Karan Johar Gets Real About Business, Friendship & Bollywood On Sunday Brunch With Kamiya Jani

When you think of Karan Johar, you immediately picture a director orchestrating glitzy Bollywood spectacles. Yet, sit down with him for a conversation, as Kamiya Jani, our editor-in-chief, did on Sunday Brunch, and you realise that he’s far more than the man behind the camera. 

Lessons In Entrepreneurship From Bollywood’s Icon

Karan Johar is a multifaceted entrepreneur; he has Dharma Productions, Dharmatics, restaurants, jewellery lines and whatnot! But he quickly deflects credit. “My business sense isn’t the strongest,” he admits, pointing to his classmate and business partner, Apoorva Mehta, as the strategic brain behind the operations. Karan Johar brings the creative spark, and Apoorva grounds it in business logic.

Kamiya, curious to uncover Karan Johar’s secret to building successful partnerships, asked the question every founder dreads: How do you know you’ve found the perfect co-founder? Karan Johar didn’t hesitate and said, “instinct.” He trusts his gut more than any analysis. For him, analytical reasoning often kills potential deals, while instinct preserves them. Hiring, firing, and forming alliances start with a feeling you can’t explain but just know is right.

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Karan Johar Shares Insights On Sustaining Long-Term Business Success

The episode balanced insight with fun. Karan Johar and Kamiya played “Bollywood Business Leagues,” a game in which they assigned Bollywood personalities to hypothetical business roles. Karan Johar’s answers were witty and unexpected and revealed his knack for reading characters, a skill as crucial in boardrooms as on film sets.

Karan Johar also spoke about what separates a fleeting idea from a lasting business. Brands like Lenskart, Swiggy, MakeMyTrip, and BookMyShow didn’t become household names by accident. “It all begins with a gem of an idea,” he said, connecting it to his own upcoming show, Pitch to Get Rich, which celebrates creativity, strategy, and execution in equal measure. He emphasised the interplay between business and creativity: a solid business foundation doesn’t stifle imagination; it amplifies it, enabling bigger and bolder ideas.

Kamiya then probed with hypothetical scenarios, like facing a competitor who launches a more successful movie franchise. Karan Johar’s responses were candid, humorous, and grounded in both experience and intuition. He conveyed a rare mix of confidence, self-awareness, and humility, the kind that only comes from navigating decades of both artistic and commercial success.

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This episode isn’t just a masterclass in entrepreneurship; it’s a peek into Karan Johar’s mindset, where instinct trumps logic, creativity and business dance together, and partnerships thrive on trust and intuition. For anyone curious about the alchemy of ideas, business, and Bollywood, it’s a conversation worth watching and savouring.

Cover Image Courtesy: Internal