The Silicon Review November, 2019
“Our vision is to lead development of sustainable wellness solutions while reducing carbon footprint and fight climate change.”
In a world where corporations need to integrate their brands into the community, sustainable technology is undoubtedly the way of the future. Amidst warnings of global warming, extreme poverty and large economic gaps between classes, it has become increasingly important for companies to take into account how their operations and practices will impact not only their target consumers but also the population and environment of the area where their factories are set up. At the same time, companies also need to be profitable while keeping to best industry practices.
For new start-ups, this could be a lot to juggle, especially when working with limited manpower and resources, with many aspects of the business needing to be outsourced, which could be costly. At the same time, the vision, concept and business model of the enterprise needs substantial capital injection, and could prove to be too valuable to let slide into failure, especially with social enterprises that empower the community and raise its standards of living.
Here’s where an investor or venture capitalist could give a startup enterprise the boost it needs. Not only will an investor be able to provide capital backing, but most come with invaluable experience and business expertise - more so if it’s a venture capitalist that invests in niche markets. Aside from being able to advise on business and management decisions to ensure sustainability as well as high commercial value, niche market investors would also have access to important resources as a result of investing in similar outfits over the years.
Incorporated in 2019 and headquartered in London, Sayris Capital is Asia’s leading private investment firm focusing on plant-based medical technology. Sayris’ portfolio of brands encompass a range of related industries including agriculture technology, healthcare technology, renewable energy, and industrial and business services with an eye on developing the plant-based medical technology industry through investing in innovative and profitable companies.
The company’s investment emphasis focuses on safe and sustainable cultivation technologies, production, research, consumer products and services associated with the evolution of an agricultural product, with a view towards a natural plant-based medicine, a constituent in pharmaceutical formulations. This cross-vertical approach creates and improves the eco-system among portfolio investments and symbiotically helping fuel growth and innovation. This in turn helps fuel the economy and leaves a positive impact on the community through sustainable growth and practices.
Speaking exclusively to The Silicon Review, Daniel Rajesh, founder and CEO of Sayris Capital Ltd shares about the motivation behind the investment firm and how they hope to impact change on the world and in the future.
Q. What was the vision behind Sayris Capital and how do you plan to expand the company and its offerings over the years? Sayris Capital was setup to accelerate the sustainability goals that we are passionate about. The United Nations’ third Sustainable Development Goal – focusing on good health and well-being, is the fundamental goal that we are aiming to solve. As we are trying to drive impact in this ever-changing ecosystem, we believe that empowering the ecosystem was the only way forward to create sustainable long-term impacts within the companies we invest in. We have identified that deeper strategic business planning and operational support was needed to truly elevate the value we provide to end consumers. To that end, we have created Sayris Union that will focus on leading a medical and agricultural consortium to drive responsible leadership within the ecosystem. In the pipeline, the union will also work on building a micro-financing arm to empower farmers in South East Asia. We aim to empower the region with further education on sustainability innovating thought leadership in this space.
Q. What would you say is the single most influential factor in determining your business’ success? The single most defining factor in our business’ success is network, specifically a purpose-driven one. In pursuit of building a successful company, the active search for partners with the same drive, vision and passion is equally important. We are only as good as our partners and team members.
Q. How satisfied are your clients with your service? Can you share some of your clients’ success stories? As we are an investment firm, we try to keep our clients educated and continuously informed on the performance of our investment portfolios and plans. It is still at an early stage to claim satisfaction of our clients, but we are continuously innovating and creating a technology-driven system to enable a bird’s eye view for our investors as a way to assure them of their returns and show them the progress and impact they are generating as a result of their investment. An example of our initiative would be the dashboard that collates the performance and the marker sentiments of the companies that we are actively investing in.
Q. What do you think is the most memorable moment in your career? As an investment company, we consistently focus on building strategies on a macro perspective. From time to time we get testimonials that are heartfelt: Once a team member of ours had a personal story affecting his mother who was going through cancer. Using one of our partners’ medical solutions he managed to alleviate her pain and suffering and consequently she returned to good health. Understanding that we were part of the enabler of the value chain truly made it a memorable one and we are out to consistently repeat success. Q. What would you have been if you were not an entrepreneur? A travel blogger, as I enjoy learning about civilizations, economy and political propagandas in each region. In fact, I travelled the world for six months – to Havana, Moscow, Cappadocia and 20 other global cities, learning and understanding cultures and their history. Educating a wider audience on these varied cultures, their beliefs, opinions and my observations through video would be my next best career. I have over 20 videos that I have created capturing the essence and flavour of my favourite cities.
Q. Which other successful entrepreneurs do you look up to? I truly admire Bill Gates. He started with his vision of ‘putting a computer on each desk’ and actually lived to see such and “outlandish dream” realized. Gates did not just create a company but practically boosted the whole software industry. It’s not a stretch to say that he triggered the third wave of computing: from the mainframe era, then the minicomputer era, and to the personal computing era we are enjoying now. At this stage of his life, he has simply not slowed down but stepped up the pace to help all people lead healthy, productive lives. In developing countries, he focuses on improving people’s health and giving them the chance to lift themselves out of hunger and extreme poverty.
Daniel Rajesh: A Formidable Leader
Daniel Rajesh is founder and Chief Executive Officer of Sayris Capital Ltd. Daniel’s access to the Asian financial landscape combined with global professional business relationship both in the corporate and start-up sector enables him to drive the investment company to scale and accelerate growth focusing on late-stage companies.
Daniel is an entrepreneurial business and marketing expert with extensive years of experience in leadership level roles at leading IT and FMCG corporations, such as Procter & Gamble and Autodesk, focused on brand management and finance. Daniel has led a few start-ups in the tech industry to scale in the APAC region raising over USD five million. He also co-founded a renewable energy start-up activating a breakthrough technology and business model within the solar industry in South East Asia focusing on redistribution of the energy mix in the energy sector. Daniel aspires to unify the best practices in the renewable energy industry that is constantly evolving within the Agritech and Medtech industries.
“Our mission is to be one of the world’s leading investment companies of plant-based medical technology. Using our portfolio of brands to differentiate our sustainable technology, services and consumer products, we seek to develop the safest, innovative and profitable companies while positively impacting the community.”