Going Global: Building a GTM Strategy with Data, Alignment & Agility

Hello everyone, uh, welcome. This is Suresh Madhuvarsu from Sales Table, and we are here with Laksho Logan. Laksho, really great to meet with you today, and I'm really excited to have you for this first podcast along with us, by the way.

Thanks, Suresh. Thanks for having me.

Yeah, absolutely. So for those of you who do not know, Lakshu is our go-to-market advisor at SalesTable, and Lakshu has been a sales leader across the APAC regions and worked with some of the best companies out there. And we are really lucky to have some time from Lakshu today. And without really further ado, one of the biggest topics that we keep thinking about, Lakshu, as part of the Valley founders here in the SF Bay Area is at this point of time, it's not the question of which market I should be really thinking through, but it is really the question of when should I enter what market. Especially the US is seeing the market turbulences at the end of the day. Everybody is really looking at how do I enter, for example, some of the APAC region in a way. Then the vice versa as well. Sometimes founders would have started their startups in Australia, Singapore, India, and they are planning to, for example, expand into the US. That's really the topic for today, which is how do we really bring in the global go-to-market strategy in a way? There is no other person that I know in my network other than you to really talk about it. So before we dig right in, Lakshya, I mean, can you talk a little bit about, I mean, what really got you into sales in the first place? And really, I think, you know, your love for sales and the leadership, I would love to really hear those stories, by the way.

Yeah, sure. My journey in sales actually happened by accident. I didn't plan to get into sales. I did a degree in software development. I was a DBA. out of university.

Wow.

The problem was that I was terrible at it. I was not very good at all. So my first internship, I bumped pretty badly. And so I was essentially trying to find a career option. My father is in sales and he said, why don't you just give sales a go? And I thought, okay, I need something to do. So I got into an organization that allowed me to, you know, train while I while I was working there, and I just fell in love with it. And ever since, I haven't looked back.

That's amazing. Yeah, so I mean, one of the things that a lot of folks think about sales is you need to have that right attitude, and some people have that sales in them. While I think I see all the arguments from your point of view, what made it really stick with you as a salesperson and as a sales leader yourself, Lakshya?

So the evolution of sales, especially during my time, if I look at the last sort of like 15 to 20 years, it's completely changed in terms of the way I've engaged and the way I've worked with buyers. I think the fundamentals in terms of what makes a great salesperson doesn't really change across industries. I think that ultimately stays the same. But what I've noticed more and more over the years that sales has become more what I call art, sorry, as from art to more science. And what I mean by that is if I look back the way I started my career back in Australia, it was very simple to actually engage with the customer based on purely relationship alone. And so I like you, you like me, let's grab a coffee, let's grab a beer. And usually the dialogue would happen and ultimately that would lead to a sale, especially during those days where it was what I call single-threaded, where you had 1 or 2 individuals essentially making a decision in an organization. Now fast forward, especially in recent years, that's not the case. There are more stakeholders. It's become more scientific in the sense that there are a lot of sort of checks and balances that need to be adhered to. And processes do come into play as well. And it's become more multi-threaded. So very rarely will you see an individual or 2 individuals make a decision. There are multiple different folks. So the way a salesperson's able to navigate through that and manage those stakeholders becomes even more key. in the world of sales these days?

Yeah, I mean, that brings up a great point because at the end of the day, every organization that I keep talking to these days, everybody is struggling with the pipeline generation. I think no matter how big, small the firm is, the pipeline generation is becoming harder. And then the whole of the deal execution is actually even more harder in a way. And that is actually frustrating, not just the leaders, but actually the people who are working out there in the trenches, the SDRs, BDRs, AEs. And I'd love to kind of learn and understand from you, how is the APAC region right now, more from the overall sentiment?

