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Ecommerce, Tech, Internet, Sports, Nutrition, D2C Brands
Articles by Ankit
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Ankit N. shared this6 years of building Curefoods!Ankit N. shared thisSix years of Curefoods 💙 Building food brands has always been about more than launching new concepts. It has been about understanding how India eats, identifying the occasions that matter, and creating brands and products that can earn a meaningful place in them. Over the last six years, that has meant building across different categories, cities, occasions and consumer needs. It has meant making thousands of decisions - from what belongs on a menu and how a product should evolve, to how a brand shows up in the moments people choose it. Some ideas have grown into brands. Some products have become favourites. And every launch, iteration and consumer interaction has taught us something about what it takes to build food experiences at scale. This milestone is also a reflection of the people behind that work. It is made possible by teams who obsess over the details, partners who grow with us, and consumers who choose our brands, share their feedback and continually give us reasons to get better. As Curefoods completes six years, we’re taking a moment to celebrate everything that has been built so far - while keeping our focus firmly on what comes next. Six years gives us plenty to look back on. But even more to look forward to. Here’s to continuing to learn, create and build - and to creating iconic food brands for India. #Curefoods #SixYears #FoodBrands #BuildingBrands
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Ankit N. reposted thisAnkit N. reposted thisRaksha Bandhan gifting in India is changing - and desserts are becoming a bigger part of the celebration. For years, the go-to Rakhi gift was predictable: a box of traditional sweets or the familiar chocolate assortment. Today, gifting is becoming more personal, visual and experience-led - something people want to share, not just receive. At Krispy Kreme India, we’re seeing that shift reflected in our Raksha Bandhan gifting range. Our Rakhi special doughnuts, combos and hampers bring doughnuts to the centre of the gifting occasion - thoughtfully packaged and designed to make festive gifting feel a little different. It points to a broader shift in India’s dessert category. Dessert brands are no longer competing only on taste; they’re increasingly becoming part of how people celebrate, gift and express relationships. And few occasions capture that better than Raksha Bandhan. Get the Krispy Kreme India Rakhi special doughnuts range in stores near you : https://lnkd.in/gk_pz2BX #RakshaBandhan #KrispyKremeIndia #Desserts #Gifting #Curefoods
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Ankit N. shared thisWhy Olio is the fastest growing Pizza brand in the country—>Ankit N. shared thisPizza marketing usually starts in the middle of the slice. We wanted to start at the edge. Because before the toppings, the sauces and the cheese combinations, there’s a part of the pizza that can change the entire bite: the crust. In our latest piece, we break down three of the simplest cues behind the OLIO product experience - smoky crust, hand-stretched dough and melty cheese - and why each one matters when the slice finally reaches you. No complicated pizza vocabulary. Just the things you can actually see, feel and taste. Read: Inside the OLIO bite. #OLIO #Pizza #FoodAndBeverage #CurefoodsIndia #BTS #ProductInside the OLIO bite: why smoky crust, hand-stretched dough and melty cheese matterInside the OLIO bite: why smoky crust, hand-stretched dough and melty cheese matter
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Ankit N. reposted thisAnkit N. reposted thisWhat an incredible experience for our young athletes! 🏸✨ Our partner organisation’s children had the wonderful opportunity to attend the BWF World Championships, watch world-class badminton live, and even meet and greet some of their favourite players! 💙 From cheering in the stands to meeting the stars of the sport, it was a day filled with fun, excitement, inspiration, and unforgettable memories. A huge thank you to BWF for creating this incredible opportunity and making the experience so special for the children. 🙌 Experiences like these can inspire young minds, build confidence, and show them what’s possible. 🌟 More than a match. A memory for life. 🏸❤️ #BWFWorldChampionships #Badminton #YoungAthletes #InspiringTheNextGeneration #SportsForDevelopment
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Ankit N. reposted thisAnkit N. reposted thisSome celebrations are sweeter when shared with the WHOLE city. 🇮🇳🍩 This Independence Day, Krispy Kreme India celebrated with Jaipur at WTP Mall - bringing together doughnut giveaways, an interactive Spin the Wheel, a larger-than-life Doughnut Box installation and live entertainment. What made the day special was the energy around it: The event brought together free doughnuts, an interactive Spin the Wheel activity, a large scale Doughnut Box installation, and live entertainment, creating a day of celebration for doughnut lovers and first time visitors alike. The turnout reflected the growing love for Krispy Kreme's chocolate doughnuts, Original Glazed doughnuts, and coffee offerings in Jaipur, reaffirming the brand's presence as a favourite dessert and cafe destination in the city. As Krispy Kreme India continues to build its presence across the country, moments like these are about more than an activation. They are about showing up for our communities, creating memorable brand experiences and finding new reasons to share a little joy. Jaipur, thank you for showing up with so much love and energy. ❤️ #KrispyKremeIndia #Jaipur #IndependenceDay #KrispyKreme
