From $500K to $1.5M ARR: Bootstrapping VR SaaS for Trade Skills

Summary

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Podcast Summary:

SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders
Host: Nathan Latka
Guest: Sabari Nir, Co-founder and CEO of Skillveri (skilveriVR.com)
Episode Title: From $500K to $1.5M ARR: Bootstrapping VR SaaS for Trade Skills
Date: December 31, 2025

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Episode Overview

This episode explores how Sabari Nir bootstrapped and scaled Skillveri, a VR-based SaaS company revolutionizing vocational training in trade skills like welding and spray painting. The conversation covers Skillveri’s early challenges, pivot from hardware to SaaS, current growth trajectory, customer base, and strategies for growth in the U.S. educational market.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Skillveri’s Product and Market

• Product Overview:
  • Skillveri sells virtual reality & mixed reality (XR) simulations for hands-on vocational training (e.g., welding, spray painting).
  • The product runs on off-the-shelf VR headsets (e.g., Meta Quest, Pico), sometimes paired with custom hardware extensions like a spray gun or welding gun for added realism.
    [01:08–01:35]
• Customer Segments:
  • Primary: High schools, middle schools, and community colleges in the U.S. with Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs.
  • Secondary: Industrial employers requiring in-house staff training (mainly outside the U.S.).
    [01:43–02:05; 05:03–05:24]
• Business Model:
  • Unique in offering a SaaS subscription (starting at $4,000/year for up to five headsets), compared to competitors’ expensive, one-time-purchase setups ($35,000+).
  • Hardware accessories are available as upgrades ($2,500 per extension, one-time purchase).
    [02:13–03:09; 11:10–12:16]

2. Revenue, Pricing & Growth Metrics

• ARR and Customer Base:
  • 2024 Revenue: $500K
  • 2025 Run Rate: $1.5M
  • U.S. customer base: ~100 schools (~500 headset installations)
  • Global reach: ~250 additional customers
    [07:06–07:54; 08:15–08:21]
• Pricing Details:
  • Most schools pay $15k–$20k/year for software; some start at $4k.
  • Largest current contract is $350k/year; average school is around $15–20k/year. [04:03–04:40]
  • Schools typically buy a mix of VR headsets and a few hardware extensions per classroom (not always 1:1 with headsets).
    [12:53–13:16]
• Revenue Mix:
  • 60% software (recurring), 40% hardware and packages (one-off plus perpetual license software).
    [03:33]

3. Business Pivot & Funding Journey

• Company Origins & Pivot:
  • Founded in 2012, initially focused exclusively on hardware.
  • Pivot to software/SaaS in 2021 after pandemic-induced revenue collapse and shipping challenges.
    [08:21–09:18]
• Funding History:
  • Raised $1.2M Series A in 2016 (early-stage capital for hardware business).
  • Bought out early (Indian, impact-investor) investors in 2021 at 50% of original investment, regaining founder control.
    [09:25–10:08]
• Current Stance on Fundraising:
  • Operating bootstrapped, open to raising only for expansion into adjacent product lines.
    [10:34–10:53]

4. Hardware Choices & Ecosystem

• Hardware-Agnostic Approach:
  • Software compatible with major VR headsets (Meta Quest, Pico); schools purchase these off-the-shelf.
  • Custom hardware designed as lightweight, tactile tool extensions to enhance immersion.
    [11:02–12:16]
• Strategy on Hardware:
  • Not planning to return to heavy, proprietary hardware—extensions now serve as accessories, not core.
    [11:42–12:07]

5. Go-to-Market and U.S. Expansion via Resellers

• Scaling with Resellers:
  • Shift from direct sales to a network of 10 independent U.S. resellers, especially as the customer base scales geographically.
    [07:54–08:15; 13:16–13:38]
  • Commission ranges: 3–4% (supported sales) up to 20% (independent sales).
    [16:03–16:09]
  • Notable reseller: Learning Labs (LLI), covers multiple states.
    [15:05–15:12]
  • Reseller selection via word of mouth and direct outreach, with dedicated training and onboarding workshops.
    [13:38–14:54]
• Rationale Against Expanding In-house U.S. Sales Team:
  • High logistical costs and broad distribution make reseller model more efficient, especially for $5K–$30K deals.
    [16:42–17:25]