I think it's an exciting time to be in APAC, to be honest with you. That's what keeps me here. So I think where I've noticed and observed a lot of organizations, especially those who are coming from North America or even the European markets, and when they come to APAC, there's this expectation because of geography, the size of the market, GDP, for whatever the reason, there should be a huge opportunity available to those organizations. Now that's true to a certain degree if you know how to approach it. And so what I mean by that is there's a few things that I always recommend organizations to look at before approaching the APAC region. The first is product-market fit. And a lot of times organizations will come with a fantastic solution. It's designed very well for specific markets, let's call it North America or the US. But when they come into certain markets in the APAC region, it may not be a fit and it could be a number of reasons. One, you know, the buyers aren't particularly ready for that type of solution. It may not be financially viable given what's available in the market as well. And just the actual TAM, the total addressable market, it may be smaller. So if you look at a market, say like India with 1.5 billion people thinking that it's a huge opportunity, it may not always be a fit in the wider scheme of things. So just being aware of that is also one thing I always recommend. The second aspect that I always encourage organizations to think about is which specific country to go after.

Yeah.

That's a mistake I think a lot of folks make. So they'll go after APAC as a whole. They may treat everything exactly the same way as they do in North America or maybe the UK or Western Europe. And it doesn't work.

Yeah.

So each country has its own nuances, expectation, cultural, aspects that, you know, organizations need to be aware of as well. So that comes in towards your go-to-market strategy in terms of, you know, you know, how you position your product and the type of people you hire as well on the ground.

Gotcha. So that's a great, great point that you talked about because when people think about the APAC, it's like, hey, you know what, let's launch into the APAC region. But then APAC is so big. Are you launching in India, Singapore, Australia, Vietnam? I mean, which country are you you really thinking? And based on that, I mean, not just from the product stand, but it's really the cultural sensitivity of the products that you are building and taking over there. So as part of that, one aspect that I have definitely seen some of the founders do is to say, they'll go into LinkedIn, they'll say, hey, we're looking for the SDR in Singapore, and then they put in great job description and somebody is sitting in the US and then maybe the SDRs are sitting in Singapore. Then after 6 months or 1 year burning through the cash of this whole thing, they are super frustrated that things didn't really work out and then we don't know what my SDR, BDR is doing out there and then for whatever reasons. That remote tryout mentality is there for a lot of founders, unfortunately, where to say, hey, you know, I mean, LinkedIn is a great resource for sure, but does that really work out? I think, you know, a lot of people actually find out in the hard way that just having somebody remote, unless, I mean, probably it's a different thing that you know them really well. I mean, there is a working relationship with them before and all that is different, but I want to understand from your point of view, if somebody is really considering, let's say, launching in Singapore or Australia or in India, what are some of the first things that I need to think about, assuming that there is a product-market fit in the US, we are selling to people, there is at least, let's say, 5, 6 salespeople team in the US, there is a bit of a sales motion that we were able to bring in as part of that. Now, what does it really mean for me to launch in, let's say, Singapore? Okay.

So before any founder or organization is looking at embarking in APAC, before you start going out and hiring people and building teams, and assuming you do have a product-market fit, is I would encourage any senior leader or founder to come to APAC. Don't go out and hire people just yet. Try and do your own due diligence. Maybe go out and see some customers on your own, understand the market, do your own research before you start hiring people. What I would encourage you to also do is have some wins on the board, have a couple of customers in market. So for example, if you chose Singapore as a market entry point for whatever reason, maybe it is 'cause you had some customers on the ground, it was a product market fit. Until you have those customers there and they're doing well where you can build from there, then I would not encourage you to hire people in country. So that's my, probably the first bit of advice before any founder embarks on coming here. But— Usually have one or two countries in mind before coming here.

