From There to Here

“I Felt Alive”

• by Gagan Sharma
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Self-challenge leads to a lifetime of opportunity. Someone once asked me how I view my success. After thinking about it, I replied that success is a journey of self-exploration and of constantly challenging one’s self. If you improve, good things happen. If you don’t challenge yourself, life is boring. My journey began in 1993 at the Indian Institute of Technology, where I had dual majors—chemical engineering and computer science. My career goal at the time was to become an environmental engineer. Computer science was, I felt, a  nice complement. Big Moves I joined Deloitte in 1997 immediately following graduation and moved to the U.S., settling in Atlanta. The whole world was new to me—new surroundings, a new job and new challenges. I felt alive. At Deloitte I was involved in telecommunications and CRM projects for large clients, including software companies that were embarking on developing CRM software.  After two years, I felt restless. I needed a new vista, so I applied to Wharton to earn my MBA. I chose this path because Wharton had a reputation for being challenging. Again, I felt the urge to rise to the occasion.  I applied to graduate school with the intent of working on Wall Street as an investment banker. Early in the application process, I began to think about my Deloitte experience and a different career path. I had spent considerable time in call centers while working on CRM projects, and I wondered why they were operated exclusively in the U.S. I asked myself, “If you can operate a call center in Spokane, why not in India?” Business Calls That question was the seed of a new business idea. I shifted my focus from working on Wall Street to learning how to build a proper business. In my first year of studies, I collaborated with a former Deloitte associate with whom I shared my  idea for a global outsourcing company. He had worked alongside me on CRM projects and embraced the concept. We spent the next six months working on our business plan. By the end of the first year of school, I had raised capital to fund a startup. My investors’ support was conditional on my leaving school to manage the company. I agreed and dropped out of Wharton in 2000 to form iSeva, a global call center company, with my fellow Deloitte colleague as a co-founder.  People I knew didn’t think this opportunity was real. They cited the volatility in starting a new company and the belief that American businesses would never work with offshore vendors. But companies large and small were poised to take advantage of the Indian labor market. The gold rush was on. I had no doubt I could make good things happen. We focused on mortgage and high-tech, two categories in which we felt confident. Key to our success was focus and specialization. We developed relationships with marquee clients like Citi and Symantec. Over four years, we built a thriving $10 million-class business that employed more than 1,000 people. A “Growing” Challenge In 2004 it became clear to me that to survive in this industry, one had to be a big dog. We were surrounded by giants like Tata and Infosys and, in order to survive, we had to get big fast. The market for a small company just wasn’t there. We had raised some institutional capital, and our investor wanted to roll us up into a collection of complementary companies to build mass.  We sold our interest in the business, and I reapplied to Wharton to complete my MBA. I felt too young to retire, and I wanted a new challenge. I believe that, in life, what you do next is based on what you’ve already done. I took stock of what I knew and began to shape my next move. I knew the U.S. mortgage industry and the U.S.–India corridor. I understood technology and operations. I began to shape my next focus from those perspectives. More Searching . . . and Growth At iSeva, we focused on the origination side of the business, which was pretty crowded at the time. I began to study other parts of the industry and settled in on loan servicing, specifically subservicing. It combined outsourcing with operations, two competencies with which I felt comfortable. I completed my graduate degree in 2005 and began to search for an acquisition candidate. I created what is now called a search fund, where investors agree to contribute capital once you identify and acquire a company. In September 2005, I discovered BSI Financial Services, a company formed in 1986 to service motorcycle leases and auto loans. At the time, BSI was operating as the mortgage division of a bank. I signed the acquisition papers at the end of 2005 and closed early in 2006. We planned to focus on loan servicing for the conventional lending market. The end of 2005 saw home prices beginning to dip and foreclosures rising. By 2007, the Great Recession was looming, and I elected to shift our focus to nonperforming and distressed assets. I took my cues from our clients. They wanted  consistent returns, 100% regulatory compliance and operational transparency. We focused on managing expenses, training and modernizing our servicing platform. During the next 10 years, BSI Financial earned a reputation of being a nimble company that used technology to craft unique solutions for investors in the nonperforming loan (NPL) space. As the company grew,  Inc. magazine recognized us as one of the nation’s fastest-growing companies. Our workforce swelled from 15 full-time employees to 350. Along the way, we discussed and debated our strategic direction: How was the market evolving, and how should we best align our talents and resources in search of the newest opportunity? Around 2014, as our clients were disposing of REO property, I noticed that investors were swooping in to buy those properties to fix-and-flip or hold for single-family rental (SFR). These investors were playing a pivotal role in stabilizing and rehabilitating the real estate