Tough times face India’s star-studded start-up ecosystem, but is there light at the end of the tunnel? That India’s start-up space has been on a roll since 2016 is an understatement. The country’s confounding and frequently downgraded growth projections notwithstanding, investors have bet big bucks on Indian start-ups. According to an EY report, investments by private equity (PE) players and venture capitalists (VCs) in start-ups have been rising each year — from $3.1 billion in 2016 to $7.9 billion in 2019 (See: Big-ticket deals). In fact, last year marked a record high for start-up investments both in terms of value as well as volume. Understandably, the ecosystem was optimistic about the new decade, until the spread of coronavirus threw a spanner in the works. During such times, who better than serial entrepreneur and promoter of several start-ups including Bigbasket, Portea Medical and HungerBox to discuss the impact of the pandemic on Indian start-ups? In this exclusive interview with Outlook Business, K Ganesh, co-founder, GrowthStory says how start-ups are dealing with the crisis and what they must do to survive.