Pranav Arora is a 24-year-old successful businessman who is regarded as a prominent entrepreneur, investor, venture capitalist, and philanthropist. He has an impressive portfolio of work behind him, having lead projects across industries like real estate, wealth management, and retail consumer goods. Pranav is currently the CEO for many global companies as well as the Vice President to charitable organization that supports young students known as The Arora Foundation.
Pranav was nice enough to take some time out of his busy schedule to answer some questions for us.
Where did being an entrepreneur all begin for you?
My path as an entrepreneur started when I was just 16 years old. I began by helping my parents open their own business which quickly developed into the global company it is today called Just Funky. In the last eight years, Just Funky has grown into a leading global manufacturer of licensed pop-culture products. It was during these beginning years of helping my parents grow Just Funky that I also was on my own adventure to build my own company. After years of creating my own company I decided to sell it and pursue my other passions. While helping my parents and building my own company is gained invaluable experiences that have pushed me to be the person I am today.
In your opinion, what are the most essential traits a successful entrepreneur?
I would say that attention to detail is an extremely important trait as being an entrepreneur is all about identifying opportunities and capitalising on them before someone else does. This means that when you interpret detailed market information, your attention to detail is going to be what causes the ‘omg’ moment when a great business idea is born. When you do make the wrong call, you need to learn from your mistake and see why you misinterpreted the data.
More important than that is the passion you have to have for what you do. If you aren’t passionate about the idea, then you won’t have the endurance to push through all the hard work that’s necessary to make your idea profitable. Your passion is going to be tested all the time, and if you give up all the work you did will have been for nothing. Every industry is different but focus and drive are useful in all of them.
What’s the mission for Just Funky and the other ventures you have?
Just Funky is all being deliberately different. We strive to create products that fans will use and love for years to come. Too often products are developed without consumers in mind, and that is when products fall short in the market. Seeing this issue, we sought out to create products that were created with fans in mind and found huge success. Today, Just Funky has over 110 passionate and dedicated team members in locations all over the world. Looking towards the future there is no telling what exciting new adventure we will meet, but we are happy to be along for the ride.
I am also developing a private equity fund known as JMTD Holdings that focused on creating long-term shareholder returns by using a mix of non-public and diversified public holdings. We combine passion and experience to create profitable opportunities for shareholders.
JMTD Holdings has a stake in multiple markets like wealth management, manufacturing as well as intellectual property profiles that generate royalties via trademarks and patents.
What does it take to make a thriving workplace environment?
For success in any business, you need an inclusive, strong and free workplace environment no matter what industry you happen to be in. In order to accommodate this kind of environment, an excellent leader is needed.
For example, I did not suddenly stop my hard work once I had established Just Funky, I continued and created Stunned Mind (effectively a twin company to Just Funky). Stunned mind is an eCommerce business that sells pop culture merchandise to collectors.
We know that our customers love the fact they can find everything they want in a single, convenient online location. Similar to Just Funky, the company’s success both externally and internally is due to strong leadership that recognised the importance of promoting the work/life balance of its employees.
What are some of the new technologies that are developing at Just Funky?
We are very excited about a huge new development in the form of our app Deciph-AR. The app works by allowing people to bring licensed brands and characters into real like via AR (augmented reality) technology.
We launched the app in Vegas at the Licensing Expo earlier this year and have enjoyed a lot of interest from investors, businesses and fans worldwide.
