On January 25, 2017, Amit Kasliwal, Harvinder Rajput and Saurabh Borah, co-founders of MyT Brewer sat at a table in their small rented office, sampling a cup of tea dispensed by the latest prototype of the tea machine they had been working on for the past few months. After experimenting with about 26 previous prototypes for tea-brewing, they knew that the final version was still a long way away. In 2013, Kasliwal discovered that the available tea-vending machines all over the country used either premix/tea bags for dispensing tea. Despite a high demand for tea in India, there was no machine available on the market that could make strong, boiled tea characteristic of the homemade version. In 2013, he joined the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA) for a year-long Post Graduate Programme in Management for Executives (PGPX) and started his dream project of building a tea-brewing machine. After developing a series of prototypes, the bootstrapped start-up ran out of resources in December 2016. The founders were still in the process of developing a Minimum Viable Prototype (MVP) and had not sold a single machine. Kasliwal felt if they didn’t enter the market immediately, they would have to shut shop. However, launching an unfinished product could backfire in multiple ways. What if customers rejected the idea? What if the design was leaked and competition alerted? All their hard work would be overridden by someone with deeper pockets. What if he was unable to raise funding? What should he do? THE REALISATION OF A PROBLEM Kasliwal was working in Bengaluru as an engineer in 2009 and was increasingly unhappy about the tea machine in his office. He was simply not able to satisfy his craving for a strong cup of tea. He started visiting a tea-stall outside the office with a friend in hope of a refreshing homelike brew. However, unlike the northern states of India, there were no roadside tea stalls in Bengaluru that would make a fresh cup on demand. Tea was available at cafes which charged a high price — the option was not viable for daily consumption. “We were from North India where tea is consumed majorly and is prepared on-demand at tea stalls. But in Bengaluru we couldn’t find a decent place that served good tea. Usually, the vendors prepared tea in large quantities and just re-heated it every time (a customer came in) or stored it in This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 2 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) flasks wherein it would lose its freshness in less than 10-15 minutes. If we wanted a freshly made cup of chai1 we had to go two kilometres away from the office to a café.” 2 SIDE HUSTLING TEA Sensing a business opportunity, Kasliwal and his friend Abhishek Jain started a small tea café, TrupTEA, in 2011 as a side hustle apart from their regular jobs. They hired staff to make tea and offered eight flavours including ginger and cardamom. The cafe was located in Bengaluru outside of a popular multi-storey retail store and next to a big office complex. Their customers were mostly visitors/staff of the retail store and people working in the neighbouring offices. The response to the café was very good with customers coming from as far as 10 kilometres away just to enjoy a cup of tea. Gradually, they started getting complaints about the inconsistent taste of tea. Upon speaking with customers, Kasliwal realised that the tea brewing process was very subjective and depended largely on the judgement of the staff making the tea and also on quantity being made. The judgement about the quantity of ingredients such as milk, water, sugar, tea leaves, spices, etc., the flame setting and the boil times made the taste of tea vary considerably. Despite training the staff, they felt that the process was not always followed as the staff had to do multiple things when an order came in and it was easy for them to miss or alter steps. Kasliwal felt that just like coffee machines, there should be a tea-brewing machine that would standardise the process, deliver consistent taste and yet be open for customisation according to the users’ preferences. Kasliwal started the search for a machine that could brew a standard cup of tea. He recalled: “When we started searching for a tea machine in the market, we were shocked to find that there are at least 10 different types of coffee machines that could make coffee but not even a single tea machine! The machines either used teabags / premixes or they used coffee process using tea liqueur. None of these would make the cut for a Chai lover.”3 THE TEA INDUSTRY OF INDIA Historically, tea was first cultivated and traded by China4 and then grown in India by the British in large scale in the nineteenth century5. Tea brewing in India eventually evolved to include milk and sugar and different spices added for extra flavour6 thus resulting in the quintessential Indian chai. In 2017, China grew 2.5 million tons of tea, making it the world’s largest tea producer and exporter7. The per capita consumption of tea of China was 1.25 pounds whereas that of India was 1 Hindi word for ‘tea’ 2Protagonist interviews 33Protagonist interviews 4Tea | History of Tea Drinking In India. (n.d.). Tea | Home. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from http://www.tea.in/history 5Pettigrew, J. (2000, August 3). The Origins of Indian Tea. TeaMuse. https://www.teamuse.com/article_000803.html 6Pal, S. (2016, December 15). The Fascinating History of India’s Best Loved Beverage, Chai. The Better India. https://www.thebetterindia.com/78265/chai-tea-history-india/ 7Statista Research Department. (2016b, September 12). China: coffee and tea consumption volume 2010-2020 | Statista. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/623672/china-coffee-and-tea-consumption-volume/ This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 3 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) 0.72 pounds8. In 2018, India was the second largest producer of tea in the world, after China9. Assam, West Bengal and the Southern states (Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka) remained the highest producers of tea at 676.31 million Kgs, 387.56 million Kgs and 233.65 million Kgs respectively10. About 80% of the tea produced in India was consumed within the country itself, though tea consumption in India by global standards was relatively low11. The consumption of tea also differed within geographical regions within the country, with Northern and Westerns states consuming about 32% and 31% tea as compared to 18% and 19% tea being consumed by Southern and North Eastern states respectively12. Tea consumption (according to a study by NSSO 2000-2003) was highest in Maharashtra (14.86%) followed by Uttar Pradesh (10.35%), Rajasthan, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh13. Overall, in India, about 64% of people (as of 2017) were predominantly tea drinkers14. Karnataka, Odisha, Bihar, Jharkhand and North Eastern states ranked low in consumption of tea15. Convenience in tea preparation was an important aspect of tea consumption and in the early 90s, the boom in the IT (Information Technology) industry led to a sudden spike in demand for convenient, machine-made tea/coffee outside home. The Ready to Drink (RTD) tea market in India was expected to grow 5% annually from 2020 to 202416 with Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL) and Nestle leading in the beverage vending machine market.17 This naturally boosted the premix market and by 2005, the vending machine manufactures had also started venturing into production of premix.18 Early versions of vending machines engaged analog technology, which meant that the machine could dispense only one beverage, either tea or coffee. Subsequent machines (post 2000) upgraded to dispense up to four options of each beverage. Small local players also came up with low quality vending machines for the price sensitive customer.19 Around 2000, the demand for milk-based tea rose and a company called Fresh and Honest came up with a vending machine that dispensed hot milk and consumers could enjoy hot tea in different flavours with the help of tea bags20. This boosted the tea-bag industry and from 2006 to 2010, vending machines were revolutionised by switching from analog to digital technology with 8Statista Research Department. (2016a, January 14). Tea consumption per capita worldwide by country, 2016 | Statista. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/507950/global-per-capita-tea-consumption-by-country/ 9India Tea Organization. (n.d.). History of Indian Tea. Home. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from https://www.indiatea.org/history_of_indian_tea 10Tea Board. (n.d.). State/Region wise and Month wise Production data. Tea Board. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from http://www.teaboard.gov.in/pdf/Production_final_2017_and_2017_18_pdf4181.pdf 11Tea Board (n.d.). Executive Summary of Study on Domestic Consumption of Tea in India. Tea Board. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from http://www.teaboard.gov.in/pdf/Executive_Summary_Tea_Consumption_20062018_pdf5940.pdf 12Ibid 13Goswami, N. (2007, January 19). Maharashtra relishes tea the most, tops chart. DNA India. https://www.dnaindia.com/business/report-maharashtra-relishes-tea-the-most-tops-chart-1075368 14Ibid 15 Tea Board of India brews growth plan. (2020, August 25). Telegraph India. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from https://www.telegraphindia.com/north-east/tea-board-of-india-brews-growth-plan/cid/1789964 16Ibid 17Sokhi, V. (2016, November 4). The Vending Industry (Tea and Coffee). LinkedIn. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/vending-industry-tea-coffee-vijay-sokhi 18Ibid. 19Ibid. 20Ibid. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 4 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) six-canister vending machines with a possible 10-12 combinations21. However, these combinations were used to make different types/flavours of coffee and not tea. By 2012, only 12- 15% of the consumer market for machine beverages had been tapped; the sale from tea/coffee vending machines was estimated to touch USD 1 billion with the price of automated vending machines ranging from INR 0.14 million to 1 million.22A gap still remained, as there was still no option/machine that dispensed freshly-brewed tea. This was the need that Kasliwal wanted to address. A NEW CHAPTER In 2013, Kasliwal applied for a year-long degree (PGPX) in Executive Management at IIMA. He quit his job, handed over the operations of the tea cafe to Jain and moved to Ahmedabad. Without support, Jain found it difficult to attend to the cafe alongside a full-time job. Kasliwal’s schedule at IIMA was packed. There was little he could do to compensate for his physical absence and eventually they decided to shut down the cafe. At IIMA, Kasliwal discovered CIIE.CO23 and became interested in its IIMavericks internship24. He applied for it and upon selection used the internship to conduct an initial market survey to understand the potential readiness of the market for a tea-brewing machine. SURVEYING THE MARKET FOR TEA Kasliwal interviewed the founders of popular tea cafes across India and floated a survey in cafes, offices and households. In Ahmedabad, he interviewed distributors/manufacturers of instant tea and instant tea-machines and owners of tea-cafes and submitted a report as part of his internship. He collected 150 responses and developed a Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis of the tea-machine market (Exhibit 2). This analysis helped him build a view about the market size and major players of the tea-brewing sector in Ahmedabad (Exhibit 1). At this point, he intended to stick to marketing and outsource the manufacturing of a tea vending machine as he knew this meant arranging for the consumables such as tea leaves. Based on his study, Kasliwal identified three places where people consumed tea: offices, eateries and households. Usually, people at offices consumed tea made by a tea-vending machine that used premix25 to make instant tea. According to the survey, consumers didn’t like the taste and it was unhygienic as the machine attracted insects like cockroaches. Alternatively, people used teabags (with either hot water or milk) or left the office to have tea at a nearby stall/cafeteria. Some offices arranged to have tea delivered by tea vendors at break timings. 21Ibid. 22Hande, P. (2012, March 26). A Vend in the Road: An Insight into the Vending Machine Market and the Neo-Indian Consumer. Youth Ki Awaaz. https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2012/03/a-vend-in-the-road-an-insight-into-thevending-machine-market-and-the-neo-indian-consumer/ 23CIIE.CO, also known as the Innovation Continuum was founded at IIM Ahmedabad in 2002 as an academic center and has grown to include incubation, acceleration, seed and growth funding, and research. Founded at CIIE.CO has grown and pivoted to include acceleration, incubation, investment, research and publication. 24IIMAvericks internship was CIIE.CO’s internship program for students in their first year. If selected, applicants undertook an internship under CIIE.CO, where they worked on a new venture idea during the summer break. 25 Instant tea powder containing tea and milk solids and sugar; it is added to hot water to make tea. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 5 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) The second market segment was cafeterias. Kasliwal spoke to owners of cafeterias in and around Ahmedabad, Bengaluru and Jaipur. They seemed to be excited about a machine that brewed fresh tea. However, a large tea company with a chain of tea-cafeterias around the country responded negatively. They claimed they didn’t need a machine and their premixes came in multiple flavours. As a challenge, they gave Kasliwal several free samples that could be added to hot water. The third market segment Kasliwal identified was the Indian household. Household tea consumers generally made fresh tea at home, normally for breakfast and afternoon tea-time and occasionally if guests arrived. Kasliwal interviewed families who came to a popular public garden in Ahmedabad on weekends. He recorded different responses across age groups and discovered taste was important for most respondents. Some respondents specifically liked the tea made by a certain member of the family or a domestic help. Most of these families were willing to pay about INR 6000-7000 for owning a tea-brewing machine. Kasliwal concluded that a tea machine for households did not solve a big problem for its buyers as one could easily make a cup of tea at home. However, in offices, time was a constraint and one had to consume whatever was most conveniently available. People were therefore forced to compromise on taste and some quit drinking tea altogether at work and switched to coffee or other water-based beverages. He also felt a tea machine for cafeterias was more desirable as it could potentially increase business and could decrease dependency on staff to a great extent. ENVISIONING A MODEL PROTOTYPE After the internship, Kasliwal decided to pitch the idea for a tea-brewing machine for the IIMavericks Fellowship26. As he would need to demonstrate a basic prototype, Kasliwal started visiting a senior from his undergraduate course to learn the basics of robotics in hardware. This senior advised him to install components such as a flow-meter and a relay-board in his prototype to make it more realistic. Towards the end of 2013, Kasliwal prepared his proposal for a teabrewing machine. He also made a cardboard model (Exhibit 3) explaining how the proposed machine would work (Exhibit 4) but the idea got rejected. However, a faculty at IIMA became interested in the idea based on conversations with Kasliwal and decided to fund him. With seed money from the faculty and investing his own savings, Kasliwal started MyT Brewer — a venture committed to a product that brewed customised tea to match the home-brewing process (Exhibit 5). PUSHING TOWARDS A PROTOTYPE Kasliwal graduated from IIMA in April 2014 and moved to Jaipur, Rajasthan as costs for sourcing hardware components were low there. After settling in, he started exploring various options in order to come up with a workable prototype. His father connected him to someone with a local reputation for repairing appliances who agreed to design a machine. However, his ideas were so different from those of Kasliwal that they fell out a few weeks later. Next, Kasliwal hired a 26IIMAvericks Fellowship program was CIIE.CO’s fellowship program for aspiring entrepreneurs. Under this program, graduating IIMA students get a placement holiday and a scholarship for two years, in addition to prototyping grants, incubation and mentoring support. At the end of the Fellowship, students could continue with their start up or come back for placement interviews. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 6 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) professional designer for this machine but in the next 3-4 months, they were only able to exchange a few drawings of a potential prototype. Frustrated with multiple follow ups and discussions leading nowhere, Kasliwal decided to meet others for ideas before completely giving up on the venture. From April to September, Kasliwal met several people in the ecosystem. These included tea traders, designers/hardware specialists, entrepreneurs, investors and other industry experts. The purpose of these meetings was to gain more insight into the tea-vending machine market and understand the engineering aspect for a potential machine. Designers/ hardware specialists felt the idea was very risky and quoted an average of INR 6-7 million to design the machine; they showed no interest in Kasliwal’s proposal for a partnership. Investors were more interested in technology related innovation like mobile applications, e-commerce, mobile and internet technology, etc. Kasliwal’s idea being predominantly hardware appeared unattractive to them. “In the past, many big companies such as Café Coffee Day, Osters, Eagle, Philips and Tata had tried making a tea-vending machine but nothing consequential had resulted. Investors knew this; where giants had failed, mine was only a small start-up. Despite meeting many people, I didn’t get any validation. Of the 300 odd people I met, only two actually encouraged me to go after this idea”.27 In September 2014, Kasliwal decided to start building a prototype on his own. He started reading about designing parts for beverage machines and learnt by dismantling existing models. He bought a small kettle and dismantled it, trying to understand how induction and other parts in it worked. He then bought an internationally branded coffee machine and dismantled it attempting to study how exactly beverage machines worked. He recalls: “I realized that to make this machine I needed an intersection of four skills — engineering, electronics, design, software and manufacturing; other than a little bit of engineering, I knew absolutely nothing!”28 Kasliwal realised he would need certain components to build the prototype. He first started creating rough prototypes made from cardboard; his strategy was to add automation gradually — one part at a time. In the first one he just built canisters. In the second prototype he tried to automate the system of adding water by attaching a pump. In the third prototype he installed a heater to boil milk. Beverage machine parts were difficult to buy off-the-shelf in India. These were specialised components and their suppliers were not willing to sell them to an individual buyer. Tired of naysayers, Kasliwal travelled to Delhi and barged into a local supplier’s office explaining to him what he was looking to build. He recalled part of the conversation: “(The supplier) said such a machine was not possible. Apparently, he had seen another person trying it three years ago but it was not successful. He tried to discourage me saying it was a painful process and that he himself already had 10 (such) dysfunctional prototypes in his warehouse. He said that ‘you are a layman and you don’t know anything’ to which I said that he is right and requested him to share his knowledge and components with me. He continued for next 2 hours 27Protagonist interviews 28Protagonist interviews This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 7 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) and finally I told him that I am alumnus of IIT29 in aerospace engineering, and that I was confident in pulling this off and just needed some help from him. He relented a little and gave me all the components which I was looking for. I would say that was my first breakthrough.”30 By February 2015, Kasliwal felt confident enough to design a working machine. With hardware parts assembled from the Delhi supplier, he made a prototype that would make tea by reading a recipe off a barcode system. Kasliwal’s senior, who helped him learn fundamentals of electronics and robotics while he was in Ahmedabad, connected him to Harvinder Rajput; a final year student in electronics engineering who offered to work alongside Kasliwal for a couple of months. With the prototypes they produced, Kasliwal found that insects kept getting into the sugar so he built a subsequent prototype in which storage compartments were placed outside the body so as to avoid the problem of insects and milk going bad. In this version, milk and water were kept separately and pumped into a pan to be boiled together. This version worked at making tea automatically but it still looked very crude. Kasliwal thought of enclosing all the components in an acrylic body. Around May 2015, he found a vendor selling acrylic parts and designed a version with an outer acrylic body — a relay board and flow-meter which used induction for heating (Exhibit 6). He took it to Gurgaon to a demonstration for a potential investor. The demonstration did not go well. Kasliwal felt dejected that day as he drove back to Jaipur. He recalled: “That person was very good at business and technical aspects. I made him tea. To be honest, the machine looked like a jugaad31 at the time. I expected him to be impressed with just the taste but he gave me feedback on the whole experience. The machine used Arduino32 technology —the connections of which got loose during the drive from Jaipur to Gurgaon. Consequently, the machine misbehaved in the demo and milk didn’t boil properly. Critical feedback was that this machine used induction system and that meant washing a pan every time a user made tea. Who would do that? I was devastated during this visit as all the hard work was in vain. During the drive back I made multiple stops at tea stalls thinking really hard what could be modified in the design to make it work till I had an idea!”33 FINDING A CO-FOUNDER In August 2015, Rajput asked Kasliwal if he could work for him but Kasliwal was hesitant to take him up as he could not pay him. Rajput persisted and so Kasliwal onboarded him as a co-founder. He said: “Up until then, I was the lone wolf working on everything, so it was very difficult to do concept generation, electronics, fabrication, testing alone and then explain (my concept) to others. I was getting tired of doing everything on my own, so with much hesitation and fear, I hired Rajput and 29 IIT is expanded as Indian Institute of Technology; a league of universities considered the best for technical education in India. 30Protagonist interviews 31Hindi word for ‘makeshift’ 32Open-source electronic prototyping platform enabling users to create interactive electronic objects. 