6. Vision and Growth Aspirations

• Market Opportunity:
  • Only scratched the surface: 26,000 U.S. schools with CTE; 1,000 community colleges.
  • Goal: Reach 2,000 schools ($10M ARR) in U.S. in near term; 8,000 in 5 years.
    [07:06–07:54; 17:47–18:00]
• Buyer Reluctance to Sell:
  • Not interested in selling today, even at $4M cash, due to confidence in future growth.
    [00:27–00:32; 17:47–18:00]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Bootstrapping & Investor Buyout:

  "We paid about 50% of what we had."
  — Sabari Nir, on buying out early investors at a discount after pandemic challenges [09:38]

• On Selling the Business:

  "No, I see a lot of growth right now. I would like to take you to 2,000 schools in the next two years, 8,000 schools in five years."
  — Sabari Nir, on turning down a $4M all-cash acquisition offer [17:47]

• On the VR Learning Experience:

  "So you would have a school which has multiple screens, and one student would be using it. Four or five other students would be watching … there would be a sense of competition as well … it encourages more and more practice in a very gamified manner."
  — Sabari Nir, describing the collaborative/gamified classroom use case [06:16]

• Commission Structure for Resellers:

  "It could range from something like 3, 4% to as high as 20%."
  — Sabari Nir, on reseller commission rates [16:03]

• Biggest Lesson for Young Entrepreneurs:

  "I realized that building is tough, but it is tougher to sell. It is tougher to have a financial way of thinking. So I wish the financial skills I had, or at least I knew the importance earlier on."
  — Sabari Nir [18:53]

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Important Timestamps

• [00:02]: Largest software contract to-date: $350K
• [01:08–01:35]: Product overview: VR/MR simulation with hardware extensions
• [03:33]: Revenue mix: 60% software / 40% hardware
• [04:03]: Largest customer contract, $350K/year
• [07:06]: ARR confirmation: $1.5M, plan to reach $10M
• [08:15]: Last year's revenue: $500K
• [09:38]: Buying out investors at 50% of investment
• [11:10]: Off-the-shelf VR hardware pricing and compatibility
• [13:38]: Finding and scaling with resellers
• [15:05]: Example reseller: Learning Labs (LLI)
• [16:03]: Reseller commission: 3–20%
• [17:47]: Wouldn’t sell for $4M—growth focus
• [18:53]: Advice to younger self: Sales skills matter most

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Lightning Round

• Favorite Business Book: Peter Drucker or Eliyahu Goldratt works [18:05]
• CEO Admired: Sridhar Vembu (Zoho) [18:12]
• Favorite Tool: Unity + emerging use of AI tools (Perplexity) [18:24]
• Personal: Married, no kids, age 42 [18:44–18:49]

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Summary

Sabari Nir’s journey with Skillveri is a testament to resilience, strategic pivots, and bootstrapped growth. From a pandemic-induced crisis and investor buyout, Skillveri rebounded by focusing on scalable, cost-effective SaaS VR for trade skills—achieving $1.5M ARR, serving 100+ U.S. schools, and partnering with local resellers for distribution. With massive market potential, clear product differentiation, and a founder determined to keep building, Skillveri is poised for significant expansion in the years ahead.

Transcript

[A]

What are your largest software contracts there?

[B]

Currently it's at 350k for the largest contract. There are very costly methods to rate how you welded or how you painted separately on the field. So we want to add some AI grading tools for the real world so that a student, when they move from the simulation to the lab that they have in the school or when they go back to work, at some point they should be able to use an AI tool from us which would grade them objectively on how well they have painted or how well they are welding.

[A]

If someone came to you today and offered you $4 million, all cash up front, to sell the business, would you ex.

[B]

No. I see a lot of growth right now.

