# Santosh Panda

> Santosh Panda is a serial entrepreneur, operator, and investor with 25+ years of building, scaling, and investing in technology companies worldwide. He is the founder of Explara (now ExplaraX — a WhatsApp-first community platform, originally India's first DIY event registration SaaS) and co-founder of Foundership (a business studio in Singapore and India, winding down in 2026). Today he works hands-on with a few exceptional founders in deeptech, AI — as operator, advisor, and investor. He lives in India and has lived & worked in Singapore, UK, Finland, and the US.

## Current work

- Operator · Advisor · Investor: Works hands-on with a few exceptional founders — growth, revenue, and operational efficiency. Focus sectors: deeptech, and AI.
- [ExplaraX](https://explarax.com): Founder and advisor. Originally founded in 2008 as Explara, India's first DIY event registration SaaS. Bootstrapped and VC-funded, scaled from $0 to $11M gross transaction volume, serving 100,000+ users across 21+ countries. Now ExplaraX — a community-first, WhatsApp-first business management platform, run by its own team while Santosh stays on as advisor.
- [Foundership](https://foundershiphq.com): Accelerator co-founded in 2021, winding down in 2026. Backed 58 startups across 8 cohorts from 1,500+ applications. Backed by Blume Ventures, Hiro Mashita, and angel investors.

## Background

- Co-founded Explara in 2008. Backed by Blume Ventures and dozens of angels; three funding rounds raised across India, Singapore, and the USA. Achieved profitability. Multi-product evolution: events, community management, payments, crowdfunding. Now ExplaraX.
- Co-founded Foundership in 2021. Started as a global emerging-tech accelerator, grew into a full-stack Business Studio, and winds down in 2026.
- Earlier career: product teams at eBay UK, core team member on the BBC iPlayer launch in 2007, FTSE 100 consulting (Vodafone, William Hill, Allianz, News International), and engineering work at CoreObjects and Sonata-Terranova in Helsinki and Bangalore. Building internet-first products since 1998.
- Lived and worked in the UK, USA, Finland, Singapore, and India.

## Communities built

- AI Valley Club: Global AI community across 40+ cities
- Blockmeet Web3: 40+ chapters, 10,000+ members worldwide
- The Foundry Club: Founders, operators, investors network
- Early contributor to India's SaaS ecosystem formation
- Grittiest: Support initiative for 2nd/3rd-tier city Founders & Startups

## Speaking topics

Santosh speaks and writes about:
- Building internet-first companies — 25 years of lessons from London to Bengaluru
- The Business Studio model — how operators are replacing the accelerator
- India's SaaS evolution — from 2008 to today, and where the next $1B companies come from
- Community-led growth and distribution — why distribution is the real moat in the AI era
- Founder resilience — what he learned almost losing Explara during COVID
- Angel investing for serious professionals — how to invest like a founder, not just an allocator
- Rescaling businesses and startups — how to rebuild after growth has stalled

## Network and reach

- 55,000+ connections and social media followers
- 3,500+ founder connections
- 2,000+ investor connections including 250+ angel investors and 200+ managing/general partners
- 3,500+ CXO/leadership connections

## Links

- [Personal website](https://santoshpanda.com)
- [Essays and posts on Notion](https://www.notion.so/Essays-Posts-a137394ba90049788e85b3a04fe342d9)
- [LinkedIn newsletter](https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/6934758897513545728/)
- [LinkedIn profile](https://www.linkedin.com/in/santoshpanda)
- [X / Twitter](https://x.com/santoshpanda)
- [Foundership](https://foundershiphq.com)
- [ExplaraX](https://explarax.com)

## Talks and interviews

A selection of recorded talks and interviews is available at [santoshpanda.com#talks](https://santoshpanda.com#talks), covering Foundership, Web3, the Explara years, India's SaaS journey, building profitable ventures, and founder resilience.

## How to work with Santosh

Where he's most useful:
- Growth that compounds: pricing, positioning, and a GTM motion that repeats — getting inside the machine, not advising from the sidelines
- The next S-curve: new markets and new models; the leap most founders see a year too late
- The operator's hard calls: fundraising strategy, board dynamics, crisis navigation, and knowing when to hold versus when to leap
- Community and the ecosystem: showing up for builders as a habit, not a service

Contact: via [santoshpanda.com](https://santoshpanda.com) or LinkedIn.