Interviewer- What according to you is your 'Success Mantra'?
Dr. Vikas Gupta- Visionary entrepreneurs need to keep one very important thing in their minds all the time. They should remember that they, like Shiva, are destroyers and disruptors of the existing market ecosystem in their field; and, they, like Brahma, are creating a new ecosystem.
Given the above, they should always keep the one Success Mantra at the top of their minds: Don’t look at the customers, channel partners, competitors or consultants for answers. Learn deeply about your market and focus on your vision.
Be focused on your Vision, flexible on your Strategy and experimental with your Tactics
Interviewer-What are the keys you use to maintain the efficiency of your work?
Dr. Vikas Gupta- There are operations which have stabilized. The faster you establish a process for those, the more efficient your established business works. The next step is to delegate that process to a team and train that team well to self-manage on the relevant efficiency parameters.
Then there is the “new initiatives” part of your business. Here you have to be hands-on as the leader and try out a lot of new ideas to learn what works and what doesn’t. Here efficiency should be measured in learning the maximum, within the shortest time, with the least amount of money at risk.
Once enough is learned and the new initiative is stabilized, it is moved to the process-driven delegation team.
And one moves on to the next “new initiative” which will drive growth.
Interviewer- How do you manage to handle the pressure to satiate your client’s needs?
Dr. Vikas Gupta- In any business the most critical client need one needs to satiate is the fundamental promise, i.e. the “value proposition” of the product.
For example, in investment management, the most critical client need is to provide the best investment portfolio which is (a) immune or resistant to capital losses and (b) has the highest likelihood of wealth creation in the long run. Our mission at OmniScience Capital is to “Kill Risk, Create Alpha”.
Based on multiple decades of research on discovering the first principles of investing and testing them out in the investment markets across the globe, we have developed our proprietary Scientific Alpha Investment Engine.
Scientific Alpha codifies these first principles of investing and allows us to search the whole listed investment universe, whether the Indian stock market or the global developed stock markets (i.e. US, EU, UK or JP) for the best investment portfolio based on the client need.
The major de-risking of the client portfolio is done by Scientific Alpha through its industrial strength search process. What is left are the SuperNormal Companies with stable business models, strong (ideally, cash-rich) balance sheets, and a persistent competitive advantage. The powerful balance sheets and strong cash flow generation of these companies act like extremely powerful engines in a sports car. These powerful engines are what drives the growth of these companies.
These companies are already primed to provide wealth creation for the client over the long run. But this is enhanced significantly by the next step of Scientific Alpha which is buying these companies at SuperNormal Prices.
It should be clear by now that the way we handle the incessant pressure to satisfy the client needs is through establishing a very well-defined investment framework in the form of the Scientific Alpha Investment Engine. This helps in continuously being fully in control of client portfolios while all the while being able to sniff out the best deals in the markets.
Interviewer- What are the aspects that sets you apart from all other investment management companies?
Dr. Vikas Gupta- Based on our multiple decades of research, thinking and practice of investment management, we have a number of very crucial and specific ideas about it.
Capital for us is a sacred thing. It is the crystallization of centuries of human ingenuity combined with human effort using natural resources. The total global wealth of approximately $300 Trillion symbolizes and quantifies the centuries of innovation and hard work combined with leveraging natural resources by our ancestors and current generation. We cannot let capital be deployed irrationally.
Our quest for deploying capital rationally and in the best possible manner positioning it for the least future wealth creation is what sets us apart. In more concrete terms, Scientific Alpha, which we have described above, is a key differentiator. The most important aspect of value investing which most other fund managers and investors miss is the risk averse mindset. This is codified in Scientific Alpha and in the DNA of OmniScience Capital.
Scientific Alpha is built on the philosophical foundations of value investing of Warren Buffett and his guru Benjamin Graham. But it has evolved into a modern day, highly structured framework, which allows the search across the full investment universe.
When we give a portfolio to the client, we are confident that this is the best portfolio which a client could have from the whole investment universe. This passion for investment management and the depth we are willing to go to to provide the best portfolio to our clients is what sets us apart.
Interviewer- What according to you future corporations should not be afraid of while establishing their company?
Dr. Vikas Gupta- Future corporations should always be focused on their vision. If the vision is based on a clear intuition of the founder of what disruption the market needs and what alternative, innovative solution the entrepreneur provides then the future corporation should not be afraid of achieving that vision.
Any disruptor, naturally, will face hurdles and challenges. They should not be afraid of these and need to be flexible and experimental on their strategy and tactics respectively to achieve the vision. Don’t be afraid of hurdles, they are bound to come. As long as you are persistently and passionately moving towards your vision, the journey of 1000 miles, the goal will be achieved.