[A]

Hey folks, my guest today is Sabari Nir. He is the CO founder and CEO of Skillvery v r I.com where they're redefining vocational training through XR simulations. He started his career in deep tech before moving into product management and now he's building immersive solutions to bridge global skill gaps. He's also the Prime Minister's Champions of Change panel. On that panel on edtech and Skills. Sabar, are you ready to take us to the top?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So, all right, so take us in the product first. I'm going to share a screen here and go to your website. But. But tell us what we're looking at here. What does the company sell? What do you do?

[B]

So we sell virtual reality and mixed reality simulations that run on either a meta quest or a pico headset together.

[A]

Hold that up. Hold that up close to the camera so the audience can see it. I didn't realize you had an example. Yeah, very cool. So it's like a VR set.

[B]

It is, but you could pair it up with real world tools like a spray painting gun or welding gun.

[A]

That's awesome. So are you mainly then selling to, you know, companies that do a lot of welding who are onboarding and training hundreds of employees?

[B]

Yes, we have two major channels. I would say we have the industry which does their own in house training for their staff, but we also have a larger set of customers from the high schools and community colleges which have a CTE program. So that's where it's more popular in the US in Europe and in Asia. It's more popular with the industries.

[A]

I see. Very cool. And so how do you price this? Right. So if a school buys, I guess give me your sample customer. What do they look like?

[B]

So one example could be a high school in a place called Modesto, California. And so they have a SaaS version of our product, which means that they own the headsets like these and they use the controllers that come standard with the VR headsets to use the product. But they are looking at doing an upgrade to have one of these spray guns and the welding guns added to their program. So typically we are possibly the only one in this space who have a SaaS option as well. We compete with well established large corporations which sell costly one time purchase simulations which cost upwards of like $35,000. We have something starting at around $4,000 as a software subscription.

[A]

So 4,000 just gets me the software. How many headsets does that get me?

[B]

That can at the starting version of the product that can power up up to five headsets and you could additionally buy these hardware add ons, the welding gun or the spray painting gun that I showed. So that adds to the immersive feel and touch and feel of the real trade.

[A]

If you look at total revenue last year in 2024, what percent came from software versus your hardware sales?

[B]

It's currently about 60, 40 mix. 60% from software, 40% from hardware plus software packages. So we have a significant recurring revenue component coming from the software packages. But some schools enhance it by having a one time purchase of the hardware alone or sometimes they do like a full package. So we have very advanced simulations that sell upwards of $25,000 per set. But that includes the hardware and a perpetual license of the software.

[A]

Interesting. And I guess are you comfortable sharing the largest package you've ever sold? Like today, the largest customer you support? Don't name them obviously for confidentiality reasons. But what are your largest software contracts? There are these $50,000 per year contracts or 5 million per year contracts.

[B]

Currently it's at 350k for the largest contract. So we would like to take it up to about $1 million. Of course.

[A]

Yes, that's great. Now three, a customer paying you $350,000 per year as your outlier, that's your big kahuna, your big whale. What's the average customer though paying you for just your software annually?

[B]

Typically a school would either go in for a subscription as low as 4,000 that I mentioned or a typical one would be about 15 to 20 thousand dollars every year. It varies from school to school, district to district and what kind of skills that they want.

[A]

Okay, okay. You keep using sort of schools as your example. Is it fair to say that is your primary customer you're selling mainly to schools?

[B]

Yes, in the U.S. the schools, high schools and sometimes middle schools which have a CTE program. Those are the ones which primarily use sometimes community colleges. And in the US it's very rare in industry. We have only four or five industrial customers right now, but that's also changing.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so four to five industry customers, meaning you're branching out from just selling to schools. But that's in the early days. How many customers today are you serving with your software?

[B]

In the U.S. it's about 100 schools, which means about 500 installations. Typically, a school will have a minimum of five installations. Some of them may have 20 or 30.

[A]

Is an installation equivalent to like a seat? A single person using the software at a time.

[B]

The license is linked to a device, but a device can be used by as many students as they want. So there is no limit on the number of users, but there's a limit on the number of devices.