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Ankit N. shared thisDream come true for 100s of kids from our grassroots academies to attend the BWF world championships and meet their favourite starsAnkit N. shared this🏸 Giving every child the chance to play #badminton for life. #BWF President Khunying Patama Leeswadtrakul and Indian team stars met with aspiring young players at the BWF World Championships #NewDelhi2026. Thanks to Simply Sport Foundation Footy Femmes ( Official Page ) SUNRISE SHUTTLERS BADMINTON ACADEMY | Coaching | Tournaments Badminton association of India
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Ankit N. posted thisGrowing up in Delhi in the 90s, I remember the excitement when someone came back from abroad. Chocolates. Shoes. Electronics. Even the shampoo sometimes :) Anything foreign somehow felt better. And for a lot of us growing up then, success also meant going abroad. Study there. Work there. Build a life there. How much India has changed. Today, some of the smartest young people I meet want to build their lives here. They want to start companies here. Increasingly, they believe they can build from India for the world. I have been lucky to see this change from close quarters through my own journey as an entrepreneur and investor. The ambition has changed. The quality of founders has changed. Access to capital has changed. Most importantly, the confidence has changed. I see something very similar in sport. Through Simply Sport Foundation, we work with athletes from across the country. We support them with things which perhaps don’t make the headlines. Nutrition, mental strength and conditioning, sports science, menstrual health, better access to training and support. Many come from very ordinary backgrounds. But their dreams aren’t ordinary at all. They aren’t overawed by the world. They believe they belong there. They want to compete. And they want to win. Maybe that’s the biggest change I see in India. A change in confidence. From thinking the best things come from somewhere else, to believing we can build them here. From being happy to participate, to wanting to win. We obviously have a lot to fix. India remains complicated, messy and sometimes frustrating. But I wouldn’t trade being in India at this point in history for anywhere else in the world. Still a long journey ahead for all of us. But what a time to be Indian. Happy Independence Day 🇮🇳
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Ankit N. reposted thisAnkit N. reposted thisWhat counts as dessert? The chocolate treat after dinner? Something sweet with your coffee? A box shared at work? Or the doughnut you picked up because it was simply that kind of day? At Krispy Kreme® India, we’ve been thinking about how the doughnut fits into a much bigger world of desserts, especially when chocolate enters the picture. From different textures and fillings to everyday cravings, coffee breaks, sharing and celebrations, our latest article explores why there’s more than one way to have your chocolate dessert. Give it a read. And maybe don’t do it hungry. #KrispyKremeIndia #ChocolateDesserts #DoughnutsYour Chocolate Dessert Craving, Served | Krispy Kreme IndiaYour Chocolate Dessert Craving, Served | Krispy Kreme India
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Ankit N. reposted thisAnkit N. reposted thisStronger together, greater impact! 🤝 Simply Sport is proud to announce its 2026 Multi-Year Grant partnerships with three incredible grassroots organisations: ⚽ Vidya:The Living School Living School ⚽ Footy Femmes ( Official Page ) 🏃 Javelin Throw & High Jump Society, Bangaon Together, we aim to strengthen access to sport, nurture young talent and create lasting opportunities for athletes and communities across India. Here’s to shared vision, long-term collaboration and meaningful change through sport! 🧡 Ankit N. Kanika Nagori Darshan NK Aditi Mutatkar Shashidhar K Dhanraj Sawanth #SimplySport #MultiYearGrant #GrassrootsSports #SportForDevelopment #StrongerTogether #EmpoweringAthletes
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Ankit N. liked thisMany congrats Ankit N. and the Curefoods team on absolutely brilliant six years!!! Iron Pillar is thrilled to be alongside on this culinary journey:) #thinkbig #foodbrands #scaleAnkit N. liked thisSix years of Curefoods 💙 Building food brands has always been about more than launching new concepts. It has been about understanding how India eats, identifying the occasions that matter, and creating brands and products that can earn a meaningful place in them. Over the last six years, that has meant building across different categories, cities, occasions and consumer needs. It has meant making thousands of decisions - from what belongs on a menu and how a product should evolve, to how a brand shows up in the moments people choose it. Some ideas have grown into brands. Some products have become favourites. And every launch, iteration and consumer interaction has taught us something about what it takes to build food experiences at scale. This milestone is also a reflection of the people behind that work. It is made possible by teams who obsess over the details, partners who grow with us, and consumers who choose our brands, share their feedback and continually give us reasons to get better. As Curefoods completes six years, we’re taking a moment to celebrate everything that has been built so far - while keeping our focus firmly on what comes next. Six years gives us plenty to look back on. But even more to look forward to. Here’s to continuing to learn, create and build - and to creating iconic food brands for India. #Curefoods #SixYears #FoodBrands #BuildingBrands
