Gaurav Shrishrimal

🚀 Swiggy Set to Make Waves with ₹11,300 Crore IPO: Key Details and Market Implications 🌐 Swiggy, India's food delivery giant, is set to go public with an IPO launching on November 6, 2024, aiming to raise around ₹11,327 crore (~$1.35B). Shares will be priced at ₹371-₹390 each (around $4.64), with trading expected to start on November 13, 2024. IPO Highlights: Price Range: ₹371-₹390 per share Funds Allocation: Expanding logistics and quick commerce operations This IPO is launching amidst rising tech-driven competition in India’s market. By securing capital, Swiggy plans to advance its quick commerce capabilities, aiming to gain a strategic edge over competitors like Zomato. Market Impact: Swiggy’s IPO offers a unique investment opportunity with strong growth potential, balancing between established dominance in food delivery and quick commerce expansion. Investor Insight: With a grey market premium around ₹25, sentiment is optimistic. As Swiggy steps into the public sphere, it's poised to redefine India's fast-paced delivery ecosystem. #IPO #SwiggyIPO #Investment https://lnkd.in/eyHRRPXh

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🚀 Swiggy IPO is providing 30X type of return to many VCs. And media is going gaga over it. A 30X return in 9-10 years is 40-45% IRR which is very impressive. Now look at it another way ----If I set up a VC fund with an expectation of 25% IRR over a 10-year fund, then the final value needs to be 9-10X for the entire fund. And I will not invest more than 10% in one deal typically. Let’s look at numbers: 1️⃣ Total fund size - 100 rupees 2️⃣ Required final value @25% IRR - 930 rupees 3️⃣ Swiggy - 10% or 10 rupees 4️⃣ Swiggy exit value - 300 rupees 💰 I still need the balance 90% or 90 rupees to deliver 630 rupees. This is not easy at all. Knowing most of the investments in startups will fail, I still need 2 more Swiggy's in the portfolio to be an average performer. 📊 On top of that, there are several small-cap mutual funds that are giving 25% return over several years. VC is a tough business. 🎢 #startups #swiggy #VC

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Optimising for survival vs valaution During my previous startup journey My Dream Store we grew from 3cr annualRevenue to 30cr annual Revenue in 24 months and we were on look out for series A of 5Mn usd , Talked to almost every VC in town by that time we have only raise an angel round of 300k usd only. Everything was green we were super ambitious , stayed in market for 3 months could not close . During this time there were few Angel groups who could write 500k to 1mn cheques but we thought it would be too small for our ambitions. We went back to building again - our growth began to drop and became flattish at 2cr monthly revenue , we went back to market to raise 2Mn after 1yr to market to a different set of VCs - very hard to raise on back of degrowth, we were willing to dilute more but yes could not close. Lesson learnt always raise when you are going to peak in the next 3-6 months. As founders we would be focused on growth during that cycle but it’s better to put more money in war chest. Back to story one more year passed on flattish growth, we did some working capital solves , cut expenses we de grew to 1.5cr monthly revenue . Was again out in market this time looking for Angels founder angels or syndicates to raise 500k to 2Mn to build back. I was almost on verge of giving up but then Sujayath Ali wrote a small cheque gave us hope to rethink and started building Nobero. Only a founder can truly understand the grit and struggle. Now Nobero is a rocket ship we are super excited along side strong partner like TMRW House of Brands . From my journey of fundraising failures here are something’s that other founders / people who want to start can pick up 1. Always raise when you are on the raise 2. Do not be finicky about valuation pick best of what you are getting and go back to building 3. Like you see in my essay I moved down from 5Mn to 2Mn to 500k , very foolish . In hindsight had I picked the 500k to 1Mn cheque when we were at 30cr the story would have been totally different . Pick whatever you can at best price you can close fast. The art is to close deal fast and move from position to position strongly on back of good metrics 4. Small cheques get large cheques , you are no longer alone in journey. It’s in interest of all parties to protect org and do what is right for org to grow 5. Fundraising is sales , be very strategic of what you offer -if you are degrowing offer a larger share, create phased offers milestone led - 500k to x size and if I hit X follow on with 2Mn if I do not grow to X be willing to take more hit on equity. Always offer what others cannot 6. Have some founders on your cap table who have been part of these , it’s millions saved #fundraising #startup #lessonsbuildingnobero