33Protagonist interviews This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 8 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) together we started working on the new idea I had come up with during my drive from Gurgaon to Jaipur.” For the next prototype, the duo worked on a prototype that would very slowly pass near-boilingtemperature water through a heap of tea leaves simulating the steeping of tea. After steeping it for a couple of minutes, the machine would add hot milk. The tea thus made tasted fine. The cofounders invited Kasliwal’s uncle who was also a food connoisseur to taste the tea, knowing he would be critical with his feedback. Kasliwal’s uncle said the taste resembled the tea made with tea-bags. Kasliwal and Rajput immediately gave up on this version and started scouting for a different idea. MOVING FORWARD A month later, in July 2015, Kasliwal and Rajput formally registered the start-up and called it Cheermap Foods Pvt. Ltd. that would design prototypes under the brand name MyT Brewer. They also decided to move to Bengaluru. Kasliwal explained this decision: “We faced a lot of problems in Jaipur over availability of parts and fabrication. Whenever we required any Integrated Circuit (IC) or any other component or needed to fabricate; we had to make a two-day trip to Delhi or Ahmedabad. We decided Bengaluru would be a good place to launch this kind of product as I had worked in Bengaluru for seven years and I found that the city quite welcoming of new things! Plus, availability of parts and fabricators would not be a problem there.”34 WORKING WITH A DESIGNER In Bengaluru, the co-founders got in touch with a design firm through a mutual contact. They spent the next eight months at the office of the firm experimenting with different prototypes. The team of designers gave them multiple ideas, and the co-founders stayed open to everything. Together with the designer’s team, Kasliwal and Rajput worked on multiple versions of the prototype. They experimented with tea bags, instant tea mix and also tried a robotic arm to dip the tea bag. Each of the prototype iterations meant making a choice between different options. For example, the co-founders had to choose between using spray-dried35 spices versus fresh ones. They also had to choose between using spray-dried tea leaves versus the Crush, Tear, Curl (CTC) leaf as the raw material. By April, the co-founders decided that they did not want an option that used tea-bags or instant mix to make tea; they wanted to stay true to their goal of achieving freshly brewed tea just the way it is done at home. However, the robotic-arm-dipping-a-tea-bag-into-acup version gave them an idea. All this while, they had been trying to heat the contents from the bottom. They thought of trying a mechanism where the contents could be heated from above instead, for instance, by dipping a heater in the cup. This was a turning point for them as the machine could brew the tea in the same cup one could drink from. The mess created in the cup could be disposed manually by the user. Kasliwal and Rajput then visited several heater manufacturers and finally got one manufacturer to design a custom heater for them that could achieve what was required. In this prototype, the storage containers for milk and sugar were 34Protagonist interviews 35Spray drying is a method of producing a dry powder from a liquid or slurry by rapidly drying with a hot gas; preferred for materials which require consistent, fine particle size. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 9 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) built outside the body to avoid hygiene issues. Although this one was able to brew tea, the challenge was the heater got very dirty as it was dipped in milk every time it was used. In May 2016, the start-up on-boarded Saurabh Borah as a co-founder. Borah had experience in leading e-commerce companies and was brought on to drive non-technical operations. The trio narrowed down to a mechanism that heated liquid contents from above and poured the contents into a cup. They communicated to the designers that they had a final design in mind and set to work making drawings on the Computer Aided Design (CAD) software which took them about three months. Thereafter commenced the search for a manufacturer. This was a challenge since most people did not want to manufacture a single piece but eventually, they found someone in Bengaluru who agreed to manufacture one piece for them. This particular machine was manufactured in December 2016. The co-founders were quite exasperated with the manufacturing and design problems. Kasliwal recalled: “Other than the quality problems in the manufactured product, we found that the whole process was very painful. Designers took time (2-3 months) to deliver drawings, manufacturer took similar time to deliver and in between there will a lot of back and forth between manufacturer and designer about how something should be done and then there were never-ending follow ups from our side. We felt helpless. On top of it we knew that unless we run the machine for next 2-3 months, we wouldn’t know the working problems in the machine. We were after the functionality but our designers had a soft corner for aesthetics. On advice of the designers, we made a plastic prototype —manufactured in China —which was very expensive. It definitely improved the outer looks but cost us INR 0.1 million! And being a bootstrapped entrepreneur, I didn’t want to spend any more money —not on the aesthetics for sure before I cracked functionality! We had to get back to the drawing board and we decided that we won’t do anything that requires incurring of any fixed cost. We conceptualized everything such that our costs stay variable. We then went to the designers and told them ‘This is what we want’.” 36 A month later, with a prototype still in making, the start-up ran out of funds. Kasliwal had also exhausted his personal savings marked for working on the prototype. The prototype was shaping up — it had two nozzles, one each to deliver hot milk and water to a cup. Tea leaves and spices were added manually by using a separate automated unit and tea was brewed by heating the contents with the specially designed heater. Kasliwal took this machine for a demonstration in a few offices to gather user reactions. Over the next few weeks, it was clear that even though the prototype brewed decent tea, it was far from the one that would prove to be the dominant design in the future tea machines. The founders had been mulling over the problems in their prototype. “Honestly, there were still a lot of problems with the prototype that would hinder its adoption” Kasliwal noted. On the small whiteboard in their office, the founders had listed down some of these: 36Protagonist interviews This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 10 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) Kasliwal recalled: “It was January 2017 and we could only fix first 3 issues quickly but that too would require 6-7 months taking into account the delays in design and manufacturing. Thinking of all the required finances, work involved and frustration that lay ahead, I felt weak in my knees.”37 The questions on his mind were strategic and existential in equal measure. What should they do now? Should they continue prototyping or enter the market with the current version? If they entered the market, they risked revealing their design to competitors. With Silicon Valley engineers also designing a tea-vending machine38, it might just be a matter of time before new players entered the markets. 37Protagonist interviews 38Tandon, S. (2016, May, 31). An Indian engineer in Silicon Valley has invented a machine to brew the perfect masala tea. Quartz India. Retrieved on June 17, 2021 from https://qz.com/india/695453/an-indian-engineer-in-silicon-valleyhas-invented-a-machine-to-brew-the-perfect-masala-tea/