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Ankit N. liked thisAnkit N. liked this#NationalSportsDay When I came back to India after completing my Master’s in Public Affairs at the The University of Texas at Dallas, I quickly realised that while the broad frameworks for policy and systems change may travel across countries, context changes everything. So I went back to being a student through the Graduate Certificate in Public Policy at The Takshashila Institution and through Ajay Shah and Vijay Kelkar’s In Service of the Republic, a book that shaped how I think about change: part science, part art, driven by persistence, probability and sometimes luck, and almost always a long journey. One framework from the book has stayed with me: Data → Research → Proposal → Persuasion → Decision → Implementation. At Simply Sport Foundation, I have been fortunate to work with leadership that has consistently supported this slower, evidence-led route, even when it would have been easier to jump straight to visible programmes. Our research on women in sport showed us the importance of transport, safety, health and career uncertainty; our Play Without Pause work showed us how deeply female athletes are affected by gaps in nutrition, mental health and menstrual health, and how little power they often have to change the systems around them. Those findings have directly shaped our programmes and, increasingly, our work with coaches, administrators and institutions. We have also learnt that policy work offers no guarantees. In Bihar, years of learning helped us build a draft of what could have become India’s first female athlete health policy. It did not go through, but the process reinforced a lesson I value deeply: systems work is about improving the probability of change, not expecting certainty. This National Sports Day therefore feels significant. With the publication of “Menstrual cycle perspectives in elite Indian female badminton athletes and coaches: A qualitative focus group study” in the International Journal of Sports Science & Coaching, I feel we are beginning to move from Research towards Proposal. The Badminton World Federation-supported research, led by Tanugatri Majumder, gives Indian badminton one of its first peer-reviewed studies on how elite female players and coaches experience, understand and communicate about menstruation in high-performance sport. Simply Sport led operations and on-ground implementation of the research and provided inputs on sport-specific design. This research is also part of the larger partnership between SSF and BWF on advancing female athlete health research. But one paper does not change a system. The proposal stage begins when athletes, coaches, researchers, administrators, federations and organisations start saying together: this needs to change. The probability of success changes markedly when the constituency behind an idea grows from one person to hundreds, and eventually to thousands. Read the paper: https://lnkd.in/dSrtqSVN
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Ankit N. liked thisAnkit N. liked thisOne thing I’ve seen - a brief can set the direction, but there’s something special about talent that takes the idea a little further. I was reminded of this on our recent shoot with #RakulPreetSingh. What I loved was how she went beyond what was asked of her, brought her own #perspective into the film and really helped us bring each of the 4 worlds we wanted to showcase to life. And of course, she looked stunning in every frame (pun-intended). ✨ The idea itself was rooted in something very simple. We doesn’t have just one world, we adorn multiple hats. In Rakul’s case - there’s her film world. Her glam world. Her entrepreneurial world (with #Arambam - which I got to know much more about through my conversations with Ankit N.) and then there’s her home & family! Different roles. Different versions of her. One person navigating all of them. Which is exactly why #YourWorldInFocus” felt like such a natural thought for Titan Eyeplus! Because eyewear isn’t just about helping you see better. It’s about helping you show up for every world you’re a part of. Watch the film: https://lnkd.in/d_cMSrXc Thank you so much for this opportunity - Raghavan N S , Nirmal lobo , Akshat Chaudhry and thank you Team Ogilvy!
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Ankit N. liked thisAnkit N. liked thisKrispy Kreme is now open on the 3rd Floor at Elpro City Square Mall! From its iconic Original Glazed doughnuts to a range of delicious flavours, there’s a new reason to make your mall visits a little sweeter. Drop by, pick your favourite, and enjoy a fresh Krispy Kreme experience.
