Founder Stories: Aparna Bhatnagar Saxena and her Values, Passion and Purpose
- Andrew
- Apr 15
- 5 min read
Updated: Apr 15
Introducing Aparna
Aparna Bhatnagar Saxena is an unapologetic feminist, a vegan, an environmentalist, and a student for life. She is the founder of AHANA Lifestyle, a platform that aims to enable eco focused and ethical businesses across the Global South, and CEO of TORAJAMELO. Her career of over 19 years has spanned 4 countries in Asia in Global, Regional, and Country roles in start-ups, SMEs, larger corporations and impact businesses. 7 interesting and eventful years of her career were spent in Singapore which she considers formative for her development as an entrepreneur. She is the Indonesia lead of Asia Startup Network, which aims to support the creation of a thriving network that collaborates and supports entrepreneurs and business. Aparna is also co-founder of Vriksh Impact Partners, a boutique investment and advisory firm in India that is focused on supporting early stage businesses especially women founded and plant-based businesses.
In her own words
Fun fact: I was Track Marshall with the Singapore Grand Prix and Australian Grand Prix for a few years when I was based in Singapore!
Dream: To climb Mount Everest as a personal challenge. However now noticing the negative impact (read trash) previous mountaineers have caused around the route, I haven’t been actively pursuing this as I don’t want to add to the problem.
1. What are your top 3 values?
Values are those non-negotiable principles that are integral to every being. And for me a values-driven life is a life worth living. I hold the following values very close to my heart - integrity (walking the talk, standing in one's own truth), conscientiousness (doing what is right), and holding oneself to high standards however difficult the times might get (commitment to not giving up easily).
2. What keeps you up at night?
What keeps me up at night is a combination of the usual questions that haunt founders in addition to some that are very personal to me.
As an entrepreneur, the company's funding, cashflows, customers and market, and having a good team is always challenging me. Right now, I am operating with a very lean team as we prepare for our next stage of expansion and I am also in the process of readying funding the same time. I am doing this totally alone as a lone founder, so this makes the process slower than usual. Everything from strategising to execution falls on me, because where I am based, delegation does not always work well so I need to be involved in every single project and task to really see things through. I am definitely on the lookout to have a senior team member join in to take this forward with me, because we are looking at a proper market entry to Singapore and Japan. Planning has been ongoing, and those are two markets where we are looking for collaborators, and partner distributors who believe in our work and our mission.
I also worry about the current situation of our world and the way we have and are over consuming, how we have become apathetic to the environmental damage we have caused, and how we have become slaves to instant gratification.
At a very personal level, I often think about my father and my eldest brother, both of whom I lost recently and whom I miss terribly.
3. What gets you out of bed in the morning?
What gets me up in the morning is the fact that there is still so much to be done and we don’t have much time.
There is so much to achieve, so many more lives to touch, and a lot of ground to be connected across the region. Being in the impact space makes all this quite worthwhile, and it keeps me going. And I look forward to the conversations that I have with AHANA partners as it is always a delight and my privilege to work with inspiring business owners who are creating products that solve a problem.
I am also a firm believer of the thought, traced back to Hillel the Elder - “If not now then when? And if not me, then who?”.
4. What fills your cup?
There are few things that give me a sense of happiness. Do note, that I don’t get satisfied easily!
A few of my happy things:
A project well delivered within timelines
A satisfied customer that appreciates us and buys from us again
A community that is able to become economically aware and eventually resilient through collaboration with us
Being able to help others without wanting anything in return
Being able to minimise negative impact to the environment
Seeing more women leaders come up and succeed
Finally last but definitely not the least - being with my family and my young nephew gives me joy.
5. What’s your vision for AHANA?
My vision for AHANA is to be an ecosystem enabler for Impact SMEs across the entire value chain and the go-to platform for ethical shopping for both businesses and consumers. I would like to reach a stage where “when you think good, you think of AHANA”. And I want AHANA to stand for the Global-South and Asia.
No one is meant to do this alone! We need collective action and effort. We need many AHANAs to come together to make a dent towards ethical consumption.
I know this is a tall order, and I won’t be able to achieve this without the support of an able team, supporters, partners, customers and to a certain level we will need regulatory support also. However, I know this is possible and we will continue to evolve and iterate to achieve that. It will need to be a continuous journey of evolution.
6. Please leave us your well wishes for SG60.
I wish all Singaporeans, residents of Singapore, and well-wishers of Singapore warmest wishes for 60 years of the formation of the Republic of Singapore. I hope Singapore continues to foster a spirit of collaboration and partnerships globally and keeps standing tall as a hallmark of Asian values built around purpose and Asian pride.
I am happy to be of service and support for your impact journey, and you can reach out to me via my instagram @aparnasaxena11 or LinkedIn. Please do support ahana.co as we stand for collective voice of the Global South to the world!
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