In recent weeks, we’ve published two stories on Light of Hope, the Dhaka-based emerging education conglomerate—a long-form essay and an interview with its founder, Waliullah Bhuyian. In this article, we distill a series of fascinating lessons in entrepreneurship, management, strategy, gathering resources, growth, product, and overall venture building from LoH and its journey.
I have written elsewhere that if you want to build an important company, you have to solve an important problem. “The success of any company depends on the type of problem it solves. If you are solving an important problem that resonates with a large number of people, you’ll build something important that will lead to an excellent outcome. If you don’t work on an important problem, you’ll build a redundant venture that will struggle to survive.”
The second aspect of this is that solving hard problems is hard and takes a long time with sincere seriousness and relentless efforts.
Identify a significant challenge and remain dedicated to addressing it, even if it takes a long time and requires adjustments to the solutions and strategies, you have a formula for building an enduring venture.
There is a famous Jeff Bezos quote that I’m paraphrasing where he said people often spend more time following and working on the current trends and what's changing than trying to understand and work on things that don’t change and things that remain the same.
The fundamentals of the world and human psychology have been the same for much of human history. While the surface of how the world works has been in constant flux, the fundamental human needs and desires remain the same.
Several LoH ventures are built around services that meet our enduring and universal needs. For instance, its after-school and children's education venture Kids Times focuses on timeless skills like creativity, problem-solving, and emotional intelligence. ToguMogu on parenting and Goofi on children's education-focused books and skills. By offering products around these enduring needs, LoH has created a business model that's likely to remain relevant despite rapid technological changes.
This offers a valuable lesson in building for the long term. In a world obsessed with the latest trends, there's immense value in focusing on fundamentals that stand the test of time.
It is hard to overstate the importance of thinking big and having a vision. Having a compelling vision that addresses a fundamental need can be a powerful motivator and differentiator. If you can offer a vision that resonates with people it can make it easier for you to attract resources, build collaborations, build partnerships, and overall inspire your team. When we pursue something bigger than ourselves, it pulls out passion and energy from us. We find dedicating our time and energy to something bigger than ourselves meaningful.
This has been true for LoH to some extent. Waliullah Bhuiyan and his co-founders didn't just set out to create another edtech startup; they aimed to revolutionize education in Bangladesh and beyond. Their vision of preparing children for an uncertain future with timeless skills is both ambitious and deeply resonant.
LoH has followed an interesting trajectory from a solar-powered classroom project to a multifaceted education conglomerate. The company has gone through a series of evolutions to become a multi-product conglomerate. More interestingly, it has evolved its business model from a non-profit model to a for-profit social enterprise. The founders' ability to pivot from a charity model to a for-profit structure, and their constant evolution of products and services, demonstrates the importance of flexibility in entrepreneurship.
This reinforces the idea that we have written about many times that successful ventures aren't always those that stick rigidly to their initial plan, but those that can adapt and evolve based on market feedback and changing circumstances.
While acknowledging the value of partnerships, LoH also emphasizes the importance of developing strong internal capabilities. LoH's early experiences with outsourcing show the limitations of relying solely on external partners, particularly for core functions of a business. Investing in building a skilled internal team allows for greater control over quality and a deeper understanding of the company's mission.
LoH team has shown incredible resourcefulness. The company started with minimal resources, relying on the founders' savings and small grants. Over the years, it has used a combination of revenue generation, partnership, grants, and similar strategies to fund its operation and expansion.
LoH's modular approach to education, creating complementary components that can be integrated into existing systems, is brilliant from a scaling perspective. It allows for rapid iteration and makes the model potentially exportable to other markets.
This strategy offers valuable lessons in scalability. By creating modular solutions, companies can more easily adapt to different markets and contexts.
LoH's strategy of building a robust distribution network and leveraging partnerships for growth is another key lesson. By collaborating with schools, retailers, and even TV channels, LoH has been able to extend its reach far beyond what it could achieve alone.
This underscores the importance of strategic partnerships in scaling a business. It's a reminder that sometimes the fastest way to grow isn't to do everything yourself, but to collaborate with others who can amplify your impact.
LoH has over the years built an ecosystem of interconnected ventures. The company has a presence in several markets, a challenging approach for early-stage companies. While focus is critical in the early days of companies, this diversification has helped LoH weather challenges like the COVID-19 pandemic.
The company has eventually evolved into a conglomerate, which allows for better risk management, learning, and capital efficiency. While the startup world often emphasizes focusing on a single product or service, the LoH experience shows that a conglomerate model could be advantageous if done right and sequentially. Building multiple, interconnected revenue streams can create a more resilient business model.
However, it is important to note that premature expansion can cause serious challenges for companies when done for vanity reasons such as raising money or hiding failure in one area by expanding into another. I have written in the past that premature expansion for the wrong reason can be a fatal distraction for a startup. To that end, diversifications work best when done sequentially and for the right strategic reason. LoH’s ecosystem model can also be a useful framework in this context.
These are some of the useful lessons from LoH’s journey but there is more. Both the article and the interview are full of nuggets of wisdom and insights. Check them out here and here.
