The story of 36-year-old US-returned Amrit Acharya, co-founder of the Bengaluru-based Zetwerk, should be a business case study for all budding entrepreneurs on how to bounce back strongly from the brink of collapse.
Returning from the US in January 2018, Acharya along with his IIT-Madras classmate and co-founder Srinath Ramakkrushnan founded a steel fabrication company. As things were progressing well, Covid-19 brought the operations to zero. But, they bounced back strongly and are today a $2 billion company with business spread across categories including electronics, renewables and automotive.
“We started with our personal funds and raised $1 million in the first round. As business was settling down, Covid brought it to zero, effectively. We had to think outside the box and look at other categories, including electronics by making PCBs,” he told businessline on Saturday at the company’s newly inaugurated plant near Chennai.
Early days
Born in Bhubaneswar, Acharya said he hailed from a middle-class family. His father is a professor, and mother runs a non-for-profit organisation. He studied at a local school and did electrical engineering at IIT-Madras; joined ITC; headed to the US to work for McKinsey & Company in San Francisco and returned home.
While he was in the US, Acharya said he realised that a lot of exciting things were happening back at home. It was at that time the Government gave a lot of focus on startups. “I was seeing all of it from outside. That’s when I felt that I should return to India,” he said. It was Ghar Vapasi at the right time, he said.
Acharya returned home and reconnected with Ramakkrushnan. “We wanted to do something together and for inspiration we looked at what we did at ITC. Ramakkrushnan had a family business that ran a steel fabrication unit, that’s how it all came together. The ambition grew over time,” he said.
On growth path
Zetwerk is a B2B marketplace focused on make-to-order custom manufacturing. In December 2024, Zetwerk raised around $90 million in a funding round led by investors Rakesh Gangwal and Khosla Ventures, valuing the company at $3.1 billion. It also achieved a Gross Merchandise Value of ₹17,564 crore or around $2.10 billion for the year ended March 31, 2024.
“We grew at over 40 per cent in the last three years and will continue to grow at that same rate or more,” he said. The company plans to go public in 15-24 months. The preparatory work has already commenced to raise around $500 million, he added.
With seven facilities, it manufactures industrial goods for renewables, aerospace and defence, electronics and capital goods sectors.
Components manufactured by Zetwerk go into electronic goods and consumer goods, he said. A challenging project was to build 21-metre-high steel girders on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train Corridor. Initially, the lack of local expertise in India led to importing these girders from Japan. “We fabricated a substantial 10,000 metric tonnes of steel girders for the project valued at approximately ₹150 crore,” he said.
Recently, the company secured a second order from NTPC to manufacture and supply 1,515 mw peak of solar photovoltaic modules, including spares from NTPC for the 1,200 MW Khavda solar project. The contract is valued at ₹2,500 crore, per media reports.
“This is the beauty of where India is today. It is unimaginable for somebody like me to raise this kind of capital that we did to start a business in India of the type we are doing, right?” he said.
