Where I See Myself in 5 Years: The Honest Roadmap of a Builder
Five-year plans are usually corporate exercises in fantasy. This one is different — it's an honest assessment of where my businesses, skills, and life are heading, with specific milestones, potential failure modes, and the flexibility to adapt. From NoteArc to Kimaya Threads to parenthood — the holistic vision.
Most "where do you see yourself in 5 years?" answers are performance art — polished narratives of inevitable success. Reality is messier. My 5-year roadmap isn't a straight line from here to there. It's a directional intent with specific milestones, identified risks, and built-in flexibility for the life events and market shifts that no plan survives.
Year 1-2: Build the Foundation
NoteArc platform: Grow from personal blog to content platform with 50,000+ monthly readers. Monetize through: sponsored content (₹5,000-15,000 per article for relevant brands), digital products (development courses, business templates), and affiliate links (books, tools, services I genuinely use and recommend). Revenue target: ₹3-5 lakhs/year — not life-changing, but proof of concept.
Kimaya Threads: Expand from D2C website to marketplace presence (Amazon, Flipkart, Myntra Kids). Target: 200+ orders/month with 30%+ gross margin. Introduce 2 new collections per season. Build a small but loyal customer base through: exceptional product quality, consistent photography and branding, and personal customer communication.
Technical skills: Deepen expertise in Go (backend), React/Next.js (frontend), and system design. Target: senior/lead-level technical conversations. Build 2-3 open-source tools or libraries that establish technical credibility in specific domains.
French: Achieve DELF B2 certification. Comfortable in professional French conversations. Begin exploring Francophone Africa tech ecosystem connections.
Year 3-4: Scale and Diversify
NoteArc ecosystem: Launch NoteArc Insights newsletter with 10,000+ subscribers. Create a premium tier with deep-dive technical content, business analysis, and community access. Revenue target: ₹10-15 lakhs/year. The platform becomes a personal brand asset that generates opportunities beyond direct revenue.
Kimaya Threads expansion: Expand into boys' formal wear and sustainable school uniforms — large, underserved categories in the Indian kids' fashion market. Hire first part-time employee (operations/fulfillment). Target: ₹25-40 lakhs/year revenue with healthy margins.
ServiceCrud / SaaS product: Build and launch a SaaS tool in the e-commerce operations space — something that solves a problem I've experienced firsthand while running Kimaya Threads. Target: 100 paying customers generating ₹5-10 lakhs ARR.
Twins enter school: Navigate pre-school selection, establish daily routines that accommodate school schedules, and shift parenting mode from full-time physical care to structured learning support. The parenting workload shifts but doesn't decrease.
Year 5: The Inflection Point
By year 5, one of three scenarios should emerge: Scenario A (best case): Combined business revenue (NoteArc + Kimaya + SaaS) exceeds employment income. The decision to go full-time entrepreneur becomes financially obvious. Scenario B (likely case): Businesses generate significant supplementary income (₹15-25 lakhs/year combined) with clear growth trajectories. Continue employment for stability while scaling businesses gradually. Scenario C (reality check): Some businesses succeed, others don't. Double down on winners, shut down losers, and recalibrate. Failure of individual projects isn't failure of the strategy — it's information for better resource allocation.
The Risks I'm Planning For
Health risk: Developer life + twin parenting + multiple businesses = burnout risk. Mitigation: the 20-minute daily fitness routine, enforced rest, and regular health checkups. Market risk: Indian e-commerce is hypercompetitive. Kimaya Threads competes with Firstcry, Hopscotch, and hundreds of Instagram brands. Mitigation: niche positioning (organic, quality-focused) rather than price competition. Technology risk: AI is changing development work. Skills that are valuable today may be automated in 3 years. Mitigation: focus on architecture, system design, and business problem-solving — skills that AI augments rather than replaces. Family risk: Overextending across businesses at the expense of present parenting. Mitigation: explicit "non-negotiable" time blocks for family, defined business hours, and the willingness to scale back business ambitions if family needs require it.
The Underlying Philosophy
This roadmap isn't about achieving a specific net worth or status milestone. It's about building a life where: work is creative and self-directed, income comes from multiple resilient sources, skills compound over decades rather than depreciating with technology changes, family remains the priority that business serves (not the obligation that business displaces), and each year is more interesting than the last. The measure of success in year 5 isn't "did I hit the revenue target?" — it's "am I building, learning, parenting, and living in a way that I'm proud of?"