Telenav are experts at navigation platforms, helping people get from point A to point B everyday. But how do they get from point A to point B within their quote to cash systems?Join our host Sandeep Jain as he sits down with Ruchi Kasliwal, the Head of Revenue at Telenav, as they discuss their unique revenue model and how a company like Telenav leverages monetization systems.
Hi. Welcome to the 4th episode of “The Enterprise Monetization” podcast. And this is your host, Sandeep Jain. In this podcast, we invite thought leaders from monetization space that has CPQ billing revenue operations, so that you can learn about challenges, opportunities and best practices in enterprise monetization. Today, I'm pleased to introduce an invited guest Ruchi Kasliwal. Ruchi is the Head of Revenue at Telenav. Before that, Ruchi was at Confluent, MongoDB, and other companies. And currently, she is also part of the advisory board at Clarity, which is a startup that simplifying the contract review process. With that, Ruchi, welcome to this podcast.
Thank you, Sandeep. It's a pleasure to be here.
Great. So hey, before we go into Quote-to-Cash details, would you like to share a fun fact about you?
Sure, sure. One of the fun facts, I can talk about myself, this something others will be surprised of, is I love to go out in the evenings and just watch the lights, not the moons and stars but the lights at different places. And just look at all the different ways the landscape lights are placed. And just observe that and not many people know about this for me.
That's very interesting. So Ruchi, any place in mind that where you were fascinated about the lights that you saw?
One of my favorite times to see the lights is, of course during the Christmas season, where everybody is going above and beyond to put lights on their houses. And a secret spot that I can think of is in Fremont in an area called Nines where you can go and see lots of Christmas lights, and it feels like you're actually in North Pole. So all different varieties of lights being showcased and each houses.
While that's something new that I learned today, because I've been in the Bay Area for last 20 years and my family, you know, we go out to see Christmas lights. But I'd never heard of this place. So we'll go there for sure.
Yeah, you should definitely check it out.
Awesome. So from Christmas lights to Quote-to-Cash now. But before that, actually, could you share like your professional background? You know, you worked at some fascinating companies before, and you're a Telenav now. So can you just describe your journey into this world?
Sure, absolutely. So for me, my journey started in finance in the revenue world. And basically, from there on, I've always been fascinated with revenue and how all the backend processes work. I've been at companies MongoDB, Confluent. And before that, I was at Goshen technology. And seeing all these companies grow from a very 220 people company to almost 1000 People Company has been fascinating. Growth that you see in this expect, except exponential companies has been amazing and to grow with them was a big part of my career.
Awesome. And so for folks who do not know about Telenav, could you just describe what Telenav does?
Sure. We manufacture we have software that goes into navigation systems. So essentially, when you see the GM Ford's and Toyota's of the world, and you'll see the navigation going on, it's all powered by the Telenav software. And it provides point of interest, locations, live searches for any kind of situation, it's restaurants you're looking for. So it's primarily navigation software that we provide.
Got it. And you guys are a public company and a private company? So what's your current situation now?
Yes, so we actually were a public company for last decade or so. But then we just recently went back private. And the main reason for that is to we do believe that our company needs to go through a big transformation, and expanding into different product lines. That's the way to go to turn it private and bring back the true value of the company.
Understood, understood. And so I guess you went private, like a couple of months ago?
Very recently.
Yeah. So can you talk about your revenue before that and like, and the reason I'm asking this question is to understand the extent of your Quote-to-Cash systems like, what's your revenue? What are your primary channels of selling? Is it a self-serve? Is a direct sales related? Is it through partners?
Sure. So our revenue channels, our primary focus with the OEMs, or the car manufacturers, and our biggest channel of revenue is through direct sales. We do have, used to have mobile advertising. But that's a product line that has been reamed out already. But our biggest channel has been through OEM. Now, the way our revenue works is, it's royalty-based revenue. So the number of cars that are sold, based on that we earn royalties on the software that goes on those cars.
I see, understood. And so could you talk about the Quote-to-Cash system in place to enable this sort of workflow? I think there's a first time I'm talking to somebody with this sort of unique royalty based startup business model?
