 in 45 days. These were the geneses from where thinQbate came from. Prior to this experience, Marwah always wanted to invest in sporting companies, but working with these kids made me realize that we do not have to just give money to the companies; it can be a lot more hands-on and add value to that company, especially in the pre-seed and seed phase.

Square-off is the name of the company. From there, the journey of thinQbate started.

Q. Are there any success stories of thinQbate that you would like to share with us?

Pranav: thinQbate is obviously just not all deals across sports. There are a bunch of deals we are extremely proud of, and one of them is Thrive, an F&B company. Its parent company was Hashtag Loyalty, a marketing and automation company. The pandemic taught them a bunch of lessons, which helped them pivot the way they hit the market.

Jubilant Food Works coming in and raising a bunch of money and getting good investors was the biggest validation for us. This is the kind of ethos we want to follow.

When you don’t build to raise, I feel like quality money can find you. For us, it’s not about the next billion dollar business; it’s about sustainable businesses that can make revenue and potential profit and give us liquidity that could be dividends or equity. This is why Thrive has been one of our success stories.

Q. As an employer, what are you looking for while hiring individuals for your organization?

Pranav: Pro-active people who want to get things done. I believe in small teams, so by default, you have individuals who realize if they just sit on their back side, nothing is really going to change. So, to make things happen, you've got to get off your backside. I was taught that if you don’t make it happen, nothing’s going to happen. This is something that is pushed down to each individual in the organization.

Long-serving employees – I have folks in my dad’s and granddad's business who have been around before I joined it, and I hope to have employees join during my time that will be around before my sons join the business.

And lastly, good communicators.

Q. What are your views on the sports technology market in India?

Pranav: Technology is going to be an enabler, and tech is always going to allow you to do things better. I think it’s a misnomer that tech is a solution. Technology is not a solution, technology is an enabler for you to make better decisions. I think a lot of high-grade image learning and performance analytics-driven tech is going to take center stage in the next few years.

If you look at the four stages of the industry — Manual to Digital to Automated to Autonomous — the four stages are named Industry 1.0 through to Industry 4.0. When it comes to sports technology, India is still in the phase of manual to digital. At the highest and most elite level, we have gone from digital to automated a long time ago in certain cases, even automated to autonomous, so it’s giving you actual insights into every scenario.

But at the grassroots, that is obviously not the case. In academies where 100 kids go for cricket training, how much tech do they use on a regular basis, what data are they harvesting? So when we think of sports technology in India, I would rather look at it as a category of data in sports in India. I think that is going to be an extremely interesting space as to how people capture data in India, what they do with the data, and whether they are able to put commercialization layers on it is what, in my opinion, is going to be extremely interesting. Technology will be an enabler, not a solution.

Q. What are your thoughts on the investments in NFT companies? Do you believe there is a future for the same in sport?

Pranav: Future yes, but presently, I am not so sure. With some of our clients and people whom we work with, we have sort of been very open and clear with the fact that we are keeping an arm’s length from the NFT space in this category. However, we have looked at the Web3 ecosystem from an infrastructure space, perhaps, a little bit closer. I think the people building toward Web3 enablement are in a more sticky space compared to those who are building digital assets alone. I feel they are experiencing a larger volume of volatility and challenges in the given current market.

I am not an expert; my team has come back with ideas as to why this is something we should do and stuff like that. I said it very openly, you guys probably have a deeper understanding of the space here. And like I said before, it’s about backing people, and that includes my team. We have made 2-3 bets on the Web3 Metaverse ecosystem that are driven by the team members.

We like the founders, they like the space, and we obviously have a mutual understanding of how we will create value. For us, at the end of the day, we are not technical people or technologists, but what we do know is how to commercialize technology.

Q. What was the thinking behind entering the education space and partnering with the Global Institute of Sports Business?

Pranav: I first heard about GISB when they were at the old campus in BKC. At that time, we were thinking about entering the sports education space. As a customer, I already had experience doing things in sports management, so I wanted to better that experience and give more value.

I remember meeting Mr. Neel Shah, associate dean of GISB, and promising him that once he finished his tenure at that location, we would have him at our location. The statement seemed very casual and we ended it by saying, 'Yeah, we will look at it then.' Lo and behold, a few years later, here we are, partnered and working together.

Investment is not just capital, investment is time, energy, and building relationships. Investing time in building the right relationships is mutually beneficial for everyone. We want to create a hub of sports in the ecosystem we are building here, and we see GISB as an integral part of the same. It’s great to bounce off our ideas with students, faculty, and other members of GISB, as it gives us a better understanding. It’s been a great experience and long may it continue.

Q. From your learnings, what advice would you give youngsters wanting to be entrepreneurs and looking to have an impact in sports in India?

Pranav: There is no short route to success or wealth or fame or anything - that’s been my understanding and learning. I feel there is a lot of impatience with the current youth and I see that even in my family. I don't think people give themselves a chance to find themselves. It’s good to have goals, but I feel that while you think of the macro, you are living in the micro.

People quit their jobs after 18 months. How are you going to cause an impact in sports in India in that amount of time? Don’t be an entrepreneur because it’s a s*xy thing to do, because you are putting yourself in the toughest spot possible. Entrepreneurship can be a very lonely place.

Q. What are the most important habits to be a successful entrepreneur? Any habits you have inculcated into yourself?

Pranav: Treat everyone the same way. Doesn’t matter who you are talking to, treat everyone the way you would want them to treat you - that’s one of the greatest learnings from being in the family business for this long. My dad lives by this even in his sixties and I keep asking him, 'Dad you can’t possibly make time for everyone.' He said 'No, that’s just how I do it.' My dad’s door is always open to everyone. That, for me, is something I just pick on, as this is the norm.

Consistency. It's just showing up. It is one of the most underrated traits. In every relationship, whether it is professional or personal, being there is half the job done.