Startup Saturday 1/2/3 – 2008

After a long time, I am back in action with my blogging. However, I am back with some real good information which could definitely help you if you are looking at understanding and being part of Entrepreneurship eco-system in India, especially , in Bangalore.

As you are already aware of KickStart, our initiative to support Entrepreneurship and its activities, I will not dig deep into them; but would highlight our new activity – Startup Saturday.

Our main motive behind this activity, is to provide a platform for entrepreneurs and entrepreneur wanna-be’s to come together and discuss various aspects of entrepreneurship. I know I am being a bit vague here, but I can assure you of what I wrote. We wanted to have this as a monthly event and started of the activity in February 2008. Startup Saturday happens on second Saturday of every month at the Indian Institute of Management campus in Bangalore. This is completely supported by NSRCEL, the incubation center of IIM B. Along with discussion, we provide a platform for entrepreneur’s to showcase their innovation to fellow entrepreneurs. Total time allocated for this event is 3 Hours.

We had 3 Startup Saturday’s till date and below is a summary of each of the Saturdays. I could not attend the second one, and hence will not speak about it much 🙁

Startup Saturday – Feb 16, 2008

This has been our first SS and we have been a bit tensed with the number of attendees who would turn up. We did no great marketing for this event, just used all mailing lists we have been part of. We invited Prateek and Nitya of Muziboo to speak of their experiences and it was very nice of them to accept our invitation and be part of the first event (knowing the uncertainties of attendees and the organization of the event).

There were around 25 people who joined us to share our passion. The room is full and the atmosphere is exciting on this warm Saturday morning.

Here is a summary of their experiences…

Muziboo is an online music community with more than 1200 registered members and 1000+ music uploads.

Features of Muziboo

• You can join for free
• Upload your music
• Tag yourself and your music
• Comment music
• Create, join, write on music groups

Growth Plan

• To be 10,000 users by end of 2008
• More channels for consumers
• “One stop huddle” for music

Competitors
None as on date
Soundclick, Esnips come close

Few questions asked by audience…
Do you want to build Muziboo as a brand/comapny?
Prateek – Brand.

How many are writing code for you?
Prateek – Only me. Have been using Ruby on rails.

Can I just listen to music and not signup?
Prateek – Definitely.

How much did you sunk in till date?
Prateek – Less than Rs. 40,000.

How are you marketing?
Started with Orkut. Searched with “music” and scrapped each of them individually.

What amount of traffic is from search engines?
Prateek – Around 30%-35%.

Do you want to start your own Radio channel?
Prateek – Yes.

Prateek – We are also working on creating an online music composition tool which will help musicians to record online and upload.
Even though I did not sign-up to submit my music composition 🙂 I like the concept and I on behalf of KickStart team wish Prateek and Nitya all the very best in their endeavor. If you have not yet visited Musiboo, it is time you go and have a taste of good music.

Startup Saturday – March 09, 2008

As I mentioned earlier, I missed this event, but I know that it has been an exciting one and there were close to 50 participants this time – a whooping 100% increase 🙂

Startup Saturday – April 12, 2008

This has been more streamlined. We had the SS website up and made this a wiki which will help people to register if they were coming to the event. We had 91 registrations on the site and close to 50 attended the event.

Ms. Dhanya Menon, a startup legal expert and partner at ALMT Legal, Bangalore accepted to speak on Term Sheet. Here are some notes I made during her talk.

What is a Term Sheet?
Term sheet is an ‘indicative’ document.

What is ‘indicative’?
Indicating the terms and conditions of the venture.

From an entrepreneur’s perspective, a term sheet is very important – I will not go to any other investor, discussing about investments in the organization.
One needs to be very clear about the terms and conditions in the term sheet, and without one, no investor would invest without a term sheet sign-off.

While there is a term sheet signed off between investor and entrepreneur and in-between (with in the time lines), if the entrepreneur goes to another investor and signs a new term sheet, the first investor has all rights to sue the entrepreneur.

Clauses
1.Breach of Contract (Exclusivity)
2.Confidentiality
3.Drop-debt fields (What ever expenses investor have incurred in this contract, the entrepreneur needs to repay)
4.Public Announcements
5.Term Promoters
6.Size of funding (try to mention money in INR)
7.Valuation

What is the typical timelines in term-sheet.
Between 3 – 6 months.

Promoters
Only people who run the organiation on a day-to-day basis should be calld ‘promoters’.

Right of first refusal (RoFR)
Right of first offer (RoFO)
Series B investment should not happen immediately. Focus should be on business. The investor can make the clause for series B funding.

What are definitive documents?
Share subscription document
Employment agreement

Anti-Dilution
This is not good from investors perspective.

PS: I know that my above notes are not very information, however, I will work towards getting more structured information and post more information on Term Sheet as I learn about it more in detail.

Along with her knowledge sharing session, we had a demo of Storzz by Chandan Maruti, CEO of the startup. Storrz is an on-line mall. Yes, I used the term “mall”. Even though there are many differences in a real mall and a virtual mall, this mall gives you the flexibility of serious shopping. If you are looking for a particular product and looking for its rating in the market and customer feedback, this is the place to go.

Storrz is created as a platform for opening a virtual mall. If you have a business, and want to sell on-line without any hazels of creating an online shop, Storrz is the place to go.

You will be surprised with what is available on Storrz – From vegetables to groceries to Camcorders and Digital Cameras and with price comparison along with customer feedback. Check out the site and experience for yourself.

If you want to keep yourself updated about KickStart activities, please do sign up for our mailing list and I am sure you would benefit from it.

The next Startup Saturday is scheduled for 10 May 2008. However, on 19/20 April we have BarCamp Bangalore 6 coming up. So, stay tuned and be there.