Gotcha. So that's actually a great one because even though the technology, the remote work, and I think, you know, the Zoom calls make it look like easy to collaborate with the remote teams and whatnot, especially I think what you are hitting on is there is so much of the cultural nuances that people need to think through, and then how customers behave, how customers want to work with you. If as a founder, as a leader, if I don't know what that means, I think it's probably very difficult to also expect the same thing out of somebody that I hire. I think that's really where you are leading to, as to say, come over there, understand that there is enough demand from the prospects that you in the sense, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. So from, let's say I do that. I mean, I come in out there and I'm really curious on a lot of folks when they think about the sales playbooks and the go-to-market strategy. I mean, go-to-market strategy means different things for different people in a way, right? Let's say I have an established business software and I'm making, let's say, $2 million ARR and now there is a decent demand coming in from Singapore market. I want to come in. I come there, I work with leaders, and then initially there is a set of folks that are really interested in what I'm doing. Now, what does it really mean by bringing in a playbook for myself? Do you think we should really bring in the SDRs, let them play it out there, How much time should I give before I know whether that market is working out or not?

Yeah. So each market's gonna have its own TAM, right? Total addressable market in terms of what's available out there for you. And so let's use your example. I come to Singapore and I start approaching the market. Now to a certain point, I'm gonna reach a sort of threshold. I'm gonna reach a peak in terms of how much I can do in Singapore. It's a country of 5.5 million people after all. There's only so much I can do. And then from there, where else do I launch? If I use Singapore as an example, typically it is the APAC hub. So it's a great launching ground for many countries in the Southeast Asian region. So from there, the methodology and process from what you've been doing in your respective home countries doesn't really change. That should be consistent because you should be speaking a common language, having a common process. But what may differ is the way you work with your customers. And so what I mean by that is in the APAC region, you're gonna see a lot of sort of variance in terms of the way buyers like to buy. So I'll give you an example. In the North America market, typically it's a very direct model. Not always, but traditionally, SaaS or technology companies like to go direct. Buyers like to work directly with the vendor. And so that works really well. In some countries in APAC, that also works really well. Notably Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand work really well if you go direct. Now, if you start going into some of these other markets, let's look at Indonesia, very huge market. It's probably the biggest, it is the biggest market from a GDP perspective in Southeast Asia. A direct model is gonna be a little bit challenging. What I always encourage anyone to look at is to go through a partner model. Japan, another classic country. It's number 3 in terms of GDP size, but I would always encourage, especially if you're entering the market for the first time, go through partners. It's a very easy approach to also enter the market without having to invest too many people on the ground. So if you want to invest in SDRs to go out and, you know, prospect and do so. There's nothing wrong with that if you're aware that I'm using this as a motion to actually identify opportunities. But to kind of answer your last question, what timeline you wanna give it, it depends on your appetite and tolerance levels.

Yeah.

Most organizations would give it anywhere between 18 months and 2 years, but I would have probably a clear goal in mind. So if you're coming in from the get-go without having done any market research or having no customers, it's gonna take a bit of time. And I don't blame a number of people being frustrated of not being able to close any deals in a timely manner. But if you've had some success, you've had some customers, you've come out and done your research, there's no reason why you shouldn't be able to achieve your goals sooner rather than later.

Gotcha. Uh, that makes sense. So to get to one step further in what you just said, Lakshu, when we think about the go-to-market, uh, in such scenario, let's say there is a startup and they are getting 2 to 3, uh, deals, uh, on an average per quarter from APAC region, they don't necessarily have a lot of leeway to say, hey, you know what, I want to spend some, allocate some budget, have a partner, have a sales team out there, and have, let's say, a 1-year runway for them. From your point of view, what are those parameters where we need to think through, or rather, what is the framework to say, What is that first quarter goal, second quarter goal, after which you know things are working or not working? Because I'm just really thinking from my point of view, let's say if I have to kind of really come into Singapore tomorrow, I mean, is it really based on the number of leads that we are generating? Is it the number of conversations that we are having? I mean, I'm just trying to understand what would that framework might look like.

