Teardowns
Company teardowns from a PM lens — the reframe, the moat, the threat, and the metrics I would want before funding the roadmap.
Groww has twice Zerodha's users. Zerodha still makes more money.
Groww overtook Zerodha to become India's largest broker by active clients, but the gap between the two companies' monetization reveals very different bets on who a retail investor actually is.
Duolingo won the AI-first bet on usage. It's still losing the AI-first bet on trust.
DAU is up 23% and revenue crossed $1B for the first time, right as the same AI strategy that unlocked that growth handed ChatGPT, Claude, and a $1B-valued rival named Speak the exact thing Duolingo used to own alone.
Meesho never sold zero commission. It sold zero commission's marketing.
961,000 sellers joined in a single year, chasing a 0% commission line that hides 15-22% in fees once shipping, returns, and ads are counted. The reframe worked. The unit economics are what's being tested now.
CRED built trust with India's top 1%. Two-thirds of them still don't pay for anything.
FY25 revenue hit ₹2,735 Cr and operating losses fell 51%, but the RBI just removed the bill-payment hook that built CRED's user base in the first place.
Zerodha never sold trading. It sold the absence of a salesperson.
India's largest stockbroker by profit, built with zero venture capital, now defending its moat as pricing stops being a differentiator.
Country Delight never sold milk. It sold a 6 AM habit.
A ₹1,380 Cr subscription business built on solving a trust problem, not a delivery problem — and quick commerce is now buying into it.