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PODCAST

Two by Two

The Two by Two podcast is a premium business podcast from The Ken that investigates, discusses and breaks down the most important business stories around you. Hosted from The Ken"s newsroom by business journalists Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan, Two by Two will feature guests and experts from across the industry and academia to talk about issues no one else is talking about.

business business news

All Episodes

80:24

Who is the entry-level software engineer now?

Two by Two ·

2026/02/05

Software engineering as we knew it is over and the entry-level job has vanished. So what do you tell someone graduating today?This question splits even the experts. Arnav Gupta, Engineering Manager at Meta and co-founder of Coding Blocks, argues the knowledge must compress. He says that the future belongs to those who adapt fast and embrace the AI tools.Meanwhile Abhay Saraf, Director at Bushel Technologies and ex-Microsoft, pushes back hard. He believes you cannot build a calculator and

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66:58

PhonePe dominates payments but loses money. Now what?

Two by Two ·

2026/01/29

PhonePe leads nearly half of India's UPI transactions, but as it gears up for a $1.3 billion IPO, a tough question looms: can a company built to defend its lead ever learn to make real profit?In this episode, Rohin Dharmakumar argues that PhonePe's dominance might actually be a strategic trap. With zero-margin transactions and shifting regulations, the next ten years cannot look like the last. To win, PhonePe must decide whether it's willing to risk its crown to become a bold market

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81:02

With Noice, Swiggy picks the 3rd path in quick commerce

Two by Two ·

2026/01/22

Swiggy has launched Noice, a private label brand that's popping up across categories on Instamart. But is this a genuine brand-building play or just another experiment destined for Swiggy's product graveyard?In this episode, co-hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar are joined by Sandeep Nair, co-founder of brand strategy consultancy David & Who and former Swiggy marketing director, and Mrunmayi Oke, SVP of Strategy at Zilo and former head of business at Dunzo. Together,

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72:40

Can Urban Company avoid BigBasket’s fate?

Two by Two ·

2026/01/15

Urban Company has spent years building trust as the go-to platform for home services. But a new generation of founders is now using the Zepto playbook to target its most profitable segments. On Two by Two this week, Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar are joined by Arpit Agarwal, a partner at Blume Ventures.The conversation explores the wedge strategy: how specialized startups like Snabbit and Dazzl are driving deep into specific categories like household help and beauty services

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71:04

How can restaurants scale sustainably?

Two by Two ·

2026/01/08

Running a successful restaurant is hard. Scaling one without losing what made it special is even harder.This week on Two by Two, hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar talk to two people who are deep in that fight: Sameer Seth, founder and CEO of Hunger Inc. Hospitality (The Bombay Canteen, O Pedro, Veronica's, Papa's, Bombay Sweet Shop), and Karan Kapur, Executive Director of K Hospitality Group (Copper Chimney, Bombay Brasserie, The Irish House).The conversation starts with

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54:44

2025 Year-end special

Two by Two ·

2025/12/25

2025 is done. Forty-eight episodes. Hundreds of guests. Endless banter between Rohin and Praveen.This year, Two by Two covered stories from Bengaluru to the world including business, tech, and everything in between. We didn't just stick to the usual. We asked about people, trends, and the things others weren't paying attention to. We brought on guests who didn't rehearse their answers and tried to make sense of things as they happened.Some episodes turned out to be prescient. Some were

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54:55

60 seconds for every 2025 episode

Two by Two ·

2025/12/18

As we try to wind down this year, Rohin and Praveen do something they’ve never done before: go through every single episode they recorded this year. All 48 of them. In 60 minutes.The rules were simple. Each host had 10 points to build their personal top 10 list for the year. No take-backs, and no pre-discussion. It was a completely live, vibe-based recording where they figured it out as they went.What follows is a rapid-fire sprint through the year. From Amazon India’s struggles to the

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70:51

QIP, IPO, Bubble. Why Swiggy, Zepto, and Blinkit see...

Two by Two ·

2025/12/11

Swiggy just raised a billion dollars in its IPO last year. Now it needs another ₹10,000 crores. That's not a great sign.On Two by Two this week, hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar try to make sense of the chaos in India's quick commerce space. Joining them are Ashwin Mehta, head of research at Ambit Capital, and Anand Kalyanaraman, finance editor at The Ken.Here's what happened: Zepto suddenly dropped all fees, forcing Swiggy to scramble and match. Blinkit's CEO is out there

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67:17

The bro-ification of business and tech podcasts

Two by Two ·

2025/12/04

"When you called me yesterday, I came up with eight different reasons to say no to you."That's Kosturi Ghosh, partner at Tri-Legal, explaining why she almost didn't show up for this podcast. It's a revealing admission and one that gets to the heart of why business and tech podcasts have such a lopsided gender problem.This week on Two by Two, hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar do something uncomfortable: they examine their own track record. Joined by Kosturi and Swapnika Nag,

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84:42

Meesho has come a long way. How much farther will it go?