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Founder blows up $22bn edtech startup to zero. 0️⃣ Founder runs away and hides in Dubai. 🛩 👻 Founder blames investors. 😯 In this situation, what words other than f*%k come to your mind? 👇 👇 👇 I present to you Loot and Thug - today’s Indian origin words that are commonly used in the English language. This is the 4th weekly edition of such words. Please repost and share with your friends if you like this. Words from the last 3 weeks are at the bottom of this post. LOOT: The term loot is primarily derived from the Hindi word lūṭ, which means "booty" or "spoils of war." The Hindi term can be traced back to the Sanskrit words loptra meaning "booty" or luṇṭ which translates to "to rob" or "plunder". Loot can be used as a noun as in booty (not that booty), or as a verb to carry off or take something. The adoption of this word into English occurred when India was a British colony. The earliest recorded use of loot in English dates back to 1802, when it was defined in a military context as an "Indian term for plunder or pillage." By the 1920s, its figurative meaning had developed further within American English. An example of its use in modern slang is “stash the loot.” THUG: Originates from the Hindi word ṭhag meaning "swindler, thief, cheat" and is ultimately derived from the Sanskrit word sthaga meaning "cunning, fraudulent." The first use of the term goes back to the 14th century and referred to a gang or network of criminals operating around India’s main roads. The first recorded English use was in 1810 to refer to members of the Thuggee gang. Like loot the adoption of this word occurred when India was a British colony. In modern usage it typically refers to a violent criminal or bully. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher of the UK used it to describe everyone from unruly football fans to people involved in race riots. The word thug actually rebounded in American popular culture, thanks in part to Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. It has also been adopted in hip-hop culture since the 1990s, sometimes with more positive connotations of resilience, like by Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. But it continues to retain strong negative connotations as well outside of its original cultural context and use PLEASE REPOST AND SHARE with friends if you enjoyed reading this. Last week we covered Musk and Juggernaut. In previous weeks we have talked about Orange, Candy, Khaki, Shampoo, Jungle and Pepper... all words of Indian origin commonly used in the English language. You can find the previous posts on my timeline. In closing, did the edtech founder do something wrong? Until the courts decide, he is innocent until proven otherwise. CAN YOU GUESS WHO IS THIS FOUNDER?

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Thanks Bismah and Inc42 Media for the insightful coverage and deep dive into the vital role of operator VCs! Bismah's thoughtful analysis underscores the growing need for operator VCs in today's startup landscape. As an operator VC , I've witnessed firsthand how founders increasingly value more than just capital. They seek partners who bring operational expertise, strategic guidance, and an extensive network to the table. These elements are crucial for driving sustainable growth and navigating the complexities of scaling a business. At GrowthCap Ventures , we understand the unique challenges faced by early-stage startups, which is why we prioritize offering not just funding, but also hands-on support and access to our extensive network. Together, we're empowering founders to realize their vision and build transformative businesses. #OperatorVC #StartupEcosystem #Gratitude

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Startup founders in India, I need your input. We're facing significant hurdles with the Google Play Store review process for our app, Queo Health. Current situation: App stuck in review for almost a month Zero feedback from Google Multiple unanswered support tickets 3-month delay in our app launch This lack of communication is severely impacting our business timeline and plans. Despite Google's promise of 48-72 hour response times, we've been waiting for weeks. Questions for the community: Has anyone else experienced such lengthy review times recently? What strategies have you used to get a response from Google Play support? How are you managing the uncertainty in your release schedules? Let's share experiences and solutions. Perhaps together I can find a way to navigate these challenges. #GooglePlayStore #AppReview #StartupChallenges #TechSupport #MobileDevelopment

