Gupshup is a well-known conversational messaging platform that powers over 10 billion messages per month. To learn more about the company, Pulse 2.0 interviewed Gupshup’s chief product officer Gaurav Kachhawa.
Gaurav Kachhawa’s Background
Prior to Gupshup, Kachhawa led product teams at Adobe, Twitter, Electronic Arts, and Zynga. While at Adobe, Kachhawa was responsible for driving experience and engagement for its diverse cloud offerings used by tens of millions of creatives globally. Kachhawa also spent several years in the social gaming industry working on some of the most loved gaming franchises at Zynga and Electronic Arts. As the chief product officer at Gupshup, Kachhawa leads the overall product strategy, product management, design, growth, and analytics at Gupshup.
Evolution Of Gupshup’s Technology
Kachhawa noted that Gupshup has been one of the pioneers in the messaging space, having launched back in 2004 as a P2P messaging service. Later, the company moved from a B2C messaging service to a B2B messaging platform, helping enterprises communicate better with their customers.
“Initially, as part of the CPaaS (Communications Platform-as-a-Service) offering, Gupshup offered SMS to our enterprise customers, enabling them to send messages for varied use cases – OTPs, balance checks, payment confirmations, etc. Once WhatsApp Business launched, we added conversational capabilities to our product, allowing for two-way messaging. So, Gupshup moved from messaging 1.0 to 2.0, offering a product that helps businesses engage customers across marketing, commerce, and support. Over the years, Gupshup added conversational AI, building bots with natural language capabilities. And now with ChatGPT, Gupshup now has a bot-building tool that can build smarter advanced chatbots more quickly and easily.”
Partnership With The Ministry of Consumer Affairs In India
I asked Kachhawa about Gupshup’s recent partnership with the Ministry of Consumer Affairs in India. This partnership has led to a streamlining of consumer report filing processes.
“Filing consumer complaints is a tedious process. Aggrieved consumers are required to call a National Consumer Helpline to register a complaint. They can also file it through the Ministry’s website or app. But, given that consumers are always constrained for time, they are in need of cost-efficient and time-efficient solutions. The government realized this, and therefore its partnership with Gupshup and WhatsApp to create a chatbot for consumer complaints is a highly commendable, citizen-friendly move,” Kachhawa explained. “By sending a message to 8800001915, consumers can quickly and easily register complaints, check complaint status, and read FAQs, all within WhatsApp. The user-friendly chatbot is available 24/7, allowing citizens to file complaints at any time of the day.”
Biggest Milestones
When I asked Kachhawa about the company’s biggest milestones, he cited a few examples.
“Our move to an enterprise messaging platform was a pivotal moment that changed the direction of the company. In 2018, our tie-up with WhatsApp was yet another turning point, as it fundamentally changed how businesses were communicating with their customers,” Kachhawa explained. “In 2021 and 2022, we acquired five companies that significantly enhanced our potential in the conversational AI space. Toward the end of 2022, we hit yet another milestone, with 10 billion messages flowing through our platform. Today, with more than 45,000 brands across 20+ countries, our automation solutions power every stage of the customer journey, from pre-purchase to post-purchase.”
Funding
The company’s last funding round happened in July 2021 when they raised $240 million led by Fidelity Management, Tiger Global, Think Investments, Malabar Investments, Harbor Spring Capital, and White Oak. And the company recorded $250 million in revenue last year, growing by 70% year-on-year.
Total Addressable Market (TAM)
I asked Kachhawa about the total addressable market that Gupshup is pursuing. Kachhawa cited a study by Gartner reporting that the value of the CPaaS (Communications Platform-as-a-Service) market will reach $30.6 billion globally by 2026, rising from $11.8 billion in 2022. And Gupshup – with its umbrella of products – is best positioned to capitalize on the more than 100% growth expected in this market.
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates Gupshup from the competition?
“Our uniqueness lies in the depth and breadth of our platform. Our product portfolio comprises full stack solutions that range across Conversational Marketing, Conversational Commerce, and Conversational Support, offering companies an innovative way to create moments of magic across the customer lifecycle,” Kachhawa replied. “By unlocking the power of conversational engagement, Gupshup makes it easy for businesses to engage, interact, and transact with their customers over 30+ channels – anytime and anywhere. In essence, we are offering CXaaS (Customer Experience as a Service) by helping brands engage their customers during their entire lifecycle not just with messaging but an umbrella of solutions that gives them deeper insight into the customer”.
Gupshup has deep experience in working with companies of all sizes and sectors. And, when it comes to innovative technologies, Gupshup has always remained ahead of the curve. For example, Gupshup launched an Auto Bot Builder product. Plus Gupshup was among the first companies globally to build an enterprise solution based on GPT-3.
Future Company Goals
What are some of Gupshup’s future company goals?
“We will continue to make it easy for businesses to communicate with their customers. With the immense possibilities of WhatsApp, we want to grow it into a channel where customers are able to do everything in one place – from messages, alerts, and booking appointments, to shopping, payments, and support,” Kachhawa concluded. “As a customer today, you must navigate multiple apps for shopping, messaging, and payments to complete a transaction. With WhatsApp, this process will all become seamless, under one single app. Further, with GPT-3 and GPT-4, we want to continue building advanced chatbots that will solve businesses’ customer communication woes in a much more efficient way.”