[A]

Okay, so when you say 100 schools and 500 installs. An average of five installs per school. An install is the software on one headset. That headset can be moved from a body to a body. So more than five people can use it, but only five at a time, at a single time can use it.

[B]

Yeah, this is typically how it looks. So you would have a school which has multiple screens, and one student would be using it. Four or five other students would be watching what the student is doing, and they would get a feel of what is this person doing and what kind of scores are that person doing. So they would take turns every 30 minutes to 40 minutes. So by the time they get their turn, they would have observed the other people and there would be a sense of competition as well. So you have. If I got 70 out of 100 in my attempt, my peer would want to have at least 71. So it encourages more and more practice in a very gamified manner.

[A]

Yeah, that makes sense. Now, you mentioned 100 school, then $15,000 average annual contract value. If I multiply those, I get about a $1.5 million software run rate for your company. Is that accurate?

[B]

Yeah, that's where we are currently at, but we are looking at. So we are only at 100 schools in the US 250 other customers globally, worldwide. But we're looking at. There are about 26,000 schools in the US which have a CTE program. There are a thousand community colleges which have a CTE program. And so the. The scope to grow is. Is much larger. So we have. Earlier, we used to do only direct selling. Now we have about 10 resellers covering about 35 of the 50 states. In the US and so we hope to grow to 2000 schools at an average of $5000 minimum per school. So we are looking at growing to $10 million. ARR, it's, it's a steep growth, but that's what we, we believe should be possible.

[A]

I want to talk more about how you expand in the United states using those 10 resellers. I also want to talk more about how you funded the company bootstrapped versus VC or not. And then also just more about how the hardware and software work together. Before we do that though, I just want to make sure I get you, I have your growth sort of accurate. So if you're at a 1.5 million run rate today, in 2025, are you comfortable sharing what revenue was in 2024?

[B]

It was about 0.5.

[A]

Okay, and when was your first year revenue? When did you launch this thing?

[B]

Yeah, so this, what we are talking about now is our pivoted form of business. So we had an earlier life before the aggregate of virtual reality. We built a lot of hardware ourselves and we started in 2012.

[A]

And that's when you were doing hardware?

[B]

Yes. And we then just before the pandemic, we had switched over to the.

[A]

We.

[B]

Pivoted to the software mode which allowed customers in the US to buy the headsets off Amazon or wherever and then just load our software onto it. And we had to pivot because we were facing problems during the pandemic here in India with our revenues going close to zero because we were not able to ship these products out. And our investors at that point of time were very India centric impact centered investors. So they, they wanted out, so we gave them an exit. So we, the promoters bought back the company.

[A]

And then what year was that? 2021.

[B]

Yes, 2021.

[A]

And how much did you have to pay them to buy them out?

[B]

We paid them. You know, I, I, Is it okay if I don't disclose that amount? Well.

[A]

Oh, can you maybe share a range? There's other people listening that might want to copy your strategy in terms of buying out some of their investors so they can learn from you.

[B]

Okay, so we, we paid about 50% of what we had.

[A]

Okay, so if they put in $2, you bought them out for a dollar.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

Okay, got it, got it. And I mean, are we talking like before that? How do you raise? Like a, like, I guess, how much, how do you raise? Was it just an angel round or a series A, B, C?

[B]

It was back then called a series a. It was $1.2 million but back then, this is 2016. Back then it was called a Series A. Now I see. Now I see seed rounds at $5 million.

[A]

So that was 2016. You said the Series A. Yeah, okay, got it. And that was. So the all in capital you had raised before you bought Anyone out was 1.2 million into the company. You bought them out for 50% of that amount in 2021 because your revenues crashed to zero because of COVID You were pivoting. And then you scaled back up with your software product and hardware product in 2024 to $500k of revenue. Now you're at a one you expect to do about 1.5 million today here in 2025.

[B]

Yeah, that's correct.

[A]

Very cool. Very cool. And you're going to stay bootstrapped going forward or any plans to raise.