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Zomato's Q2 results are amazing! and one of the reason for that is it's strategic acquisition, here's what happening... After acquiring Blinkit, zomato acquired Paytm Insider But why is a food delivery company buying a ticketing platform? Zomato is exploring a new domain by acquiring PTM Insider, a leading ticketing platform for movies, concerts, and sports events, for a whopping ₹2,000 crore! Let’s break it down: 1. Zomato’s Vision Zomato aims to become a lifestyle brand and not just a food delivery platform! That's what their new launch 'district' is about. It's a app for everything outdoors Food, Movies, Concerts etc PTM Insider will still operate under PTM, till the next 12 months but then all ticketing services will migrate to District 2. But why did Paytm sell a profitable business? While Zomato is diversifying, Paytm is doubling down on its core business—finance. You might remember Paytm’s recent regulatory troubles, which led to the shutdown of Paytm Payments Bank. This might just be a smart move, allowing PTM to consolidate resources and fortify its position in the fintech space, especially after the recent regulatory hiccups. 3. Zomato’s Growth Strategy: The Bigger Picture Zomato’s Q2 report shows ~5X profits rise since last year But here’s the catch: while Zomato’s food delivery revenue grew by 10%, their acquisition Blinkit surged by a insane 222%! This tells us that Zomato is not just diversifying for the sake of it; they’re strategically positioning themselves in high-growth areas like quick commerce and now, ticketing. To kickstart this Zomato is organizing the “Feeding India Concert” in Mumbai on November 30! Zomato’s dream is ambitious: to become India’s ultimate lifestyle platform. It’s a bold vision that won’t be easy to realize, but if they pull it off, Zomato could redefine how we eat, play, and live. #zomato #acquisition

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Sometimes, serendipity plays a crucial role in shaping what problems we pick to solve, especially at pre PMF startups. A few months ago, a friend building an RMG from India shared two challenges. One of them was in performance marketing that he was uploading a lot of creatives and wanted suggestions for new ones based on previous learnings. At the time, we were focused on something else and didn’t have time to dive in. Later, the idea we were pursuing didn’t work out, but another agency mentioned the same challenge. So, we decided to take a day to figure out a solution. I manually gathered data from videos, putting it into an Excel sheet to run a correlation analysis. At first, I didn’t realize Google AI Studio could read videos, so I used OpenAI to analyze the video frame by frame, and it worked surprisingly well. Through some YouTube tutorials, I discovered AI Studio could do it even better and with an API. That made everything fall into place smoothly. In the video below, you’ll see this analysis for Subway Arabia. We did this as a way to showcase our work via a friend who works at Subway MENA (Middle East and North Africa), hoping to present it to them. This wasn’t an official collaboration, but the data was publicly available, so we scraped and used it. If you’re interested in the data insights or prompts, feel free to comment with “data,” and I’ll gladly share them with you on DM.

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How do people see founders from IIT? 1. Raises investment People: "It's easy to raise money when you are from IIT" 2. Burns money People: "Investors should look beyond IIT's founders. Founders from non-IIT/IIM backgrounds would better utilise the money." 3. Build a successful company/unicorn People: "Valuation is still high. It won't sustain and will fail" 4. Shuts down after raising money People: "I told you it won't work" Meanwhile, Founders, the real ones, don't care whether they are from IIT/IIM. They keep building, keep pushing, and keep changing the world. ******* Follow Shubham Bansal for unfiltered life stories and learnings.

