Starting entrepreneurship at a young age: Aneesh Dhawan, CEO of Knit

Aneesh Dhawan’s journey in business started early. As a teenager, he worked with a team at MIT to install a desalinization device in Haiti. The following year he launched a marketing company and also helped set up a solar-powered device for a school in Haiti. And as a high school senior, he founded the company that would later become his current business: Knit. Knit helps brands understand the next generation of consumers by empowering Gen Z to share feedback over video. In other words, before brands launch marketing content, they hire Knit to make sure the content will appeal to the young generation; doing away with the archaic focus group method of gaining consumer feedback. “If you think about how brands are talking to their consumers today, it is definitely not built for this world,”  he tells Carol. Aneesh uses sports as an example: Data shows that Gen Z doesn’t broadcast games or go to watch in person as much as generations before them did. Instead, they stream games. So Knit helps sports-related brands figure out how to monetize streaming and how to enhance the in-person experience to fit Gen Z's interests. In this episode, Aneesh tells us about a high school program that shaped his business mindset. And he brings us on his journey of founding start-ups and dropping out of college to go all-in. Listen to hear how the pandemic actually helped him pivot his idea to solve an issue all-size companies were encountering. And how, as a young entrepreneur, he took on the hiring of a dozen employees. Learn more about Aneesh Dhawan and Knit. You can find more information on all our episodes at Vertical Elevation, and you can find Carol on Twitter @carolbschultz or on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carolbschultz/.