Right. So royalty based businesses, a very unique business to the, primarily this is in the car industry, because it's you can relate it to usage based business, the more you use. The more revenues that you earn. So the more cars that GM sells, the more revenues we would earn. So in talking back on the Quote-to-Cash part of it, like our contracts are generally pretty long term contracts. Because having a software installed in a car is not an overnight thing, you need to have the right components built due for that software to run. And the way our contracts work is you keep adding features. And when we talk about features, it's the features that the car companies want, and how is your software going to support these features. So it's an ever evolving process in terms of contracting. And for that you have to have a very robust back end system to support these changes and features, changes and contracts. And how do you price these changes? How does it have an impact on your back office and your revenues and royalties that you earn? In addition to that, we also have royalties that we pay to our vendors. So it's not just a front end process, but a back end process as well.
Got it. And what are the systems, like what is your Quote-to-Cash systems that you're using to enable this?
So in our current company, we do use a version of Salesforce, but our primary Quote-to-Cash system is still very manual, and very nascent in terms of going through red line Word documents. And that is something that needs to be enhanced and bring brought to more modern life and automated solutions.
But given that, what you're sharing, like, I'm assuming the number of transactions that you guys have is very few. Are these contracts are huge in terms of dollar value. So doing things manually, maybe okay?
For now, it might be okay. But as we expand into different product lines, different markets, this is not a sustainable place to be. So for that you have to have a solution which can cater to big contracts. Because even though these are big long term contracts, there are high volume transactions that go within these contracts. So to cater to those, you need a robust back end solution.
So what do you mean by, sorry, I didn't catch that part of the large number of transactions that go as far as one contract. What do you mean by that?
So by that, I mean there, if you're familiar a little bit with the car industry, each car company has different model years based on the years, the models, like I'll just take GM or Ford, for example, there are different versions of Ford Explorer, different versions of Ford Explorer within different years, all the features that keep changing, and you multiply that with the number of people buying these Ford cars, and you have volumes and volumes of transactions where the software is being used. So that's what I mean by high volume transactions.
But in your case, I'm assuming that probably before the end of the quarter, you receive a massive excel from Ford, which says how many, you know, cars are sold?
Yes, we do. And that is where the beauty comes in of processing, order processing, making sure the prices are right, the model numbers are right, the model years are right. So that's exactly where having a good system to reconcile these things comes in place.
Understood, understood. And do you use, like, what do you use for order management today?
So order management is all done through our ERP system, NetSuite. And also part of it goes through our self-billing system.
I see, and what is the self-billing system, I'm sorry?
The self-billing system in our current company is more related to our internal processes that we have, we have a homegrown way of tracking different payments, different transactions. So I wouldn't call it a very robust billing system, but it's a very self-created, enhanced or excel on steroids. Let's put it that way, excel on steroids.
That's interesting. So Ruchi, based on, so it looks like you guys are going private, you guys are planning to do something wonderful. So as you see this transition of the company, what are your thoughts about your current Quote-to-Cash system? I know you mentioned that it needs to change, but on what X’s, are you thinking this requires rethought?
Sure. So the way our company is heading, we are going to go more on high volume transaction business. Obviously, I cannot share too many details. But just to give you a gist of the scope of the change, it's going to go more on consumer level businesses. And when we talk about consumer relevant businesses, it's all high volume, low dollar transactions. And that is where you need to have systems in place, tools in place that can support the volumes of transactions that we are expecting. And that would mean providing the users a self-serve kind of tool where they can purchase what they are looking for. And then billings can be generated, payments can be generated seamlessly. So the user does not have any hiccups. And for that we need to develop back end systems to track all these transactions. And there could be different flavors of the transactions that users can purchase. So providing that product catalog in a very seamless way and a user friendly way is the critical part, which needs to be sorted out now.
So that's interesting. You mentioned that, given that these are the requirements, like I heard high volume, low dollar, sales serve, and possibly direct sales as well, because that's as well?
Yes, yes.
Given these requirements, do you think that you have an answer for this problem today, in terms of what systems you may use to solve this?
So I've visited multiple companies before, and this is similar to like usage based billing, uses based business. And I have yet to see a tool or a solution that can work. And that has not happened. Like in a few of my prior companies, we had homegrown billing systems, which really did not work to the scale that we needed it to work. So I don't have a solution. I'm still looking. And there is something that can be built. But I would rather have an outside vendor provide that kind of tool rather than building it internally.
So a couple of follow up, Ruchi. So why do companies go to the route of building their own only to realize what you just said, that hey, does not meet my needs? So why do you think people still continue to build?