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Very often, early stage founders talk about "shortly launching our app". During a convo with Vikul Goyal of Bimaplan, we discussed better options to "launching an app" Indian consumer behaviour suggests that unless your app delivers your core business proposition (game, content streaming, ecomm catalogue, etc), or customers open 2+ times EVERY week, the use case for an app is weak. An app isn't just about compiling the .apk file or getting it approved on the play store. The real cost of an app is getting users to download it, install it, update it, and make sure they don't uninstall it. What's the alternative? Unless your customer *needs* to open your app more than twice a week, you should be making a WhatsApp bot as your first customer facing UI. Indians have taken to chat (like most other consumers globally), and taking advantage of consumer behaviour shifts is the path of least resistance and lowest CAC for startups. 1) Buying Metro tickets in India on whatsapp is seamless 2) ICICI support on whatsapp is fast Can you think of at least a few apps that should have instead been a WhatsApp bot? #startups #entrepreneurship #venturecapital

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When a startup keeps tweaking its product / business model / marketing, it can seem indecisive and chaotic from the outside. But constant iteration is the very DNA that separates startups from traditional businesses. Established businesses operate on decades of legacy—processes shaped by years of trial and error. Startups, on the other hand, are navigating uncharted territory, trying to create something entirely new in volatile markets. There's no playbook, no guarantees. Anyone who claims to know exactly what will work is merely guessing. The only constants when building a startup are agility and a bias for action. You leap, measure, learn, and adapt. Your startup's bread and butter isn't a fixed product or service—it's your ability to evolve faster than anyone else in the market. #entrepreneurship #startups #agility #business

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Important announcement for our INDIA operations: ADDA.io becomes the ONLY Community App in this market that is: ZERO SPAM ZERO ADs  100% Mgmt & Acctg SaaS We are fully devoted to the Management Committees of Multi-Crore Apartment Communities, who have understood the need of a Serious Software. We want these Management Committee members to sleep well.. ...Sleep well without the niggling fears of putting at risk the Data Privacy of Hundreds and Thousands of Residents. ...Sleep well without any concern of life-destroying Cyber-Crime cases waiting to happen.. Cyber-Crime? Today MCs choosing Free Apps / Ad-Supported Apps as their OFFICIAL App are doing this: selling not just their individual private data but their Owners/Tenants private data for monetisation! This data is used to sell anything from Real Estate to Insurance to Gambling. Residents trust information on their Association's Official App. And MCs believe they did great by saving few thousand INR on paid software subscription. With the ever increasing Cyber Fraud in India, upon any crime traced to this data monetisation, the President, Secretary etc. find it hard to avoid legal liability. Regardless of water tight vendor agreements. So, we want to scream from the Rooftops - that YOU - the discerning Treasurer, the Chairman, the Secretary have a choice! Please help us spread this word, and stop Lives of Management Committees from being destroyed! ========== Note: We are making this effective from July-1-2024. Why July-1, why not right now? While we never served Spam or Advertisements, we were listing third-party home service vendors - the 'Discover' platform. This too we are stopping by July-1-2024. As for the robust Tech Platform we have built for interfacing third party vendors, we are Open Sourcing its functionality! The technology - banners, service marketplace etc. will remain available for large Communities who wish to bring their own trusted vendors, event sponsors etc., by their own choice, and within their own by-laws. #HappyCommunityLiving #RiseHigh #FocusOnTheCore