Two by Two ·

2025/11/27

This week on Two by Two, hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar dissect Meesho's strategy with Adarsh Menon (partner at Fireside Ventures and former head of Shopsy at Flipkart) and Ganesh Nagasekar (founder of GSN Invest).Fresh off filing its DRHP, Meesho has gotten here by doing everything differently. Zero commission when competitors charged fees. Optimizing for cost when others raced for speed. Building a logistics arm that slashed delivery costs. All while serving 210

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85:49

The numbers behind OpenAI and Perplexity’s deals with...

Two by Two ·

2025/11/20

This week, Two by Two debuts a new format: "Reverse engineering the playbook."Hosts Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan attempt to crack the math behind this recent wave of AI-telco partnerships in India. Why are companies like Perplexity, Google, and OpenAI racing to bundle their expensive premium subscriptions with Airtel, Jio, and Phonepe? To decode the economics, they are joined by two industry experts with firsthand experience managing these exact types of deals:

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78:36

What will bring ambition back from the dead?

Two by Two ·

2025/11/13

The popular narrative often blames Gen Z for a lack of ambition, but is it the millennials who are truly suffering from “ambition fatigue”?This week on Two by Two, the conversation takes its lead from The Ken’s deputy editor, Arundhati Ramanathan’s recent and concerning article, “Indian Tech Companies are Spawning an Ambitionless Generation”.Hosts Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan sit down to discuss how to solve this cross-generational problem and bring the “fire back in the

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58:03

The great big Indian IPO

Two by Two ·

2025/11/06

What is the “listing pop” that everyone is chasing, and does it still matter six months later? This simple question is the starting point for a deep look into the current boom in the Indian Initial Public Offering (IPO) market. Despite a massive influx of investor wealth, the standards for companies going public have significantly dropped. In this episode of Two by Two, co-hosts Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan are joined by their colleagues, The Ken’s finance editor, Anand

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88:20

How do we reimagine hospitals from scratch?

Two by Two ·

2025/10/30

What’s the dumbest thing about hospitals that we still tolerate in 2025? This simple question kicks off a deep dive into the broken core of the Indian healthcare system. From confusing X-ray pricing and misaligned incentives that prioritise “sick-care” over healthcare, to the irritating experience of endless queues and fragmented records, the problems are deeply entrenched in the system. In this episode of Two by Two, co-hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar talk to two

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1:17

Deepavali Break

Two by Two ·

2025/10/23

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83:12

India risks losing cultural relevance in the AI era

Two by Two ·

2025/10/16

In this episode of Two by Two, we map out a viable AI strategy for India that plays to its unique strengths, not its weaknesses. Co-hosts Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan sit down with Chaitanya Chokkareddy, co-founder and CTO of Ozonetel–a cloud-based communication platform providing call-centre solutions—who presents a contrarian view: India’s current focus on acquiring GPUs is a flawed, capital-intensive race it cannot win. Instead, the real, defensible moat lies in India’s

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65:30

What happens when diamonds are neither rare nor...

Two by Two ·

2025/10/09

In this episode, we sit down with Ishendra Agarwal, founder and CEO of Giva, to unpack his mission to democratise fine jewellery in India. We look at how Giva is rapidly scaling its omnichannel presence with over 270 stores and targeting Rs 850 crore in revenue, all while catering to the modern consumer’s desire for accessible, fashionable pieces. Co-hosts of Two by Two Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan take a deep dive into the transitioning shift caused by lab-grown diamonds

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79:18

What killed India’s first fintech lenders?

Two by Two ·

2025/10/02

India’s fintech-based NBFC lending sector offers many lessons. Three early pioneers—Capital Float (now Axio), Zestmoney, and Lendingkart—raised significant amounts of venture capital, built solid momentum, and achieved growth and penetration. They pivoted, explored multiple opportunities, and yet, ultimately had to sell out. In this episode of Two by Two, co-hosts Rohin Dharmakumar and Praveen Gopal Krishnan are joined by guests Shivashish Chatterjee, co-founder of DMI Group, and Arundhati

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68:52

Firstclub wants to be the Costco of quick-commerce

Two by Two ·

2025/09/25

In this episode of Two by Two, co-hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar are joined by Ayyappan Rajagopal, founder and CEO of the quick-commerce platform Firstclub. A veteran of India’s e-commerce sector with leadership roles at Flipkart, Myntra, and Cleartrip, Ayyappan shares his vision for a differentiated experience in the crowded quick-commerce market. While existing platforms are highly transactional and compete on speed and discounts, Firstclub aims to be a curated,

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93:36

What happens when Indian consumers discover what they...

Two by Two ·

2025/09/18

In this episode, co-hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar sit down with Munaf Kapadia (VP of growth and marketing, Natfirst), and Arjun Anjaria (founder, Unbox Health) to discuss the challenge posed by misleading food labels in India and the resulting deterioration in consumer trust. Unbox Health uses independent lab testing to verify product claims, creating an objective D to A+ rating scale based on label accuracy, toxicity, and nutritional profile. While Natfirst, and its

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115 results

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