Outliers Season 1 Finale: Vijay Shekhar Sharma on the life of a founder

Pankaj Mishra December 25, 2017 1 min

So who is Vijay Shekhar Sharma?

Depending who you ask in India’s technology and startup ecosystem, the answers will range from “that crazy guy” to “overly obsessed entrepreneur”, “trying to fight too many battles at the same time”, “a desi entrepreneur”, “rags to riches story” and so on.

If you ask us at FactorDaily, we’ll perhaps point you to our Code of Conduct that names him as one of the three investors backing our media startup.

But this podcast isn’t about what we think of him; it’s about who he really is.

And as I sat down with him for this special episode Outliers Podcast Season 1, I realised he’s no different from many important entrepreneurs in these times — at the core, they all want to make it big, are inspired by Elon Musk or such, and are very, very lonely.

“When I lost my father few weeks ago, I also lost the only one who understood what I really do. Now, I have no one who understands me, and that will remain a gap forever,” he says.


               

Disclosure: FactorDaily is owned by SourceCode Media, which counts Accel Partners, Blume Ventures and Vijay Shekhar Sharma among its investors. Accel Partners is an early investor in Flipkart. Vijay Shekhar Sharma is the founder of Paytm. None of FactorDaily’s investors have any influence on its reporting about India’s technology and startup ecosystem.