Yeah. So what I would probably encourage everyone to think about is have a think about what your CAC looks like, your cost of acquisition per customer. What does that look like? Is that 6 months, 12 months, 18 months, whatever that is, right? Let's take a benchmark. It takes 12 months to acquire a customer. What is the investment that you're going to make in terms of a team size? Let's call it SDRs, partners, to acquire that, what has typically been your CAC. Now, as you develop a pipeline and opportunities, you're gonna see an average deal size that also is being generated. You'll have enough data to hopefully kind of understand what's going on.

Yeah.

If that doesn't marry and match in terms of your traditional CAC, then I think you have a bit of a red flag. You have a concern there. But if you're seeing motion in terms of exceeding that or generating opportunities at a higher conversion rate, typical, that's not typical from your home markets, you have a winner. So it's a kind of simple formula from that perspective.

Gotcha. So I mean, you think about probably the deal execution and the CAC as part of that mix. So at the end of the first quarter, second quarter, we know exactly what is working, what is not working from the overall sales motion. With that as the baseline, the next question comes really, on the surface, it really feels easy. Again, I'm talking about in the era of Zoom and LinkedIn and everything to say, you know what, let me just put up a job posting out there and then recruit a couple of people and then because they will be my people that kind of, it's a mind play in that sense, instead of really working on with the partners. But then we do know, especially there is a lot of cultural sensitivity, the nuances that are out there on how to sell, who to sell in these markets. So if I need to really look into the partners, where do I even start? How do I know a partner is a good partner that I can work with versus not? I mean, can you give us some guideline about that?

Yeah, so there's no real simple answer, unfortunately. There are a number of strong partners in the region, but that alignment, you're right, needs to make sense. Now, if anyone is hoping that I come to, you know, Asia and I sign up a partner and they're gonna go out and sell for me, they're gonna be very disappointed. It's not gonna happen like that. There's gonna be a strong investment, especially at the beginning, because ultimately, like any partner in any part of the world, there's gonna be a sense of probably skepticism, probably a little bit of doubt because it hasn't been proven yet. And so I know from my own experience, there's gotta be a lot of handholding and a lot of work that needs to to be done with a partner in tandem, especially at the beginning until they win some deals. Now to kind of answer your question, what's a good partner? I don't think it's any different from any other region is the one that's collaborative, the one is sharing, the one that's opening up are the ones that are gonna probably be your best fit. Now it depends on how much you give as well as you get. So in terms of the investment you make, any, joint efforts, resources you give them will also determine how that relationship is reciprocated. I've seen some really creative ways of organizations working partners, even white labeling to get some traction in the market. It's worked really well in the sense that I've got an established brand here, people know who I am, and if it gives me another product in my bag, that's under my brand, that's a great proposition. I know it's not a right strategy for a lot of organizations, but if that's something you're open to, you know, these are sort of things that work really well with partners, but it will all depend on the investment, the time you make with your partners before you see traction.

Gotcha. So when we think about the partner and the traction in a way, Laksho, one of the challenging things that we always see is the demand generation aspect of it.

Yeah.

What works from the messaging and the channels point of view, for example, right now everywhere and especially in the US, people are not opening emails, people are not taking phone calls. That's one of the reasons where there are more of these community events, private dinners, private lunches are becoming much more deliberate and intentional that a lot of people want to do. So with that as a kind of nuance and the background, do you think the whole of the demand generation is also very different in the APAC region? And if so, can you give some insights on what is working right now?

Yeah, it varies per country and per region, but what I've noticed in, in Asia Let's put a few countries aside as an exception. But usually that notion of trust, do I know you? Can I see you? Goes a long way. Not so much in countries like maybe Australia or maybe Singapore where you can probably get away with doing things remotely. But I know in countries like Japan, Indonesia as an example, they would much prefer to deal with someone in person and build that relationship. That's why I find that working through partners who've had years of established relationships and transactions and sort of goodwill been built. And so to kind of replicate that quickly is not easy.

Yeah.

