Balaji Ganesan is the co-founder and CEO of Privacera, an industry-leading cloud access and data governance platform. Hoping to learn more about his experience as a 2-time founder and the advice he would give to the next generation of entrepreneurs, we sat down with Balaji for a conversation.
What inspired you to start your own company?
The Privacera journey started with my earlier startup, XA Secure, where we solved a challenge of access control and governance in big data environments. Hortonworks acquired XA Secure, and the product turned it into a project called Apache Ranger. While at Hortonworks, I spent a lot of time with large enterprises to establish governance and security in their big data environments. Enterprises were constantly looking to extend the governance capabilities to all of their data, not just big data. These conversations led to the genesis of Privacera, where we leveraged the incredible work done in the Apache Ranger community to solve broader data governance challenges for all companies.
This is your second time starting your own company. What are some of the lessons learned from the first time? What are you doing differently this time?
I do get this question on how easy it is doing a second startup. My answer is that every startup is very different, with varied market dynamics, team, and even the customer base. Starting and building a company is a learning experience for any founder. I did learn a lot about taking a concept and building momentum in the market from my first startup.
With Privacera, I've approached things with a bigger vision in mind and a better understanding of the enterprise market. The previous experience certainly helped in our initial stages.
What challenges do you face as an entrepreneur and what is your long-term vision for Privacera?
As an entrepreneur, you have to be nimble and a fast learner to navigate the different challenges you face at each stage of your growth. It's similar to raising a child. For example, a parent may face different challenges when their child is an infant compared to a toddler, growing child, and a teenager.
I am building Privacera with a vision of helping every enterprise company in the world enable secure and governed access to their data using any application, any cloud. Our vision is bold and big. I wake up every morning excited about what we can do today, this week, this month, this year, and in the next few years to accomplish our vision. We are just starting our journey.