This is I think, Sandeep, a very classic case, where companies generally think, Oh, I have all this engineering talent, who my engineers can really build you a tool. You're just looking for a billing tool. But in reality, that's not exactly what the finance or the ops folks are really looking for. And that is one of the biggest mistakes that companies do that they think that it's a simple tool. It's not a simple tool. It requires a lot of thought and process to be put together to build this tool. And when you have companies out there who can build this tool as their bread and butter, why do we want to spend resources, internal resources, in terms of time, effort, money, to build something that's readily available? So to have a scalable and expertise. Now, not every company has the expertise to build this kind of tools. And having a band-aid solution is not always a good solution.
Got it. Great, Richie. So another follow up. You talked about challenges in usage based billing. What's so hard about usage? Like, why is this still a problem?
Yeah, sure. So usage based billing is actually a very new business model that the companies are facing, enterprises are facing. And it's as new as I would say, not more than five to six years. And people are still thinking about how to solve for this. In usage based billing, the key that you need to know is what's the usage and what's the price point that I need to put out there? And as usage increases, how do you make that price point work? Like how do you provide the user having the functionality of tiered pricing? So all of these functions are still not available in any of the tools? The other thing that I can think about when usage based billing is how do you generate the bills? How do you make sure that there is a minimum commit as an enterprise, you need to make sure you have a consistent ARR? So how do you make sure there's a minimum commit that I can build my customer on? Is it a catch up at the end of the term, or do you keep doing a methodology of monthly minimum versus actual usage? So there are lots of still open questions that needs to be solved.
I see. But then tell me this Ruchi, there are companies today that are whose entire bread and butter and business model is usage. But I think, Confluent could be in that category. Even maybe MongoDB, means dealing with usage like it's is it completely manual or like what are these companies doing?
It's a hybrid solution that these companies have come up with. But I wouldn't say this is a very scalable solution. Because a lot of the tools available out there, especially from a finance perspective, do not solve for the entire Q2C cycle. Like, you know, how do you generate the quote? How do you get the user to put in their credit card? How do you make sure that the cash is collected, there's a lot of backend information that needs to be tracked. And ultimately, there are chunks that you need to track, there needs to be lot of customization done. So it is not a foolproof solution yet. It is still hybrid, where there's a lot of manual work in the backend that needs to be done, especially by the accounting and finance team, when they are trying to reconcile all the data,
I see. My understanding was that given these existing products, you know, you can create a metering table on whatever the axis of monetization is. And then the products that are emitting usage, you know, you dump it in an Excel or something. And then you upload this in the billing system, and it will calculate this at the end of the month or a quarter or whatever it is?
Not really. So a very simple example, it can be that there are different versions of the usage product that you can provide, depending on the type of product and there are different varieties. So a certain user, I'll just take a very simple example, a certain user wants a license or some kind of product software license. Now there's specific requirements, they want certain security, certain storage size, certain location. So these are the different variables that go into that use it. So the first challenge that I see the companies face is how do you provide these to be very seamless, less click, and more function for the user? Let's say that's all done, and companies come up with a very nice front end system, but then how do you convert all of that in the backend? It cannot be a fixed price thing. So you need to have different kinds of methodologies to convert this and monetize it. And at the end of it, how do you collect the cash related to that? How do you track thus user and so that you can make sure you have continuous ARR from this user? So there are different challenges still out there that has not been solved for.
I see. In your mind, is there any company or any way to do this, or any example on how to do this right, given that there is not a good solution exists or people have to experimented on their own how to get it done?
I think, like each business is definitely different but a very simplistic solution to do this right would be to have a seamless integration between what's out there in terms of the code that's been generated? And then how does it integrate in the back end in your accounting and finance tools? And that's not just limited to your cash coming in? But how do you track all these different metrics? If you have a user who's having a hard time navigating through the portal to just generate a quote, then it becomes very difficult for them to come back again to your portal. So that's the churn that you would see on that user. So those are different things that can be done. There're tools out there. I know NetSuite has a tool called usage based billing, but it still does not solve the issue of variable usage. It still has fixed usage that is being implemented, but doesn't solve the issue of variable usage patterns.
Understood. And so on that note, Ruchi. I know there's a like, there's three big products or features here. It's like one is CPQ and other is billing. And another is your ERP with his general ledger. And when I said features, I actually meant functionalities.
Tools.
Tools, yeah. So these three unique functions, three separate functions now. What do you think about combining these together? So you have, you know, one vendor saying billing and general ledger are together. Another saying billing and CPQ to be together. Like, what's your perspective on these three functionalities existing separately, or should they be together, any thoughts on that?