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The worst-kept secret in retail is that retailers are overstocked. Buyers mistook COVID-19 growth for marketing skills. It was luck. Founders have lost their brands because of this. The biggest lie is that the root cause of this issue has been fixed. The second biggest lie is that there is an easy fix. Inventory Planning Software is not a new category. It pre-dates DTC, but DTC demand dynamics have certainly stirred the pot. It is incredibly nuanced, and each software has its place in the market depending on a brand size, sales channels, product types and categories, seasonality, assortment, continuity of products and growth rate. That's before you consider integration to your Ecommerce platform, ERP or WMS. Yikes. No wonder Operators burn more time reviewing these solutions than any other. The vendors find this tough, too. Some of the vendors I am highlighting here rejected my request for a demo 👀 Even if you're not currently shopping in this category, save this as your shortlist for when you need to. 📥 If you're one of these vendors, please use the comments to state your differentiation and call out your ideal customer profile to help people qualify themselves. Inventory Planner by Sage - Wider SKU range. Repeating products. £10K+ per year. Toolio - Merchandising focused. Works well with NetSuite. Retail+DTC forecasting. $10K+ per year/module. Flieber - recommended by a client of mine. Uses AI. No pricing intel. Singuli. Data scientists. Strong in 'What to buy'. Starts at $3,000/month. Optiply. AI and automated buying. Great for seasonality and resellers of brands with big catalogues. Syrup Tech. Google-backed. I don't know much, but logos look cool. I would love a demo tbh 😂 Lokad. The nerds of inventory forecasting. Over my head, but one for the more studious operator. Prediko is Shopify-focused. It integrates with the Bundle app and Shopify bundles. It is Felix Capital-backed. It starts from £119/month. Slimstock. Veterans of the game. Solid platform. Pricing is not disclosed. Netstock. ERP-Focused inventory planning. Works well with NetSuite in particular. It's a solid option you have an ERP-stack. Madden Analytics. Fashion-focused merchandise solution. I've got a demo lined up next week. More soon 👀 No inventory planning solution is going to replace the art of merchandising. These are tools to make the merchandise team's life easier so they can focus on making the right decisions. The hottest tip outside these solutions is Klaviyo waitlists and using pre-orders on new products to gauge demand and reorder before they land. Airtable isn't the right solution for figuring out what to buy. Airtable can help combine your costs, purchase orders, and supply chain workflow with the 'what to buy' data your inventory planning software generates. What Inventory Planning tools did I miss? Which of my summaries sucks and needs to be amended?! #inventoryplanning #techstacks #ecommerce #shopify

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5+ Cr in investment. Team in 3 countries. 18 months in the making - Layers is going bigger in August 2024. It all started when we first launched Layers in 2022, we had 0 experience of - D2C, Branding, SKUS and everything in between. We hustled, failed, but ultimately figured things out building India’s largest skins brand—100% bootstrapped, selling over 2.5 lakh skins. (The Neel who scored -2 Marks in JEE would have never imagined this.) But, the entire experience taught us 3 core things: > The confidence to succeed in markets that never existed > The freedom to think long-term and take bets in short term > The understanding of a creator-led D2C brand’s potential It wasn’t easy, but that’s the fun part. And now, we’re taking on the next big challenge. LAYERS IS LAUNCHING ITS FIRST TECH PRODUCT! In all honesty, building a tech product is ten times tougher than building the skins business. We had to revisit our entire strategy—pricing, distribution, customer service— and most importantly, the right innovation to stand out in the market. In the skins market, we had little competition. But here, we face giants with 1000X resources and decades of experience. Competing with them and building a superior tech product - bootstrapped with a lean team, is a huge challenge. I am quite nervous and afraid. Don’t know what’s gonna happen.. Until then, feel free to guess what the product is! :)

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One of the biggest lessons I learned from working on this business is that there is no greater foundation for a young person trying to break their way into the business world than sales. This doesn't mean if you aren't a good seller this invalidates your ability to start a business. But someone on your team needs to be. Also as social media progresses, marketing and sales become increasingly intertwined. LinkedIn itself is a huge part of that. I think there is usually a point in every bootstrapped entrepreneurs journey where the partners say - "Alright, we need to make some money otherwise were gonna have to go find a job." And usually 1 of 2 things happen from that point. Either the startup fades away (Startups don't die they fade away). Or you break down your offering to the simplest level (guided by actual customer feedback) and try to ascertain what your target customer actually wants to pay for. Then you sell it to them. That's how you build a business in a nutshell.

