Week 1 of Ideabaaz (October 25–26, 2025) did exactly what we hoped it would: give real Indian founders a national stage and let the ideas speak for themselves. The premiere weekend moved fast—two crisp episodes, a host who’s both anchor and enabler, and Titans who cut through fluff to ask the questions that matter. By Sunday night, you could already sense the show’s rhythm: rigorous, empathetic, and refreshingly outcome-driven.
If you’re catching up, start with the Ideabaaz, then keep browsing our TV Shows hub to line up more non-fiction that fits your weekend mood. From there, it’s easy to jump back into the pitches everyone’s talking about.
The launch weekend in one frame
Saturday’s opener set the tone. Episode 1 closed on a headline moment—host Pratik Gandhi became the brand ambassador of the first idea—a subtle but powerful signal that Ideabaaz isn’t just about cheques; it’s about skin in the game. Episode 2 widened the lens with a fuller slate, balancing consumer ideas with problem-solvers built for the real world. Both episodes aired in our weekend primetime band and simul-streamed on ZEE5, with regional telecasts scheduled across our network so that Bharat’s builders and families could watch together.
The room, the rules, the rigour
We designed Ideabaaz as a marketplace-first non-fiction series: founders pitch to a panel of Titans who’ve built and scaled in the wild—operators like Arjun Vaidya, Jimmy Mistry, Sandesh Sharda, Shaili Chopra, Anupam Bansal, among others. Their questions are practical (unit economics, distribution, defensibility) and their offers—whether capital, mentorship, or strategic access—are anchored in execution. It’s not theatre; it’s a deal desk with cameras on.
Five moments that defined Week 1
1) A host who doubles down
There’s craft in the way Pratik Gandhi steers the room: he eases founders into clarity, reads the panel’s appetite, and keeps the stakes visible. When he stepped in as brand ambassador in Episode 1, it wasn’t a flourish; it was a commitment that tells early-stage makers, “We’ll meet you on the field, not just in the boardroom.” That choice set the reality show’s emotional temperature—and the bar for follow-through.
2) Teja & Venkat’s life-saving idea
Sunday’s clip of Teja Dadi and Venkat Sai Ram distilled the show’s purpose. Their GPS-enabled life jacket is the kind of utility-first innovation you want to see funded: clear problem, credible solution, real-world stakes. The pitch drew immediate interest, with on-air cues of collaboration from the panel. It’s exactly the sort of idea that benefits from Titan networks—policy conversations, pilot access, procurement pathways.
3) ‘SkinInspired’ takes the floor
A two-year-old skincare startup walking into a room of operators could easily have leaned on gloss. Instead, SkinInspired kept it matter-of-fact: formulations aligned to Indian skin needs, a direct articulation of product edge, and a founder duo that projected both credibility and hunger. Social clips teased the segment through the weekend; inside the room, the brand’s clarity earned real attention.
4) ‘Neon’ and the kid-tech mandate
With ‘Neon’, Kranti Gada pitched a kids-focused platform that blends utility with guardrails—exactly where the category is moving. The right question isn’t “Is kid-tech big?” It’s “Can you build trust and habit without noise?” The clip suggests a tight value proposition and a market that’s primed for focused, parent-approved use-cases—hence the panel’s interest.
5) Bengaluru’s student-talent play
The pitch from Maitri & Apoorva felt instantly relatable: a platform that helps students showcase talent and gain recognition. It’s a classic “make the invisible visible” product—simple to explain, easy to champion, and deeply scalable within campuses and local communities. The Titans responded the way we expected: lean in, test the mechanics, map the distribution.
Why the format lands
The backbone here is clarity. Founders arrive with working ideas; Titans interrogate without theatrics; and the outcomes are legible—interest shown, collaborations hinted, next steps made explicit on screen. That discipline is by design. Ideabaaz launched at the National Stock Exchange with a commitment to turn television visibility into real marketplace outcomes, and Week 1 held that line.
A pan-India telecast for a pan-India problem set
Entrepreneurship isn’t a metro monopoly, and neither is Ideabaaz. Alongside our national slot—weekends, 6:30 PM—Week 1 also rolled out regional telecasts across language feeds so families could discover and discuss pitches together. The effect is subtle but important: the more people see relatable founders in their language, the more “I could do this” moves from wishful to workable.
The Week 1 aftertaste: energy, not hype
What lingers after two episodes isn’t the sound of applause; it’s the sound of decisions. You hear it when a Titan says, “I’m interested, if…,” or when a founder rewires a go-to-market on the fly. You see it when the host converts belief into public commitment. In a landscape crowded with noise, Week 1 of Ideabaaz felt like a well-run review meeting—the kind where good ideas leave with momentum.
If you’re joining late, start here
Begin with Episode 1, “Pratik Gandhi Becomes the Brand Ambassador of the First Idea,” then jump to Episode 2 for the full slate—Teja & Venkat’s life jacket, SkinInspired, Neon, and more. Each segment is easy to navigate via clips on the show page, and the full episodes give you the context that clips can’t. That’s where you’ll catch the cadence of the room: the short silences before a number drops, the quick pivots when a Titan probes distribution, the relief when a founder finally gets to the slide that matters.
What to expect next weekend
Expect sharper sector focus and the same no-nonsense questioning from the panel. The early mix—consumer problem-solvers, civic-minded safety tech, youth and education products—will broaden as we bring in deep-tech and services that don’t usually make it to TV. If Week 1 was our handshake, Week 2 is where we roll up our sleeves.
How to Watch Ideabaaz (Weekends, 1-hour episodes)
Launch: 25 October 2025 · Frequency: Every Saturday & Sunday · Runtime: 60 minutes
Simulcast: 6:30 PM on Zee TV (Hindi) and live on ZEE5 at 6:30 PM with multi-language feeds.
Regional telecast time bands (Sat–Sun):
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Zee TV (Hindi): 6:30 PM
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Zee Bangla (Bengali): 11:00 PM
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Zee Sarthak (Odia): 5:00 PM
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Zee Punjabi: 6:00 PM
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Zee Marathi: 5:00 PM
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Zee Tamil: 11:00 PM
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Zee Telugu: 11:00 PM
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Zee Kannada: 10:30 PM
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Zee Keralam (Malayalam): 10:30 PM
Come for the pitches; stay for the decisions. The ideas are already moving.
Stream Week 1 highlights and full episodes now on ZEE5.
Bio of Author: Gayatri Tiwari is an experienced digital strategist and entertainment writer, bringing 20+ years of content expertise to one of India’s largest OTT platforms. She blends industry insight with a passion for cinema to deliver engaging, trustworthy perspectives on movies, TV shows and web series.