So leverage what they've already built, that really helps. And so there's a lot of sort of like additional add-ons, upsells that they can also way they can introduce your product from what they've already sold into those particular customers, which makes things a lot easier and does help from a demand generation perspective. But I find that's probably the easier route to take. But in terms of generating demand, it's the same playbook in terms of without having an established pipeline, you're not gonna see any success in in region or in country.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And to further that one, are people open to more of the cold emails and cold calls in the APAC region, Lakshya?

They are, they absolutely are. So I don't think that really changes, but it's, I think, kind of alluding to your own point, is how do you get through the noise? So any senior leader is gonna be bombarded through sales messages. It doesn't change. regardless of which country you're in. But how do you get through the noise is gonna be key. So if you don't have a massive budget and you don't wanna do events, I don't think it's necessarily important to do that. It doesn't hurt to do these things, but if you have another creative way in getting in front of them, be it through an introduction, maybe through another associate or partner, which I usually do, it goes a long way in terms of building trust quickly and them willing to at least have a conversation with you to start the process.

Yeah. While you were kind of providing that detail, I was just remembering my time last year. I was doing a couple of webinars to a Vietnamese partner and It's really again going back to those cultural nuances, right, Lakshya, which is I had this 1-hour webinar and then in between I was asking folks on, hey, any questions? Do you have any comments? I mean, do you have any critique? Then the first webinar was over and then my contact partner from Vietnam, he came back and said, hey, you know what? People feel rude to ask questions during the webinar, so they won't. But then I'm like, if people don't ask me questions, then how do I know whether I'm doing good or not? But then those are the things, I guess, when we think about those cultural nuances, we've got to be really clear about. We need to understand them, we need to respect those nuances, and that's really where I feel the value of a partner that you choose over there. For example, if not for Laksho, I mean, finding you, I wouldn't necessarily know what is happening in the markets like Singapore or Australia, and even for that matter, Dubai, in a way, right? So I think it's always necessary for founders to really look into who is that partner who is going to give you those insights. Because it's not as though that, I mean, even if I travel every quarter, I can only be there for 1, 2, 3 days at the max. But it's really about those insights that the local partners will have that the founders need to be really dependent on in a way, and collaborative, of course. I mean, but at the end of the day, it's really like working through those nuances of What is my product? Who am I really selling to? And is the same messaging resonates everywhere? And I think that's going to be really the place where partners help a lot.

No, absolutely, absolutely. And those continuously ongoing conversations that, you know, to your point, when you're only here for a few days, the conversation still continues. So, you know, who's going to tell, you know, continue those conversations, whether it's your own people on the ground or you know, your partners or your alliances that you've built in country.

Yeah, yeah. Again, that's a great, great point that you talked about because it's very easy for folks to say, oh, I've attended these 10 conferences, I just came back from Dubai and Singapore and all these. Yeah, you have, let's say, 20 LinkedIn connections or 20 cards that you brought back And then what?

Yeah.

What happens next? Yes, of course you can send all these messages on LinkedIn, but then who is going to respond? Why should they respond? Then the whole of the distance and where you are really keeps— again, it's all people know people, people want to work with people, and that's really where a lot of that partnership model is really strong when we want to kind of really bring the products over there. So now as a other next topic in a way, Lakshya, let's flip the cycle, right? Where let's say there are some startups that are in Singapore and then wanting to land in the US. Let's say, do you think it's the same playbook or would you see other differences, especially in the North America?

