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A Stanford dropout in Silicon Valley has a better shot at raising millions than most Indian founders ever will, says Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora. In a candid conversation with Zerodha co-founder Nikhil Kamath, Arora laid bare the cultural and structural barriers that continue to hold back India’s innovation potential.
“A kid who dropped out of Stanford has a higher chance [of building a $100M company] than here,” Arora remarked, pointing to the stark difference in how risk and failure are perceived in the Indian startup ecosystem compared to Silicon Valley or even Israel.
When Kamath asked whether India’s biggest barrier was risk capital or something deeper, Arora traced it to a complex cocktail of factors: capital, talent, infrastructure, ease of doing business—and most importantly, cultural acceptance of failure.
“For 25 years I’ve been asked why there’s only one Silicon Valley. Everyone wants to build one—in Bangalore, in Israel—but it’s not just money. It’s the culture,” he said. In Silicon Valley, Arora explained, founders who fail are often funded again. “There are people who’ve done something wrong, come back, and started companies again. And the market gives them the benefit of the doubt.”
Kamath agreed, referencing his Israeli speech trainer who said failure in Israeli tech circles is celebrated, not punished. Arora backed it with hard numbers: “I’ve bought 20 companies in the last seven years—more than half from Israel. There’s a different risk trade-off. In the U.S., a dropout says ‘I’m building a $100M company’ without blinking. In Israel, people feel lucky to exit at a billion.”
The conversation peeled back the narrative that India simply needs more VC money. Arora argued that India also lacks pattern recognition and success models. “Name the last five $20 billion companies to come out of India and live to tell the story,” he challenged.
Ultimately, both agreed: India’s roadblocks aren’t just economic—they’re cultural. Until failure is normalized and risk-taking is encouraged without stigma, building the next Silicon Valley in India may remain just an idea.
