Bhavin Turakhia

From an 18-year-old with ₹25,000 to the builder of Directi, Zeta, Titan and Flock.

Born: 21 December 1979, Mumbai
Country: India
Known for: Directi, Zeta, Titan, Flock, Radix, CodeChef
Industry: Fintech, web infrastructure, email

Early life

Bhavin Turakhia was born in Mumbai into a middle-class Jain family and went to school at Arya Vidya Mandir in Bandra. He began studying science at D.G. Ruparel College but dropped out, and later completed a commerce degree at Sydenham College of Commerce and Economics. He has often credited his father's advice and his modest beginnings for the way he approaches business.

Starting Directi at 18

In 1998, at just 18 years old, Bhavin started his first technology company, Directi, together with his brother Divyank. The starting capital was only ₹25,000, roughly US$675 at the time. Directi grew into a group of internet infrastructure businesses, among them the domain and hosting brands BigRock, ResellerClub, LogicBoxes and Webhosting.info. He also became involved in the global domain industry and served several terms as chairperson of the Registrar Constituency at ICANN, the body that coordinates internet names and numbers.

Selling the web businesses

In 2014, the brothers sold four of their web companies (BigRock, LogicBoxes, ResellerClub and Webhosting.info) to the US firm Endurance International Group. The deal was reported at $160 million, and it freed them to put their energy into newer ideas rather than staying only in domains and hosting.

A second act: new companies

After the sale, Bhavin kept building. Over the following years he founded or ran several new ventures, including:

Zeta, a cloud-native banking technology company, launched in 2015 to give banks modern card processing and core banking systems in place of slow legacy platforms.
Titan, a professional business email service.
Flock, a team messaging app for workplaces.
Radix, a domain name registry, and CodeChef, a platform for competitive programming.
Ringo, a mobile app for phone calls and recharges.

Timeline

1998Starts Directi with his brother Divyank, aged 18, with ₹25,000.
2011Named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.
2014Sells BigRock, LogicBoxes, ResellerClub and Webhosting.info to Endurance International Group.
2015Launches Zeta.
2016Ranked 95th on Forbes India's list of the 100 richest people, and wins two Entrepreneur India awards.
2019Zeta takes its first major outside investment, from Sodexo, at a $300 million valuation.
2021Zeta raises $250 million led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and becomes a unicorn at about $1.45 billion. In August, Automattic invests $30 million in Titan at a $300 million valuation.

Recognition

Young Global Leader, World Economic Forum (2011)
Serial Entrepreneur of the Year and Entrepreneur of the Year in Innovation and Technology, Entrepreneur India (2016)
ETPanache Trendsetter Award, The Economic Times (2016)
Bharti Entrepreneur of the Year (2005)

The takeaway: sell the plumbing, in the industry where it is oldest, and be patient. Bhavin's path shows how one early company can fund and teach you enough to build the next, bigger one.

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Sources

Written from public information, including Wikipedia, Business Outreach and Biographies.net. Figures such as deal sizes and valuations are as reported in those sources.