So I haven't got a lot of sort of experience doing the other way around, but ultimately if I'm an organization entering, say, the US or North America, I don't think it really would change in terms of the way I would approach it for the other way around. So as an organization coming from Asia, I would still be looking at the same fundamentals. Do I have a product market fit? Who would be my customers? Ultimately, which part of the continental or North America would I target? You know, is there specific industries that I'm best suited for? So those are sort of things I would be looking at. I would encourage any director or founder to make a trip out there as well to meet folks. I know some folks who are now in Singapore looking to open up there are doing that very thing in the early stages, but they find that going out there meeting potential, you know, organizations, potential entities, potential partners even, just to kind of do their own research and due diligence in terms of, you know, before they start making their respective investments is something that they're doing as well. But I don't think it really changes too much in terms of if you flip the script.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the same way where When we think about the US side of the things, the one aspect that I got in feedback, by the way, Laksho, is that a lot of US prospects are really straightforward in the sense, if they like it, they are continuing the conversation. If they don't like it, then you don't have your time wasted on some of these things. I think I have a lot of friends from India who are selling into the US, and the one thing that they always appreciate is really that straightforward feedback nature. Because it's not as though that you are sitting on these calls for 4 or 5 times, let's say 6 calls and then half an hour, 3 hours of time, the preparation that you have and everything. And then you figure out that at the 6th call that, oh, you know what, you know, this is not something that I'm interested versus people are probably pretty intentional. I think, you know, that is something at least I get the feedback that from the founders that that's a good thing for them. Then they don't have to waste their time in chasing people. And I mean, I probably want to just get your thoughts on that specific angle on How the deal cycles really change across.

Yeah. So maturity market will also play a factor. Also in the case of Asia, maybe people here are probably polite and they don't wanna say no at the get-go. But if you are any founder or director who's looking to, you know, get proof points quickly, It can probably be frustrating for folks. Usually if I look at the perspective of any North America or European countries that come into APAC, it doesn't surprise me why a lot of them will choose Australia first, because from a maturity standpoint, cultural similarities, it's probably the closest to North American, if not Western Europe.

Likely.

And so that generally works well because the straightforward nature of Australia as well. Works really well. It's when they go northwards into the different markets, I think it changes a little bit, but with a little experience and hopefully they've already got a few customers on board, they've kind of gone through those hard lessons. What I've seen, especially the folks who've come from say Singapore, Australia, who've gone to North America, typically because of the persona they've had, they don't really find any challenges coming into those markets. And I think to your point, they appreciate the bluntness and being very direct because they know where they stand and they can move on. So it's kind of worked well, but if you're not used to the opposite flip coin in terms of the persona and the culture, then yeah, that's when it becomes problematic for a lot of organizations.

Yeah. And I mean, probably Lakshya, as a last segment of this one. I know in your previous organizations you scaled sales teams and you launched multiple products across. Are there any specific instances where you can share some of your lessons learned for the benefit of the audience?

Yeah, I can. I did some work with an HR tech firm called People's HR. And as part of that remit, I was launching the business in Southeast Asia. And so my perspective at the beginning was to build a sales team to go into market. And so the countries I had identified were the larger ones, which were Indonesia and Philippines. And I came to a realization very quickly, it wasn't a fit by building a direct sales team. That's why I usually always advocate partnerships because if you don't have a lot of resources to hire and arm your sales people, it's also very risky as well for any founder because the point of your cost of acquisition and having that upfront investment in a sales team, it's not gonna always work. You may not always get it right. I know I haven't got it right with some of my hires. And so that becomes a very costly sort of decision. So the easiest way to do that is through partners. Also kind of building on the cultural nuances as well. For those of you who don't know, in APAC, not everyone speaks English as well. So trying to find countries that from a cultural standpoint, but also from a communication standpoint also helps. So Philippines is a very large English-speaking country. So to not having to localize a solution for another language also helps. In Indonesia, it's every— everyone speaks Bahasa Indonesia. There's a lot of folks who'd also speak English there as well. But the reason also for Indonesia is you don't have to make any dramatic changes in terms of the script because it's all in Roman script. So you can still adjust and adapt your software and solution for that market in particular as well. Singapore, definitely. And of course, Malaysia, great market as well. Like all English-speaking and fairly large. What worked really well for me was partnerships, not just having a partnership as a reseller, but when I was kind of alluding earlier on, it was the white label agreement that worked really well. And for that reason, because a lot of organizations, especially the ones who are less mature, will always ask for, you know, who else is doing it. They'll want reference points. Okay. I don't wanna be your guinea pig. I wanna know who else has done it. And so the easiest way to scale quickly is to give your solution, if you're comfortable doing it, is to give your solution where that respective partner can white label it. So what I mean by white labeling is they'll rebrand it to that organization's branding, marketing, but ultimately it's still your product with all underneath. And that worked really well for me because immediately overnight they would take it to their customers and instantly you would have customers on board. So when I would go to a particular prospect or a buyer and they would ask me the question, you know, Lakshya, who else is using it? I would have multiple number of organizations. So, you know what? Yeah, I do.