1. Some components often blow up and we are still unsure why.
2. One moving part used in the machine is flaky and can breakdown anytime unless maintained twice a week.
3. The machine is designed as a prototype and isn’t manufacturable.
4. It takes almost 3 minutes to make a cup MAKE A SHORT SUMMARY FROM THIS GIVEN CASE STUDY GIVING SOLUTATION TO IT AND PREPARE A PRESENTATION AS WELL ON THIS

I WANT IN EASY LANGUAGE AND IN 250 WORDS

On January 25, 2017, Amit Kasliwal, Harvinder Rajput and Saurabh Borah, co-founders of MyT Brewer sat at a table in their small rented office, sampling a cup of tea dispensed by the latest prototype of the tea machine they had been working on for the past few months. After experimenting with about 26 previous prototypes for tea-brewing, they knew that the final version was still a long way away. In 2013, Kasliwal discovered that the available tea-vending machines all over the country used either premix/tea bags for dispensing tea. Despite a high demand for tea in India, there was no machine available on the market that could make strong, boiled tea characteristic of the homemade version. In 2013, he joined the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA) for a year-long Post Graduate Programme in Management for Executives (PGPX) and started his dream project of building a tea-brewing machine. After developing a series of prototypes, the bootstrapped start-up ran out of resources in December 2016. The founders were still in the process of developing a Minimum Viable Prototype (MVP) and had not sold a single machine. Kasliwal felt if they didn’t enter the market immediately, they would have to shut shop. However, launching an unfinished product could backfire in multiple ways. What if customers rejected the idea? What if the design was leaked and competition alerted? All their hard work would be overridden by someone with deeper pockets. What if he was unable to raise funding? What should he do? THE REALISATION OF A PROBLEM Kasliwal was working in Bengaluru as an engineer in 2009 and was increasingly unhappy about the tea machine in his office. He was simply not able to satisfy his craving for a strong cup of tea. He started visiting a tea-stall outside the office with a friend in hope of a refreshing homelike brew. However, unlike the northern states of India, there were no roadside tea stalls in Bengaluru that would make a fresh cup on demand. Tea was available at cafes which charged a high price — the option was not viable for daily consumption. “We were from North India where tea is consumed majorly and is prepared on-demand at tea stalls. But in Bengaluru we couldn’t find a decent place that served good tea. Usually, the vendors prepared tea in large quantities and just re-heated it every time (a customer came in) or stored it in This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 2 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) flasks wherein it would lose its freshness in less than 10-15 minutes. If we wanted a freshly made cup of chai1 we had to go two kilometres away from the office to a café.” 2 SIDE HUSTLING TEA Sensing a business opportunity, Kasliwal and his friend Abhishek Jain started a small tea café, TrupTEA, in 2011 as a side hustle apart from their regular jobs. They hired staff to make tea and offered eight flavours including ginger and cardamom. The cafe was located in Bengaluru outside of a popular multi-storey retail store and next to a big office complex. Their customers were mostly visitors/staff of the retail store and people working in the neighbouring offices. The response to the café was very good with customers coming from as far as 10 kilometres away just to enjoy a cup of tea. Gradually, they started getting complaints about the inconsistent taste of tea. Upon speaking with customers, Kasliwal realised that the tea brewing process was very subjective and depended largely on the judgement of the staff making the tea and also on quantity being made. The judgement about the quantity of ingredients such as milk, water, sugar, tea leaves, spices, etc., the flame setting and the boil times made the taste of tea vary considerably. Despite training the staff, they felt that the process was not always followed as the staff had to do multiple things when an order came in and it was easy for them to miss or alter steps. Kasliwal felt that just like coffee machines, there should be a tea-brewing machine that would standardise the process, deliver consistent taste and yet be open for customisation according to the users’ preferences. Kasliwal started the search for a machine that could brew a standard cup of tea. He recalled: “When we started searching for a tea machine in the market, we were shocked to find that there are at least 10 different types of coffee machines that could make coffee but not even a single tea machine! The machines either used teabags / premixes or they used coffee process using tea liqueur. None of these would make the cut for a Chai lover.”3 THE TEA INDUSTRY OF INDIA Historically, tea was first cultivated and traded by China4 and then grown in India by the British in large scale in the nineteenth century5. Tea brewing in India eventually evolved to include milk and sugar and different spices added for extra flavour6 thus resulting in the quintessential Indian chai. In 2017, China grew 2.5 million tons of tea, making it the world’s largest tea producer and exporter7. The per capita consumption of tea of China was 1.25 pounds whereas that of India was 1 Hindi word for ‘tea’ 2Protagonist interviews 33Protagonist interviews 4Tea | History of Tea Drinking In India. (n.d.). Tea | Home. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from http://www.tea.in/history 5Pettigrew, J. (2000, August 3). The Origins of Indian Tea. TeaMuse. https://www.teamuse.com/article_000803.html 6Pal, S. (2016, December 15). The Fascinating History of India’s Best Loved Beverage, Chai. The Better India. https://www.thebetterindia.com/78265/chai-tea-history-india/ 7Statista Research Department. (2016b, September 12). China: coffee and tea consumption volume 2010-2020 | Statista. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/623672/china-coffee-and-tea-consumption-volume/ This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 3 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) 0.72 pounds8. In 2018, India was the second largest producer of tea in the world, after China9. Assam, West Bengal and the Southern states (Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka) remained the highest producers of tea at 676.31 million Kgs, 387.56 million Kgs and 233.65 million Kgs respectively10. About 80% of the tea produced in India was consumed within the country itself, though tea consumption in India by global standards was relatively low11. The consumption of tea also differed within geographical regions within the country, with Northern and Westerns states consuming about 32% and 31% tea as compared to 18% and 19% tea being consumed by Southern and North Eastern states respectively12. Tea consumption (according to a study by NSSO 2000-2003) was highest in Maharashtra (14.86%) followed by Uttar Pradesh (10.35%), Rajasthan, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh13. Overall, in India, about 64% of people (as of 2017) were predominantly tea drinkers14. Karnataka, Odisha, Bihar, Jharkhand and North Eastern states ranked low in consumption of tea15. Convenience in tea preparation was an important aspect of tea consumption and in the early 90s, the boom in the IT (Information Technology) industry led to a sudden spike in demand for convenient, machine-made tea/coffee outside home. The Ready to Drink (RTD) tea market in India was expected to grow 5% annually from 2020 to 202416 with Hindustan Unilever Limited (HUL) and Nestle leading in the beverage vending machine market.17 This naturally boosted the premix market and by 2005, the vending machine manufactures had also started venturing into production of premix.18 Early versions of vending machines engaged analog technology, which meant that the machine could dispense only one beverage, either tea or coffee. Subsequent machines (post 2000) upgraded to dispense up to four options of each beverage. Small local players also came up with low quality vending machines for the price sensitive customer.19 Around 2000, the demand for milk-based tea rose and a company called Fresh and Honest came up with a vending machine that dispensed hot milk and consumers could enjoy hot tea in different flavours with the help of tea bags20. This boosted the tea-bag industry and from 2006 to 2010, vending machines were revolutionised by switching from analog to digital technology with 8Statista Research Department. (2016a, January 14). Tea consumption per capita worldwide by country, 2016 | Statista. