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"You know what OYO’s abbreviated form is? 'OnYour Own'," Agarwal says in an interview at a Mumbai hotel. "And it was because I couldn’t have the remote control at relatives’ homes (that I thought of starting OYO Rooms). The relatives would want to watch soap operas and I wanted to watch Cartoon Network." Throughout the interview, Agarwal uses the term "high quality" to describe an intelligent/smart person or conversation. He also speaks about Thiel, who is his inspiration, his views on education, getting death threats from hotels and the controversies surrounding him.
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What was your impression of Peter Thiel?
Every fellow gets to do breakfast with Peter and if you are in the (Silicon) Valley, you do it multiple times. But I only got the opportunity twice. His breakfast includes different exotic fruits plucked from orchards behind his house and your dietary preference is checked five times before the meal. The conversations are intelligent. There are copies of the New York Times and WSJ (Wall Street Journal) in front of him on the table.
Why the travelling young gun finally "settled down"
Until two months ago, Agarwal was in the habit of staying at different OYO properties in Gurgaon. But now, he has rented a place close to his offi ce. "My family pushed me to," he says. "They wanted a place to crash when they came to the city. My home has three-tier security, which is valuable to me considering I get fi ve death threats a month. I have been getting them for the last five-six months, since we started scaling up. When we get a hotel to join our network, we hurt the businesses of other hotels. I didn’t expect this would happen."
He has never seen Indian businesses but he can spend 10 minutes with you and understand how the local environment works. He was doing numbers in his head about OYO and said it sounded like a good business to him. And, I was like, this is what I do on Excel. He’s also very supportive. The first thing he asked me was, "How is your family?" When I told him that they are not very happy about my decision to drop out, he said, "Can I call and make them feel more comfortable?"
What were the key takeaways from your interaction with Thiel?
Think huge. I am never concerned about these big hotel chains because I can give it in writing, these guys will never catch up with us. What I am afraid of is a 16-17-year-old will have nothing to lose and disrupt the space, like we did. Building culture as part of your team is extremely important. You should never compromise on culture even if your company becomes huge. Hire extremely smart people.
When did your parents know about the fellowship and you dropping out?
When the newspapers started reporting it. My dad came to Delhi and was perplexed to see the office. It took me a day to convince him. My mom was very unhappy because she felt who would take me for a groom? You needed to be at least a graduate (laughing).
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Pic: Ashwani Nagpal
Tell us about your early experiences of handling customers.
Initially, when we were running just one hotel in Gurgaon, I used to handle housekeeping, sales, CEO duties, etc. I would literally wear the OYO Rooms uniform for housekeeping and would show the room to customers. Sometimes, couples would tell me, "Abe nikal ja room se, hume kuch karna hai (Get out! We want to do something). I would be like, ‘Okay sir, sorry about that’. I was usually nice to people, so yes, I got tips too. One time, a family asked me to babysit their cranky kid. And thankfully, the child was quiet with me. The family was so happy that they gave me Rs 50. I have also been offered by people to work at their homes (laughs).
How many dropouts do you have in your company?
Only one. We have 10-20 people from IIMs, more than 200 people from IITs, HBS and Ivy leagues. It’s funny, in India, I haven’t come across any dropouts who are smart and high quality. Hopefully, in the next few years, we will have more high-quality dropouts. When I go to colleges for talks, I encourage the students to drop out.
Do you think formal education is important in the long run? Don’t you miss college?
Education is important. But it’s the current education system which is not right. I was in Stanford for a month during the Thiel scholarship, where I had a great time. I attended a bunch of frat parties. And I was the cool guy in these parties because when people heard I was a dropout and a Peter Thiel fellow, they treated me like the next Mark (Zuckerberg). I was like, "Ho gaya college ek mahine me. Aur kya chahiye? " (I experienced college for one month. What else do I want?)
A news report suggests that you weren’t transparent in your dealing with former co-founder Manish Sinha. Please comment.
You will hear more about this in the coming quarter. There were many factual inaccuracies in that story and I am hurt. It doesn’t impact the company though. I am doing the right thing by reaching out to the right people without going out and screaming about it or writing a blog.
Who has inspired you?
Bill Gates. He knew when was the right time to leave and share his wealth with real people in the world and impact their lives. I find Bhavish Aggarwal inspirational. His entire team is very helpful to us.
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