I would love to have one seamless tool that works for all three of them, because you have to think of it this way that the data that goes in in the front end from in the CPQ tool is ultimately what is being recorded in the billings and in your general ledger or your ERP system. So if you have one source of information, one true source of data, then you have consistent information going throughout the whole process. And it simplifies the processes for the organization on so like your sales and sales ops functions, who are primarily involved in the CPQ side, are looking at the same thing that probably your billings guys, which are the OTC guys looking at, and ultimately, your finance and accounting folks who are looking at the ERP system. So at least one consistent information is being flowed throughout the entire process. And that brings in lots of operational efficiencies, you will all be talking the same terms and not talking apples and oranges when dealing with any kind of situations.
Understood. Ruchi, based on your previous examples, or companies that you worked at, can you give us specific examples on what problems you guys faced because these things were separate? Like, was it like…?
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. So I'm sure you must be hearing this a lot. Because this is this is when the standard processes and lots of organizations where all these three tools are either built in silos are managed in silos, and there's no connection between the two, between the three, actually. So in my previous orgs, or previous companies, we had very, very big challenges. Because in the CPQ tool, if we wanted to put a price list, and that was not consistent with the price list that you had in your billing tool, which in turn was not consistent with the ERP pricing, then you had the same order being transacted at three different price points, which was a big issue. There's no reconciliation that would get done. The customer, if they are getting a bill, which is totally off than what their quote was, then there will be lot of customer satisfaction issues. So having one tool which addresses all three of these is the solution to go for.
Understood. And do you see the industry moving there in some ways?
Yes, I would say like I know that for example, Salesforce CPQ has their CPQ tool, which is the Quote generator or Quote builder, and then they also have functionality of Billings, Salesforce just I do not know if they have still integrated with the ERPs systems or not. But there are work talks about that. But and I don't know if they have done it yet. But I think if there are tools available that caters to all three needs, then that would be the way to go.
Understood, understood. And Ruchi, in your role do you interact with like the sales ops people? And would they share the same opinion as you have like that they need to be together?
Yes. So in my roles, like my role is not limited just to the revenue function, like I have a very wide role, which is basically all of operations, which starts from implementing deal desk, for example, deal desk is a biggest thing that helps the sales guys in shortening the deal closure process. And on the other side, you don't have to implement any of the tools you need to interact to with the IT and engineering or the BSA teams, also the BI teams. So it's, I would say that sales ops for sure does feel like we should have consistency. And what's being presented to the customer should be consistent with what is eventually sent to the customer. And that's why having one simple tool or one single tool that connects the three is very important. I'm sure the sales ops guys that you talk to would share the same opinion.
Got it. And probably I should have asked you earlier about this. I want to talk about your team, like what does your team do? And does it have, I know you do your head of revenue at Telenav? But does that mean it encompasses both finance and sales, or how does it work?
So what I do right now is like, of course, on the finance side, I am responsible for revenue operations, which includes all of your order to cash functions, and also finally booking of revenue, the booking of the top line of the company, and also includes a lot of technical accounting and contract negotiations with our sales and BD guys. On the ops side, I am implementing deal desk, which is a big thing nowadays in all enterprise software companies, because deal desk is essentially your backbone of the company, where the responsibility resides to ensure that everything related to a deal is being done in a single team. And the sales guys don't have to go figure out, okay, who do I need to get pricing approval? Who do I need to go to get product approvals? What kind of features can this be added on things like that. So that's why having a deal desk function in an organization is very beneficial. So I lead all of those functions, and along with that, you know, my I'm big involved in NPI, new product introductions as well. So making sure that any new product and features that are launched in the company have the right backbone with them.
Understood. And, hey Ruchi, I liked this description of deal desk. Could you talk a little bit more about this? Like, is it just a set of processes done by a few people, or is it a set of tools that the deal desk folks use?
Yeah, so I actually implemented this at Mongo about four or five years ago now and it's a full blown function. Now there are like 10 or 12 people doing the dealer squirt. So deal desk, you can call it like a central monetization team that helps close deals on the front end, and in the back end also helps improve efficiencies within the organizations. So deal desk has a big share in implementing any tools and processes. That simplifies your front end processes as it relates to sales ops, lead generation, or SDR and LD. I might be talking to many acronyms, so let me know if you want me to elaborate on that. So on the front end, and on the back end deal desk has a big share in implementation of tools like CPQ because they know in and out of how these tools should function what kind of priceless needs to be there. Are we talking regional priceless? Do we need to have multiple currencies implemented? What kind of product portfolio needs to be implemented? So all of these things and compasses the function of deals desk. And once deals come through, how does it transition from being the deal and an order to the billings role to the finance role.