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/507950/global-per-capita-tea-consumption-by-country/ 9India Tea Organization. (n.d.). History of Indian Tea. Home. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from https://www.indiatea.org/history_of_indian_tea 10Tea Board. (n.d.). State/Region wise and Month wise Production data. Tea Board. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from http://www.teaboard.gov.in/pdf/Production_final_2017_and_2017_18_pdf4181.pdf 11Tea Board (n.d.). Executive Summary of Study on Domestic Consumption of Tea in India. Tea Board. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from http://www.teaboard.gov.in/pdf/Executive_Summary_Tea_Consumption_20062018_pdf5940.pdf 12Ibid 13Goswami, N. (2007, January 19). Maharashtra relishes tea the most, tops chart. DNA India. https://www.dnaindia.com/business/report-maharashtra-relishes-tea-the-most-tops-chart-1075368 14Ibid 15 Tea Board of India brews growth plan. (2020, August 25). Telegraph India. Retrieved on June 17, 2020, from https://www.telegraphindia.com/north-east/tea-board-of-india-brews-growth-plan/cid/1789964 16Ibid 17Sokhi, V. (2016, November 4). The Vending Industry (Tea and Coffee). LinkedIn. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/vending-industry-tea-coffee-vijay-sokhi 18Ibid. 19Ibid. 20Ibid. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 4 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) six-canister vending machines with a possible 10-12 combinations21. However, these combinations were used to make different types/flavours of coffee and not tea. By 2012, only 12- 15% of the consumer market for machine beverages had been tapped; the sale from tea/coffee vending machines was estimated to touch USD 1 billion with the price of automated vending machines ranging from INR 0.14 million to 1 million.22A gap still remained, as there was still no option/machine that dispensed freshly-brewed tea. This was the need that Kasliwal wanted to address. A NEW CHAPTER In 2013, Kasliwal applied for a year-long degree (PGPX) in Executive Management at IIMA. He quit his job, handed over the operations of the tea cafe to Jain and moved to Ahmedabad. Without support, Jain found it difficult to attend to the cafe alongside a full-time job. Kasliwal’s schedule at IIMA was packed. There was little he could do to compensate for his physical absence and eventually they decided to shut down the cafe. At IIMA, Kasliwal discovered CIIE.CO23 and became interested in its IIMavericks internship24. He applied for it and upon selection used the internship to conduct an initial market survey to understand the potential readiness of the market for a tea-brewing machine. SURVEYING THE MARKET FOR TEA Kasliwal interviewed the founders of popular tea cafes across India and floated a survey in cafes, offices and households. In Ahmedabad, he interviewed distributors/manufacturers of instant tea and instant tea-machines and owners of tea-cafes and submitted a report as part of his internship. He collected 150 responses and developed a Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis of the tea-machine market (Exhibit 2). This analysis helped him build a view about the market size and major players of the tea-brewing sector in Ahmedabad (Exhibit 1). At this point, he intended to stick to marketing and outsource the manufacturing of a tea vending machine as he knew this meant arranging for the consumables such as tea leaves. Based on his study, Kasliwal identified three places where people consumed tea: offices, eateries and households. Usually, people at offices consumed tea made by a tea-vending machine that used premix25 to make instant tea. According to the survey, consumers didn’t like the taste and it was unhygienic as the machine attracted insects like cockroaches. Alternatively, people used teabags (with either hot water or milk) or left the office to have tea at a nearby stall/cafeteria. Some offices arranged to have tea delivered by tea vendors at break timings. 21Ibid. 22Hande, P. (2012, March 26). A Vend in the Road: An Insight into the Vending Machine Market and the Neo-Indian Consumer. Youth Ki Awaaz. https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2012/03/a-vend-in-the-road-an-insight-into-thevending-machine-market-and-the-neo-indian-consumer/ 23CIIE.CO, also known as the Innovation Continuum was founded at IIM Ahmedabad in 2002 as an academic center and has grown to include incubation, acceleration, seed and growth funding, and research. Founded at CIIE.CO has grown and pivoted to include acceleration, incubation, investment, research and publication. 24IIMAvericks internship was CIIE.CO’s internship program for students in their first year. If selected, applicants undertook an internship under CIIE.CO, where they worked on a new venture idea during the summer break. 25 Instant tea powder containing tea and milk solids and sugar; it is added to hot water to make tea. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 5 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) The second market segment was cafeterias. Kasliwal spoke to owners of cafeterias in and around Ahmedabad, Bengaluru and Jaipur. They seemed to be excited about a machine that brewed fresh tea. However, a large tea company with a chain of tea-cafeterias around the country responded negatively. They claimed they didn’t need a machine and their premixes came in multiple flavours. As a challenge, they gave Kasliwal several free samples that could be added to hot water. The third market segment Kasliwal identified was the Indian household. Household tea consumers generally made fresh tea at home, normally for breakfast and afternoon tea-time and occasionally if guests arrived. Kasliwal interviewed families who came to a popular public garden in Ahmedabad on weekends. He recorded different responses across age groups and discovered taste was important for most respondents. Some respondents specifically liked the tea made by a certain member of the family or a domestic help. Most of these families were willing to pay about INR 6000-7000 for owning a tea-brewing machine. Kasliwal concluded that a tea machine for households did not solve a big problem for its buyers as one could easily make a cup of tea at home. However, in offices, time was a constraint and one had to consume whatever was most conveniently available. People were therefore forced to compromise on taste and some quit drinking tea altogether at work and switched to coffee or other water-based beverages. He also felt a tea machine for cafeterias was more desirable as it could potentially increase business and could decrease dependency on staff to a great extent. ENVISIONING A MODEL PROTOTYPE After the internship, Kasliwal decided to pitch the idea for a tea-brewing machine for the IIMavericks Fellowship26. As he would need to demonstrate a basic prototype, Kasliwal started visiting a senior from his undergraduate course to learn the basics of robotics in hardware. This senior advised him to install components such as a flow-meter and a relay-board in his prototype to make it more realistic. Towards the end of 2013, Kasliwal prepared his proposal for a teabrewing machine. He also made a cardboard model (Exhibit 3) explaining how the proposed machine would work (Exhibit 4) but the idea got rejected. However, a faculty at IIMA became interested in the idea based on conversations with Kasliwal and decided to fund him. With seed money from the faculty and investing his own savings, Kasliwal started MyT Brewer — a venture committed to a product that brewed customised tea to match the home-brewing process (Exhibit 5). PUSHING TOWARDS A PROTOTYPE Kasliwal graduated from IIMA in April 2014 and moved to Jaipur, Rajasthan as costs for sourcing hardware components were low there. After settling in, he started exploring various options in order to come up with a workable prototype. His father connected him to someone with a local reputation for repairing appliances who agreed to design a machine. However, his ideas were so different from those of Kasliwal that they fell out a few weeks later. Next, Kasliwal hired a 26IIMAvericks Fellowship program was CIIE.CO’s fellowship program for aspiring entrepreneurs. Under this program, graduating IIMA students get a placement holiday and a scholarship for two years, in addition to prototyping grants, incubation and mentoring support. At the end of the Fellowship, students could continue with their start up or come back for placement interviews. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 6 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) professional designer for this machine but in the next 3-4 months, they were only able to exchange a few drawings of a potential prototype. Frustrated with multiple follow ups and discussions leading nowhere, Kasliwal decided to meet others for ideas before completely giving up on the venture. From April to September, Kasliwal met several people in the ecosystem. These included tea traders, designers/hardware specialists, entrepreneurs, investors and other industry experts. The purpose of these meetings was to gain more insight into the tea-vending machine market and understand the engineering aspect for a potential machine. Designers/ hardware specialists felt the idea was very risky and quoted an average of INR 6-7 million to design the machine; they showed no interest in Kasliwal’s proposal for a partnership. Investors were more interested in technology related innovation like mobile applications, e-commerce, mobile and internet technology, etc. Kasliwal’s idea being predominantly hardware appeared unattractive to them. “In the past, many big companies such as Café Coffee Day, Osters, Eagle, Philips and Tata had tried making a tea-vending machine but nothing consequential had resulted. Investors knew this; where giants had failed, mine was only a small start-up. Despite meeting many people, I didn’t get any validation. Of the 300 odd people I met, only two actually encouraged me to go after this idea”.27 In September 2014, Kasliwal decided to start building a prototype on his own. He started reading about designing parts for beverage machines and learnt by dismantling existing models. He bought a small kettle and dismantled it, trying to understand how induction and other parts in it worked. He then bought an internationally branded coffee machine and dismantled it attempting to study how exactly beverage machines worked. He recalls: “I realized that to make this machine I needed an intersection of four skills — engineering, electronics, design, software and manufacturing; other than a little bit of engineering, I knew absolutely nothing!”28 Kasliwal realised he would need certain components to build the prototype. He first started creating rough prototypes made from cardboard; his strategy was to add automation gradually — one part at a time. In the first one he just built canisters. In the second prototype he tried to automate the system of adding water by attaching a pump. In the third prototype he installed a heater to boil milk. Beverage machine parts were difficult to buy off-the-shelf in India. These were specialised components and their suppliers were not willing to sell them to an individual buyer. Tired of naysayers, Kasliwal travelled to Delhi and barged into a local supplier’s office explaining to him what he was looking to build. He recalled part of the conversation: “(The supplier) said such a machine was not possible. Apparently, he had seen another person trying it three years ago but it was not successful. He tried to discourage me saying it was a painful process and that he himself already had 10 (such) dysfunctional prototypes in his warehouse. He said that ‘you are a layman and you don’t know anything’ to which I said that he is right and requested him to share his knowledge and components with me. He continued for next 2 hours 27Protagonist interviews 28Protagonist interviews This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 7 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) and finally I told him that I am alumnus of IIT29 in aerospace engineering, and that I was confident in pulling this off and just needed some help from him. He relented a little and gave me all the components which I was looking for. I would say that was my first breakthrough.”30 By February 2015, Kasliwal felt confident enough to design a working machine. With hardware parts assembled from the Delhi supplier, he made a prototype that would make tea by reading a recipe off a barcode system. Kasliwal’s senior, who helped him learn fundamentals of electronics and robotics while he was in Ahmedabad, connected him to Harvinder Rajput; a final year student in electronics engineering who offered to work alongside Kasliwal for a couple of months. With the prototypes they produced, Kasliwal found that insects kept getting into the sugar so he built a subsequent prototype in which storage compartments were placed outside the body so as to avoid the problem of insects and milk going bad. In this version, milk and water were kept separately and pumped into a pan to be boiled together. This version worked at making tea automatically but it still looked very crude. Kasliwal thought of enclosing all the components in an acrylic body. Around May 2015, he found a vendor selling acrylic parts and designed a version with an outer acrylic body — a relay board and flow-meter which used induction for heating (Exhibit 6). He took it to Gurgaon to a demonstration for a potential investor. The demonstration did not go well. Kasliwal felt dejected that day as he drove back to Jaipur. He recalled: “That person was very good at business and technical aspects. I made him tea. To be honest, the machine looked like a jugaad31 at the time. I expected him to be impressed with just the taste but he gave me feedback on the whole experience. The machine used Arduino32 technology —the connections of which got loose during the drive from Jaipur to Gurgaon. Consequently, the machine misbehaved in the demo and milk didn’t boil properly. Critical feedback was that this machine used induction system and that meant washing a pan every time a user made tea. Who would do that? I was devastated during this visit as all the hard work was in vain. During the drive back I made multiple stops at tea stalls thinking really hard what could be modified in the design to make it work till I had an idea!”33 FINDING A CO-FOUNDER In August 2015, Rajput asked Kasliwal if he could work for him but Kasliwal was hesitant to take him up as he could not pay him. Rajput persisted and so Kasliwal onboarded him as a co-founder. He said: “Up until then, I was the lone wolf working on everything, so it was very difficult to do concept generation, electronics, fabrication, testing alone and then explain (my concept) to others. I was getting tired of doing everything on my own, so with much hesitation and fear, I hired Rajput and 29 IIT is expanded as Indian Institute of Technology; a league of universities considered the best for technical education in India. 30Protagonist interviews 31Hindi word for ‘makeshift’ 32Open-source electronic prototyping platform enabling users to create interactive electronic objects. 