Against All Odds: CoinDCX is India’s 1st Crypto 🦄
Today, CoinDCX became India’s first crypto unicorn after launching to Indian users in 2018. Entrepreneurship is not a straight path. By now, Sumit and Neeraj from CoinDCX know this better than most people.
April 2018 was a trying time for the nascent Indian cryptocurrency industry. RBI had just come out with a circular banning all fiat on/off-ramp activity for crypto entities and that meant locking out a majority of the Indian population from this new technological marvel. This was the time when CoinDCX was preparing for a launch.
Just before that had happened, I met Sumit on Twitter on a Sunday and we spoke the same day itself over a call. The next day, I decided I wanted to lead their pre-seed round and invited many of my close investor friends. Almost all of them wanted to participate knowing that I was early into crypto and wanted to follow me here. Next week, post the RBI announcement, almost all of them backed out. 6 people who stayed on—are now handsomely rewarded by the tremendous execution demonstrated by Sumit & co.
It has been my honour to experience their story closely as a seed round investor, (now ex-) board member and more importantly as a friend. Sumit and Neeraj are 1% done on their mission to make crypto more accessible to Indians.
From launching India’s first hybrid-liquidity exchange (crypto liquidity in exchanges was a big pain point back then), to beating all odds and defying regulations to finally overcoming them and now having the title of India’s first cryptocurrency unicorn—this is not a story about blockchain, cryptocurrency or any technology platform but that of the resilience of Indian entrepreneurship—the time for which has never been brighter.
Disclaimer: Nothing here is investment advice.