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Raised $26,000,000 with just an idea Lyskraft India Pvt Ltd - the latest kid in the block! So, Mukesh Bansal is back with another startup this time with Mohit Gupta, the former CEO of Zomato's food delivery arm. In July of last year, there were reports about Bansal and Gupta raising funds for a new venture. As per TechCrunch, both of them pitched a range of ideas to potential backers like a female-focused counterpart to Manyavar and "Infosys 2.0" a presumed upgrade to a multinational IT services and consulting firm. Now finally... The news is out and we know what they are building, Lyskraft: initially a women's only marketplace for premium brands mostly focusing on Gen-Z shoppers. Recently we have seen giant e-commerce platforms launching dedicated portals to attract GenZ shoppers, like SPOYL launched by Flipkart within its app, FWD by Myntra, also we are seeing the growth of new-age startups working in this space like Virgio(Mukesh Bansal is an investor in it), Newme(recently raised $4,500,000), Absolute Brands, Snitch, Styched and many more As per Inc42's Report, India's fashion and apparel sector is projected to reach a mouth-watering $112 Billion by 2030, which will be over a quarter of the country's $400 Billion e-commerce market!! Let's be honest, anyone will want a piece of this market. As we are already aware of how crowded this space is, let's see how Lyskraft differentiates itself from others. Mohit Gupts and Mukesh Bansal, in this crowded space building a community around your product, building digital IPs, and creating experiences through videos are the ways to elevate your brand to the next level. I the founder of Elevate would love to connect and assist Lyskraft in building a community, digital IPs and help create experiences through videos, if that sounds like something that interests you would love to connect and discuss!! sources of information : TechCrunch article 2021 - https://bit.ly/49UwkLI Inc42 article - https://bit.ly/3w0SDlb #mukeshbansal #myntra #fashion #startups #venturecapital #fundingwinter #norevenue #cultfit #community #communitymarketing #socialmediamarketing #india

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Bolt raised $1.4 Bn and Fast raised $120 Mn in 2021-22 5 companies in that year’s YC cohort were building Checkouts for LatAM, South East Asia, etc As we were still narrowing down on a problem, this was impossible to ignore. Having seen Flipkart build Amazon of India, Ola build Uber of India, it made sense that “someone will build Bolt/Fast of India” It became a good starting point For our VC experience, we also knew such pattern matching is useful in fundraising We launched the product and had some customers. That’s when stories of bolt and fast failing started to do the rounds on Twitter. There was a lot of drama. It was hard to look away. After some introspection on what this means for us, we realized that 1) Customers were excited about the problem and were willing to pay. To the extent, people were signing up for demos inbound via word of mouth 2) It was merely a starting point. As we started spending more time with customers, we started to see plethora of problems in “effectively engaging customers” they were facing 3) India (our first market) is uniquely different from US (their first market) : Phone number as an identifier, un-standard addresses, low trust, Cash on Delivery, So many more payment options 4) US had likes of PayPal, ApplePay and GooglePay solving this problem making the competitive landscape even more intense I personally think it is a great wedge into the market. It got us the customers who shared several insights turning the wedge into a product, which we hope to turn into a platform. It was also clear that everyone is writing their own story. Pattern matching only goes so far. Is there another company who you think has successfully executed the “X for Y” strategy like Flipkart and Ola? #floBTS This post is a part of our effort to share the behind the scenes of building our company. You can see the other posts by clicking on the hashtag or link in the comments.

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From Mobycy to Zypp Electric ⚡️ From 250 Cr valuation to 350million $ valuation(expected) ✌🏻 From cycle to e-scooter 🛵 The man I admire as a founder is Akash (I call him Akash bhaiya). He's an inspiration to all founders. Despite having a background in fintech apps (MobiKwik) he chose to tackle short-distance mobility issues. Now, he's already reached $40 million 🤑✌🏻in revenue last year. He didn't secure funds from Shark Tank, but he got real 'sharks' in the form of customers, which is even better. ♥️ Whenever I feel demotivated, I watch my Shark Tank episode. I gain a bit of motivation from our 17 Lakh ARR, but now we're at 40 MRR. I also watch Zypp's Shark Tank video simultaneously to get super pumped. Akash is now our biggest motivation, investor, go-to guy, and bulk purchaser too 🙌🏻 from DECIWOOD. #motivation #founder #brother

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Guys, I am trying to figure out successful examples of monthly subscription digital businesses for the Indian market? Scaled Businesses who’s Customer LTV - Variable Delivery Cost > 2 X CAC Please leave out OTTs & Real Money Gaming startups. Context: A friend is starting something in the space and I am actively discouraging him to do so. But maybe I am missing something. So do comment if you have a view.

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