[B]

So we are keeping it open right now for whatever business we have been pursuing right now with the current set of products. We don't want to raise money for that, but we are also looking at adding some adjacent products.

[A]

Can you just hold up the headset one more time there? This is the generic one people can buy on Amazon, right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What's the brand? Can you put the logo to the camera? What's the brand called here?

[B]

So this has a Meta logo up here. It is a.

[A]

It's the meta. So it's the Meta VR headset.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What does that retail for?

[B]

So this one retails for about $500, but there is a 300 version that also works. This is a Pico headset. So we are kind of agnostic to the hardware. Okay, so just to be clear, you.

[A]

Will work with any of these on my screen right now, the Meta Quest. And then what's the other one? Pico. Yeah, we go virtual. This one? Yes, the ico. Okay, cool. So these are the two soft, the hardwares that you recommend to your audience, you know, the schools, if they want to get five units for their classroom.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay, great. Very cool. So. And no plans to move back into the hardware space. You already did that back in 2012, 2013, and realized you didn't want to do that anymore, so you moved into software, Right?

[B]

We bought into software and then we realized that there is a certain value to hardware as an accessory, as an upgrade. So then we came back to hardware, which we made it very differently. So earlier we had huge, bulky hardware, but then now we have all these smaller ones, which.

[A]

So what is that? What is that? What do you sell that for? That you're holding right now.

[B]

So this one would sell for 2,500 one time. So they just paid once and they have it forever.

[A]

And you're building that yourself, that's like an extension that works with your software on the Meta headset? Yes.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. Okay, interesting. So if a school is buying for their ct, you know their program. Right. To train welders. Right. Or a community college and they need five of those extension welding sets plus five headsets. They're going to pay about five for headsets times 500 pop is 2500 plus they need five of those welding extensions that you just showed at. I think you said 2500 a pop. Right. So that's 12,500. So now we're up to like 15 grand and then they spend about another 15 grand for an annual thing on your software. So it's about 30k all in for a school to get started. Is that accurate?

[B]

Not necessarily. So what some schools do is to. The software would still work with, without the hardware extension. So they can, they could still work with this. So they would buy five headsets and then they may buy two or three of those extensions. So they would get the beginners to work on just the controllers and then as they progress on the lessons, they would get them the, the hardware extensions.

[A]

I see. Very interesting. Tell me more about, about how you grew. Right. My audience loves growth stories that they maybe can learn from. You mentioned that you obviously found it in India. You've expanded in the US you have a large presence in the US and you have that presence through using a reseller program. Some people will hire full time employees in India. Why did you go the reseller route and how did you find those first 10 resellers?

[B]

So word of mouth was how we found the. So we had a couple of resellers before and we found challenges with onboarding of customers. So one of the biggest challenges with a tech like this is that unless somebody wears it and then feels the immersive method of how we are using this tool, it doesn't sound different from any of my competitors products. So most of my competitors have tech from maybe 10, 15 years back. And so for example, we use mixed reality quite a lot. So you wear the headset, you see virtual equipment in front of you, but you also see the surroundings and you can walk around with the headset, which is wireless. So some of these things, if we try to do without a reseller, what would happen is that they would think that this is just like one of the competitor products. So they may not have had great success with that. So it can't be better than that is a typical refrain we keep hearing. But the moment they wear the headset and try it, they are totally wowed.

[A]

So that all makes sense to me. Subari. My. My specific question is, how did you. How are you finding and incentivizing these resellers to sell your product? Can you maybe name, like, what's the website of one of your top resellers.

[B]

In the U.S. so there's one company called Learning Lab. So these are typically smaller companies which operate in three, four or five states. This site.

[A]

Learning Labs.

[B]

No, Learning Labs. LLI is how they are called.

[A]

These guys?

[B]

Yeah, yeah, these guys. Yes.

[A]

Okay. So they heard about you via word of mouth. They said, we love your product. You said, okay, let's. Let's incentivize you. Why don't you sell more of our products into the U.S. what. You know, you don't have to share their specific deal, but in general, how are you paying resellers to take the time to sell your product?

