Falguni Nayar built Nykaa to stand out from the crowd Nykaa, in its early years, was funded entirely by Falguni Nayar and her husband Sanjay Nayar, the chairman of private equity major KKR & Co. in India. The focus was on building an inventory-led business, as she said in a 2017 interview to The Economic Times. “The company ran on family funds for two years because I didn't want to raise money. I wanted to make the metrics happen,” Nayar had said then. “We had good momentum by the time I went to investors. We had access, since my husband and I were both bankers.”In the process, she has become the wealthiest self-made woman in India, is among the country's 20 richest people, and worth more than her peers who have either listed their startups or are in the process of doing so. (All of these people are men, save for Savitri Jindal—the richest woman in India—and Mobikwik cofounder Upasana Taku.)The company turned unicorn only in March 2020, after just f