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Ankit N. liked thisAnkit N. liked thisWas pleasantly surprised to attend a coffee sampling session at Starbucks. While the coffee was amazing, what was even more notable was the confidence and knowledge of the Baristas. Amazing organisation which is still heads and shoulders above anything else available in the market. Way to go! Sunil D'Souza Ajith Kumar (he/him) Rajiv Aggarwal
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Ankit N. liked thisAnkit N. liked this#greatestracketsportathleteever?! I think An Se-young may be the most complete racket-sport athlete I have ever watched. I am deliberately saying athlete, not player. Calling her the greatest racket-sport player of all time would be premature. Djokovic, Serena Williams, Lin Dan, Ma Long, Nicol David, Jahangir Khan and others have careers built over many more years. But when I look specifically at the combination of physical qualities required to dominate a racket sport, I find it increasingly difficult to think of someone with fewer weaknesses than An Se-young. The numbers make the argument harder to dismiss. In 2025, An won 73 of 77 matches, a win rate of 94.8%. According to BWF data reported at the end of the season, this was the highest single-season win percentage of any singles player, male or female, who played at least 60 matches in the Superseries/World Tour era. For context, Lin Dan’s 2011 season was 92.75%, Lee Chong Wei’s 2010 season was 92.75%, and Kento Momota’s extraordinary 2019 season was 91.78%. An also won 11 titles that year, equalling Momota’s singles record for a calendar year. What interests me even more, though, is how she wins. Badminton demands an unusual mix of aerobic capacity, repeated anaerobic efforts, acceleration, violent deceleration, lunging, balance, reaction, anticipation and technical execution under fatigue. Research on racket sports has found badminton to produce some of the highest heart-rate and blood-lactate demands, while elite singles also involves constant acceleration, braking and changes of direction. An seems unusually complete across this entire spectrum. She retrieves exceptionally well, but retrieval alone does not explain her dominance. She recovers her court position quickly, absorbs pressure without losing balance, anticipates early, makes good decisions under fatigue, and repeatedly produces quality shots from compromised positions. Her greatest physical gift may not be speed or endurance in isolation, but the way all these qualities integrate. And then there is the slightly frightening part. She has spoken about increasing her strength training because she still sees power as an area she can improve. In other words, perhaps the most physically complete badminton player in the world still believes there is another dimension to add. She already has Olympic gold, two World Championships, Asian Games gold and an Asian Championship. She is not yet the greatest racket-sport player ever. Time will decide that. But as an athlete, I am beginning to think we may be watching something historically unusual. Also, she is just 24. Image by India Today
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Ankit N. liked thisAnkit N. liked thisMy first private investing cheque was in 2014 as an angel into epigamia (when it was Hokey Pokey ice creams), backing Rohan's vision to get tasty dairy products into India. Rohan's excitement and energy was infectious. I started jamming with him over the idea of starting a consumer brands focused fund to help young founders like him with capital and support. He encouraged me to start my entrepreneurial journey and the first and largest LP cheque for Fund 1 came from his family. He and I never looked back thereafter as we drowned ourselves into our respective missions. Over the last decade, Epigamia has emerged as one of the most loved food brands in India. It is also one of the most profitable and cashflow rich food businesses I have seen. Growth is underpinned directly by tailwinds of healthier consumer choices (especially those looking to add protein to their diets) and the advent of quick commerce making access to such products easier. Life has truly come full circle today. Sauce has invested from its most recent growth fund to back Ritesh, Ankur, Uday and the stellar Epigamia team as it embarks on its next phase of growth. I am grateful to Arjun Anand and Verlinvest for giving us the opportunity to be part of the journey again and to Swaraj Mirchandani for his support in making this happen. Excited to partner with Deepak Shahdadpuri and the DSG Consumer Partners team once again. All three long term backers and believers in the business. I truly think Epigamia's time has come, and I am very excited along with the Sauce team to get a small part to play in the next chapter of this brand's story. https://lnkd.in/dBz-XVdb Zoeb Padma Atul Arjun Shripad
Experience & Education
Honors & Awards
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Fellow of IIHM
IIHM
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Young Alumni Achiever Award
IIT Guwahati
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Entrepreneur 35 Under 35, 2019
Entrepreneur Magazine
Was chosen as one of the business leaders in the '35 under 35' list by Entrepreneur Magazine in Feb 2019.
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Fortune India 40 under 40, 2016
Fortune India Magazine
Was chosen as one of the business leaders in the '40 under 40' list by Fortune India Magazine in Feb 2016.
Test Scores
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GMAT
Score: 770/800
Languages
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Hindi
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English
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Kunal Kishore
Pleased to announce that Karekeba Ventures, among others, has invested in Stylework SaaS-based co-working/managed workspace aggregator Stylework on Wednesday announced the closure of Rs 30-crore Pre-Series B funding, which is planned to be deployed towards technology enhancement, domestic and international market expansion, and hiring key leadership personnel. Of the total funding, the company had achieved the first close of Rs 10-crore led by Equentis Angel Fund last month, with participation from Karekeba ventures /Cogniphy AIF Fund alongside continued subscriptions from Lets Venture Fund, MoneyVyapaar, HNIs and other strategic investors, Stylework said. Karekeba Ventures Kshitiz Anand Vishal Nikumbh
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