Got it. And Ruchi, to enable the tools to do what the deal desk wants them to do, do you engage with it counterpart to make things happen or is it done within the deal desk itself? Like, you have people with software knowledge or IT knowledge to do?
No, it depends company to company, but very holistically like deal desk responsibilities is to work with the business system analyst and the PSA teams can reside under the IT orgs in the company, and generally I've seen IT orgs being under the CFOR. So they work with the BSAs to put together the BRBs. And those BRBs are then vetted out along with product guys also, because product has a big say in what goes on to product has to make sure they have all the different items available, the product catalog is available, if it is a standalone item versus a bundle product that they want to sell. So, this involves collaborations with the IT folks, product folks, the marketing team as well, like you know, collateral, what kind of collateral will go out. And to some extent, even sales enablement. So it's a very wide function. That's why I call it the backbone of any organization. Because if a deal desk is working smoothly, then you have a happy camper in your sales or because deal desk makes sure that sales is doing sales functions and not doing admin functions. Like, if you've talked to a few sales folks, I'm sure the biggest challenge that they have seen in their roles is how easy or difficult is it to generate a quote? How many clicks do they have to do and how many variations of the product they have to select? So simplifying those processes is the core function of deal desk.
Understood. And Ruchi, we talked earlier about, like the CPQ billing and ERP kind of sitting together. But what's your advice or recommendation to vendors based on the pain points that US practitioners are facing? Like, do you have any other tips like these things, vendors should be thinking, these specific things to make life of a few guys easier?
So there can be lots of advices. But I think one of the things I would say as a vendor, don't try to solve for everything, you know, pick your niche, and then build on that. That's the key thing. Because when you try to solve a sales ops function, rev ops function, and also finance function and billing function, then it's too big of a bite to chew on. So one of the biggest things I would say is pick a niche, and then build on it. And each organization has different business processes internally. But the core of those business processes always the same. So the thing that they should work on is what is the end result? Are they trying to solve it for the sales guys, or are they trying to solve it for the finance guys, or the IT guys? I think that's the biggest thing that people start solving the problem for everybody.
I see. But it's your only a point, if you're bringing CPQ and billing together, then the product will have to deal with sales and financial together.
True. But then again, like I said, you can always land and expand is a big strategy in sales. All right, so first, we need to identify what's the key problem child? Is it generations of quote that is the problem child, or is it generation of bills? That's a problem child. And then you solve for those things and expand on that that is the best way to go forward. Instead of building a tool or my tool is going to solve this and this and this and this all at once.
I see. Understood, understood. And Ruchi, on a similar note, what do you think about AI and ML in Quote-to-Cash? Is it like theory? Should it be done at this stage, or is it just a whole?
No, no, I think it's for real, and it's here to stay. Like, you know, the smartness that the AI tools and ML tools bring to these processes is just amazing. From a CPQ perspective, like we talked a little bit ago about the number of clicks a sales guy has to do, so this is something that you can do trained the system that take for these kinds of enterprise deals or these kinds of deals, this is the standard format that each time my sales guy is generated. So why not just give him out of the box solution that do you want this kind of format? Do you want this kind of format? And that's like, it's ready for the guy to go take it and close the deal on. So then AI and ML are big on those.
Got it. Got it. This brings us to the end of the podcast, Ruchi. Thanks a lot for sharing your insights about the CPQ billing, ERP and the usage side. But before we let you go, could you share a business resource, like maybe a podcast, a book, or maybe even a blog that you ended up liking and why?
Sure, sure. I think one of the business resource I wouldn't call it just business, but it kind of touches a little bit of the human side of the business as well. The author is Adam Grant. And if you've read the book called “Think Again”, he's amazing. Like I like listening to his podcasts very regularly on TED also. But the way he presents unlearning of things is amazing. Like the way he presents this via storytelling way is very impressive. And it's very important for people to unlearn what they have already learned, especially as we venture into this new industries, new models. We are no longer in a very simple SaaS based or subscription based business like we talked about usage based, it's very different ballgame. So very important to unlearn what you already know and be open to learning new things.
That's interesting. You mentioned that, I think we need to unlearn that CPQ billing and ERP need to be separate.
Yes, that's the critical part here that these are all the nervous systems of the company and they all need to work together and not in silos.
Awesome.
And you nailed it, Sandeep, like unlearned the fact that CPQ and billing should be different.
Awesome, Ruchi. Hey, once again, thank you so much for your time today.
All right. Thank you so much, Sandeep, for having me.
