The previous chapter discusses how Soul started helping us address the whole electrical system of a given building. In this chapter, we discuss how Zodhya's ambitions for International markets started.

But how did products like SaverX and Soul lead to global markets?

The first seed of thought for international markets emerged when Zodhya participated in BuiltWorld Tech in 2020, an event for proptech held worldwide, where we finished as winners at the semi-finals of the country level - India. This event helped us connect to a few global companies based in the EU and SE Asia. These connections helped us understand that the problem of energy isn’t a regional problem but a global one and is also a lot similar. We didn’t think much about it then as we were focused purely on the Indian market. And then, Covid happened. 

Post lockdowns, when everyone came out, they were dead serious about the ongoing climate change and what can be done to mitigate it.

In fact, as per the UN Environment Programme, “In 2022, buildings were responsible for 34% global energy demand and 37% of energy and process related CO2 emissions “. If you wondering if buildings emit CO2, refer to this blog.

And then in 2022, we came across a program by the Singapore Tourism Board, which was referred to us by another startup we knew. As we were one of the 4 startups shortlisted from India for this program, we got exposure to the hospitality industry in SE Asia and the challenges of energy they face remained similar.

We were later invited by GHV accelerator in 2023 to participate in a program by JETRO and Panasonic to design a product involving energy efficiency and AI. As Zodhya became a winner in the program, it had the chance to attend the prestigious Innovation Leadership Summit in Tokyo 2023 and received valuable exposure to the Japanese market. 

Similarly, the German India Startup Exchange Program by NRW Global also helped us understand the German market and how Zodhya’s technology can cater to market needs.

But, the next steps of product integration to global markets didn’t look as easy as it seemed. Meanwhile, we found a challenge in version V1 of our product, which will be discussed in the next blog.

If you liked our story of startup evolution and feel it could be useful to someone you know, please do share this blog. The intention of writing these stories is to provide some sparks that might help at least one individual reading this to make a great product.