[B]

So typically, we would handhold them. We would run some workshops to train them on how to demonstrate our product, how to highlight the benefits that this has over the other people. Also, about. We have different scales of how much effort they put and how much commission they make. So if we are assisting them very actively, then the commission is less. But if they are doing it entirely on their own, which they have started doing now, then they get a much higher commission.

[A]

What's the range? What's the low? What's the high?

[B]

See, it could range from something like 3, 4% to as high as 20%. So.

[A]

Okay, got it. So if one of these folks, you know, sells $100,000 package and requires very little help from you, you might pay them, you know, 10, 11, 12, you know, up to 20%, potentially $20,000 on the $100,000 sale. Yeah, I see. Very cool. And how many. You said there's 10 resellers like learning Labs that you're working with?

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Okay. At what point do you go, man, it makes sense for me to put a body or two in a small office in California and do this ourselves because we're paying our resellers so much in referral fees.

[B]

No, actually, we find that we were earlier doing a lot more direct. Now we are switching that to have more and more resellers to do that. Mainly because US is a large country. It's. It's. Even if we have an office in. So whenever I'm in the US I operate out of Dallas, and then I Fly towards various parts of the country. But then we have prospective customers all over the country. We have three installations in Alaska, three schools in Alaska. So it, it's very difficult for us to, even if we are based in one central point, to, to fly to all the parts of the country and then do the sale. Especially if your sale volume is only $5,000 recurring, then your flight expenses itself might eat away all that.

[A]

Okay, that makes sense. The reseller model makes sense to me. Hey, we're about out of time, so let's wrap up here with some rapid fire stuff. First question I have is just on, on, on valuation. If someone came to you today, you know you're doing 1.5 annually, right? We didn't talk about profit or marginal things like that, but we know that you own most of the company because you bought out your investors. But if someone came to you today and offered you $4 million, all cash up front, to sell the business, would you exit?

[B]

No, I, I see a lot of growth right now. So like I said, I, I would like to take you to 2,000 schools in the next two years, 8,000 schools in the next five years. So I may be open to selling after five, six years. Not, not right now.

[A]

All right, sounds good. Let's wrap up with the famous five. Number one, favorite business book.

[B]

Most books by Peter Drucker or Eliyahu Goldratt.

[A]

That's a good one. Number two, is there a CEO you're following or studying right now?

[B]

So there's an Indian origin CEO who started this company called Zoho. I don't know if you have heard.

[A]

Of them, but Zoho is the most successful bootstrap company in the world. Number three, what's your favorite online tool for building your business?

[B]

So internally we use Unity for creating all the virtual reality software. Recently I've been playing around with perplexity and some of the AI tools and seeing how can I make things faster than what I was doing before?

[A]

Yeah, very good. And what's your situation today? Married, Single, Kiddos?

[B]

Married, no kids.

[A]

Married, no kids. And how old are you?

[B]

I'm 42.

[A]

Last question. Something you wish you knew when you were 20 years old.

[B]

So when I was 20, I was most of my 20s, I was working for somebody else and I was focusing on building stuff. And I started this company when I was 29. And then I realized that building is tough, but it is tougher to sell. It is tougher to have a financial way of thinking. So I wish the financial skills I had, or at least I knew the importance earlier on. I did pick up those on the go, but I, I could have paid more attention in business school, you guys.

[A]

There you have it. Skill Vary sells products to school systems to help them train their students on things like, you know, spray painting in an industrial way or, you know, all kinds of sort of specialized skill sets. They sell to community colleges as well. They'll do 1.5 million of revenue this year, up from 500k in 2024. So Good Growth launched in 2012 as a hardware company at a 1.2 million Series A in 2016 before buying out his investors at a discount in 2021 when his revenues went to zero because of COVID Now he's on the rebound. He's selling fast in the US already in 100 schools. His go to market motion is he's leveraging 10 resellers in the US that he pays anywhere from 3% to 20% commission or on sales. His plan is to expand to 2,000 plus schools over the next couple years as he looks to continue to grow the business. Sabari, thank you for taking us to the top.