Yeah.

And these are all my customers. So it was less of a risk for them to take to go out and, you know, do it for the first time or what they thought was doing it for the first time. So those sort of things kind of worked for me as I scaled, but that worked. That was my strategy. But depending on your willingness to make those sort of investments or take those risks or to give away your brand, I know a lot of organizations are not willing to do that. It's for you to decide, but that's something that worked really well for me and was able to scale and see results quickly.

That's amazing. The one aspect that you talked about is especially the languages and the non-English speaking countries in a way. That is very relevant today, Lakshu, because a lot of AI startups that are out there, if somebody is actually training their model with a specific set of English language in a particular industry, in a particular vertical, then it's very important for them to consider when they're getting into some of the non-English speaking, do we have the right training of the model that you have? Did you test it? Who tested it? If English-speaking people tested the non-English speaking model, then of course it's not going to really fare well. I think those are definitely some of the nuances for some of the startups, especially in the AI realm, I would say, to think through on how their functionality on the AI models and the training fare. That's actually a great point, by the way.

Absolutely.

Yeah. I wanted to have this for about 30-minute discussion, but I think looks like we had great 40 minutes of discussion, Lakshya. But This is amazing. Especially I think for me, the lessons really are, if there are startups that are really thinking about the APAC entry, number 1, make sure that there is enough of initial discussions that you've had with some of those prospects. Make sure you visit, talk to them personally. I mean, talk to the local partners and prospects. Make an attempt, I mean, a sincere attempt at the end of the day, and then make sure that there is enough of the messaging and the go-to-market nuance that you understand about that market. Whether it is about your product or messaging, you know exactly how to fit the customers. Last but very important aspect, at least my takeaway is, the whole of the partnership model because it really depends on how much of the risk you want to take by really having completely your own team out there. But really have that partnership model, make sure that your partners are collaborative with you. I think to your point, it's really a commitment when you bring in a partner. Make sure that you have that bandwidth within the company to actually have that partner because I do know, I think I have to admit, last year I've brought in about 6 partners and none of the partners really worked out because unfortunately I didn't have the bandwidth. Then without me having the bandwidth, they didn't really perform well and then it didn't really go anywhere. I think that really is a great, I would say, advice for sure, Lakshya.

Before we Say bye.

Are there any last insights that you can provide?

Yeah, if anyone's considering coming to APAC, I welcome you. It's a great opportunity. It's never been a great time, in fact, to invest in APAC. The place is booming. It's just where do you place your bets and make your investments. So definitely encourage anyone who's thinking about doing it to do it. But do your due diligence first and make your— do your own research before coming out here. But it'll be very rewarding if you get it right.

No, absolutely. Um, this is great. Uh, Laksho, I know, uh, for all the startup founders out there and, um, sales leaders, I've been talking to Laksho for the last, uh, 4 months or so, and then he's been super kind and, uh, very insightful in terms of providing the details on what is working, what is not working. Then the fact that Lakshya also understands the US market, I think there is a great bridge that he provided, especially for Sales Table. If any of you would love to really understand those nuances, feel free to reach out to Lakshya for sure. I will leave some of the contact details as part of this webinar. Lakshya will be really great to work with for everyone. Again, Lakshya, thanks a lot for providing the time. I know it is early morning for you as well and really appreciate that.

Sounds good. No problem at all. Thank you, Suresh.

Yeah. Thank you.