ClassPass co-founder visits Singapore and shares valuable advice for entrepreneurs

This week Payal Kadakia, co-founder of ClassPass (the subscription-based service that lets users find and book fitness classes online) was in Singapore, and FirstCOUNSEL COO Linda Schindler was there at the intimate fireside chat held at Facebook.

ClassPass recently raised US$85 million in Series D financing led by Temasek (bringing the total to US$255 million), and Payal has been on both Forbes’ Women Entrepreneurs to Watch list and Fortune Magazine’s 40 under 40.

On product-market fit: "You don't need that many customers to prove product-market fit. I knew ClassPass worked when we had 150 customers. I had 2,000 email addresses from the company that didn't work, and that didn't mean anything."

On their biggest competitor: "Who is ClassPass's biggest competitor? Netflix, because we want to get you off the couch."

She shared personal stories of how she got her parents to accept her giving up “traditional success” for an untraditional path in dance, eventually leading to her starting ClassPass.

And her advice to entrepreneurs: "Build something that solves a problem" and "Be mission obsessed and not product obsessed."