33Protagonist interviews This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 8 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) together we started working on the new idea I had come up with during my drive from Gurgaon to Jaipur.” For the next prototype, the duo worked on a prototype that would very slowly pass near-boilingtemperature water through a heap of tea leaves simulating the steeping of tea. After steeping it for a couple of minutes, the machine would add hot milk. The tea thus made tasted fine. The cofounders invited Kasliwal’s uncle who was also a food connoisseur to taste the tea, knowing he would be critical with his feedback. Kasliwal’s uncle said the taste resembled the tea made with tea-bags. Kasliwal and Rajput immediately gave up on this version and started scouting for a different idea. MOVING FORWARD A month later, in July 2015, Kasliwal and Rajput formally registered the start-up and called it Cheermap Foods Pvt. Ltd. that would design prototypes under the brand name MyT Brewer. They also decided to move to Bengaluru. Kasliwal explained this decision: “We faced a lot of problems in Jaipur over availability of parts and fabrication. Whenever we required any Integrated Circuit (IC) or any other component or needed to fabricate; we had to make a two-day trip to Delhi or Ahmedabad. We decided Bengaluru would be a good place to launch this kind of product as I had worked in Bengaluru for seven years and I found that the city quite welcoming of new things! Plus, availability of parts and fabricators would not be a problem there.”34 WORKING WITH A DESIGNER In Bengaluru, the co-founders got in touch with a design firm through a mutual contact. They spent the next eight months at the office of the firm experimenting with different prototypes. The team of designers gave them multiple ideas, and the co-founders stayed open to everything. Together with the designer’s team, Kasliwal and Rajput worked on multiple versions of the prototype. They experimented with tea bags, instant tea mix and also tried a robotic arm to dip the tea bag. Each of the prototype iterations meant making a choice between different options. For example, the co-founders had to choose between using spray-dried35 spices versus fresh ones. They also had to choose between using spray-dried tea leaves versus the Crush, Tear, Curl (CTC) leaf as the raw material. By April, the co-founders decided that they did not want an option that used tea-bags or instant mix to make tea; they wanted to stay true to their goal of achieving freshly brewed tea just the way it is done at home. However, the robotic-arm-dipping-a-tea-bag-into-acup version gave them an idea. All this while, they had been trying to heat the contents from the bottom. They thought of trying a mechanism where the contents could be heated from above instead, for instance, by dipping a heater in the cup. This was a turning point for them as the machine could brew the tea in the same cup one could drink from. The mess created in the cup could be disposed manually by the user. Kasliwal and Rajput then visited several heater manufacturers and finally got one manufacturer to design a custom heater for them that could achieve what was required. In this prototype, the storage containers for milk and sugar were 34Protagonist interviews 35Spray drying is a method of producing a dry powder from a liquid or slurry by rapidly drying with a hot gas; preferred for materials which require consistent, fine particle size. This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 9 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) built outside the body to avoid hygiene issues. Although this one was able to brew tea, the challenge was the heater got very dirty as it was dipped in milk every time it was used. In May 2016, the start-up on-boarded Saurabh Borah as a co-founder. Borah had experience in leading e-commerce companies and was brought on to drive non-technical operations. The trio narrowed down to a mechanism that heated liquid contents from above and poured the contents into a cup. They communicated to the designers that they had a final design in mind and set to work making drawings on the Computer Aided Design (CAD) software which took them about three months. Thereafter commenced the search for a manufacturer. This was a challenge since most people did not want to manufacture a single piece but eventually, they found someone in Bengaluru who agreed to manufacture one piece for them. This particular machine was manufactured in December 2016. The co-founders were quite exasperated with the manufacturing and design problems. Kasliwal recalled: “Other than the quality problems in the manufactured product, we found that the whole process was very painful. Designers took time (2-3 months) to deliver drawings, manufacturer took similar time to deliver and in between there will a lot of back and forth between manufacturer and designer about how something should be done and then there were never-ending follow ups from our side. We felt helpless. On top of it we knew that unless we run the machine for next 2-3 months, we wouldn’t know the working problems in the machine. We were after the functionality but our designers had a soft corner for aesthetics. On advice of the designers, we made a plastic prototype —manufactured in China —which was very expensive. It definitely improved the outer looks but cost us INR 0.1 million! And being a bootstrapped entrepreneur, I didn’t want to spend any more money —not on the aesthetics for sure before I cracked functionality! We had to get back to the drawing board and we decided that we won’t do anything that requires incurring of any fixed cost. We conceptualized everything such that our costs stay variable. We then went to the designers and told them ‘This is what we want’.” 36 A month later, with a prototype still in making, the start-up ran out of funds. Kasliwal had also exhausted his personal savings marked for working on the prototype. The prototype was shaping up — it had two nozzles, one each to deliver hot milk and water to a cup. Tea leaves and spices were added manually by using a separate automated unit and tea was brewed by heating the contents with the specially designed heater. Kasliwal took this machine for a demonstration in a few offices to gather user reactions. Over the next few weeks, it was clear that even though the prototype brewed decent tea, it was far from the one that would prove to be the dominant design in the future tea machines. The founders had been mulling over the problems in their prototype. “Honestly, there were still a lot of problems with the prototype that would hinder its adoption” Kasliwal noted. On the small whiteboard in their office, the founders had listed down some of these: 36Protagonist interviews This document is authorized for personal use only by Dr Om Prakash, of AIMT till 07 December, 2024. It shall not be reproduced or distributed without express written permission from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. 10 of 17 IIMA/CIIE0026(A) Kasliwal recalled: “It was January 2017 and we could only fix first 3 issues quickly but that too would require 6-7 months taking into account the delays in design and manufacturing. Thinking of all the required finances, work involved and frustration that lay ahead, I felt weak in my knees.”37 The questions on his mind were strategic and existential in equal measure. What should they do now? Should they continue prototyping or enter the market with the current version? If they entered the market, they risked revealing their design to competitors. With Silicon Valley engineers also designing a tea-vending machine38, it might just be a matter of time before new players entered the markets. 37Protagonist interviews 38Tandon, S. (2016, May, 31). An Indian engineer in Silicon Valley has invented a machine to brew the perfect masala tea. Quartz India. Retrieved on June 17, 2021 from https://qz.com/india/695453/an-indian-engineer-in-silicon-valleyhas-invented-a-machine-to-brew-the-perfect-masala-tea/

1. Some components often blow up and we are still unsure why.
2. One moving part used in the machine is flaky and can breakdown anytime unless maintained twice a week.
3. The machine is designed as a prototype and isn’t manufacturable.
4. It takes almost 3 minutes to make a cup - results in a long queue. ChatGPT ! The message you submitted was too long, please reload the conversation and submit something shorter.

2 / 3

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Regenerate ChatGPT can make mistakes. Consider checking important info SOLVE THIS GIVEN CASE STUDY AND PREPARE A SHORT SUMMARY IN A EASY LANGUAGE IN 250 WORDS GIVING SUTIABLE SOLUTATION FOR THIS PROBLEM