If you are an entrepreneur and looking for some Angel Funding, the below is a list of Angel Investors in India:
Indian Angel Network
Accel Partners
Ojas Ventures
SeedFund
Axon Ventures
Mercatus Capital
Epiphany Ventures
Garage Again
Well, many people asked this question and many people responded with what they thought. I am not a financial expert nor an Economist who can answer this question. But, I have been in the Industry for close to 10 Years now and have friends who have been in the Industry for longer than me and also many of my close friends have their own startup’s. This post comes with my interactions with them and also what I have been seeing in the Industry I work.
During 2001-2003, we saw the Internet bubble burst. There were many people who sacrificed their lives, given up their line of work and moved to the IT field to make their name and fame. There were many organizations born, but eventually, most of them faded away. Let us also not forget, that organizations which had their fundamentals correct, grew up to be giants in their own fields.
So, are we seeing the same phenomenon here today? The only similarity I see from my eyes in the two recessions is that they are man made. We have been hungry for more in a shorter span of time and this has really effected us. If this is human’s thought process, we should never forget that the nature also has its own ways of sustaining itself. This is a natural cycle and if the 2001-2003 recession helped in streamlining the speed at which we travelled in making a new world, this recession is setting expectations for us to ensure we have our fundamentals correct for a better future.
Fortunately, most of my very good friends organizations have not been disastrously hit by this current situation and also quite a few of reputed organizations are also not hit. Organizations which have been disturbed are the one’s which missed out one or two of the key elements of ensuring the life of the organization works the way it should.
What are the fundamentals which I am talking about?
The fundamentals I am speaking apply to both individual and also the organization. The fundamentals which each of us should be aware of. The precautions we take to ensure we have a healthy living (not money, but health). Eat good food, have healthy habits, keep your mind calm and peaceful and ensure that you perform your responsibilities well. The same applies to even organizations. They have life too.
I once received a forwarded email about Recession and it made a lot of sense to me. I just wanted to summarize the story here as an illustration of the concept.
There was a poor man, who made eateries on the roadside. He worked very hard, to ensure he maintained cleanliness around the place he ran his business, he had few chairs for his customers to sit, clean drinking water and his USP was that he always ensured that he was presentable and welcomed his customers with a big smile. He did this for all the last 15 years since he started his small outlet. He was contended with his earning, and ensured that his customers left with a smile.
This businessman had a son and ensured he provided the best of the education to him, with what he could earn. His son went on to study well and acquired a very decent and dignified job for himself. One day, his son stopped over at their eatery and was explaining the current situation to his father. How people are loosing jobs, how banks are going bankrupt and how access to money was getting difficult day-by-day. With this, the poor father began to think. Over the period of time, he reduced his expenses. He was getting the place cleaned once in two days instead of every day. He stopped buying fresh water every time, but instead managed by mixing tap water to the water he bought. With various thoughts and tensions in his mind, his smile went away, he cared less about his presentability.
Over the period of time, his customers stopped coming and his business went gloomy. He told his son that he was absolutely correct and the economy is really very bad. Their business has come down heavily and tomorrow does not look bright.
What is the morale of the story? It is actually not a story, but REALITY. The reality is that we are more worried and hence our productivity is reducing. What would have happened if his son never studied and helped his father? I am sure their business would be the same and their lives would have definitely been the same. At times, too much of thought also hits our overall productivity.
Let us stop worrying about recession and concentrate on our work. Organizations should do what they need to do and individuals need to do what they need to do. I am sure, our tomorrow is more bright.
In my next post, I would share about my experiences with the industry and entrepreneur friends who are definitely working at the same pace and ensuring they get their business 🙂
Everyone and anyone – be it an Entrepreneur, Employee or Head of the Organization… today, every one is focusing on Innovation and how to go up the value chain. This post of mine is inspired by a presentation I saw (I sincerely apologize as I am not able to retrace the presentation) on how small thoughts can change the way we can package a service.
Project Management is one key focus area which most of the start-up community ignores when they are beginning. There is no time to define the Organization Project Life cycle. I do agree and am with you on this. However, once we start looking into this area, I assure you that your innovation will definitely have a better output.
You have got a great idea! and you confirmed that the world has been waiting for your innovation to come into market 🙂 That’s great and good news, however, before you put in your heart and soul, you need to look into the viability of your solution, how much would it cost to make your dream a reality, time to market and end of the day the returns which you are going to get.
Project Viability
Well, now you are at the first step and desperately waiting for your solution/product to come into the market. Before you begin, the best practice is to get inputs from your family and friends (assuming that they are your customers) if they are going to use your innovation in their daily lives. It makes a lot of sense with family and friends because they critic it very well and give you a honest feedback. If you are not satisfied with their feedback, go out into the market and speak to potential customers take their feedback. If 5 out of 10 acknowledge you for your idea, then you can dive deep and see what else they want / do not want. Accordingly shape up your idea so that you increase the chances of the 5 to definitely buy your innovation.
Work on the Costing
As you are working towards taking feedback for your innovation, also ask your ‘potential customers’ how much they are willing to spend if a product like yours is available in the market. This is to understand/analyze/assess how your idea is accepted into the system. With this base information, you can reverse-engineer your costing model. Instead of you fixing the price, go with the price what people are willing to spend. This makes sense for you on the long run. It is better to sell 100 numbers at Re.1, rather than selling 10 numbers at Rs.10. Of course, this entirely depends on who are your target customers and what problem your solution would solve.
Time to Market
The next aspect which you need to consider is the “Time to Market”. You are starting from the scratch and you definitely need to have enough funds and plan to take your innovation into market. With this analysis in place, you are very sure of how your project will shape up and also gives you the flexibility of time to build a quality solution.
Returns
Well, now you have potential customers feedback, cost of your innovation and time to market. This gives you a clear picture of how things should be running for you. These become your milestones and ensure you are in track all the time, when ever you are missing your internal deadlines.
During your journey in giving shape to your innovation, you will also need to keep working on how you are going to structure your Market entry and sales. How are you going to distribute your solution? (Internet, wholesale, retail etc). Identifying how your innovation is going to reach its customer is very important. Vague aspects like I will find someone to stock my product, will be available for download from the website etc are all very vague answers. Remember, if your innovation does not reach the right customer, at the right time and in the right way, then all your efforts are totally waste.
What are your revenue streams? How are the customers going to pay? If yours is a wholesale/retail innovation, do you have the commission structure in place? Have you thought about the branding and positioning? We usually miss these small things. Right?
Last but not the least, ensure you have required licenses and approvals from the local authorities to ensure that these things do not delay your innovation entry to the market. The customer cannot wait and even you too… 🙂
Last Friday, I was at a book shop and the first book I stumbled upon was I too had a dream. I was looking for any books by/on Dr. Kurian for a long time and finally found it. I just picked up the book and began reading. Today, I completed it.I have to rate this a 5 Star. An amazing narration and very well written and compiled.
I didn’t know what to name this post. First, I wanted to name it as “Malayalee.Milk & Movie” (Read the book and I am sure that you would agree with me on the title).
Well for those of you who are wondering what this book is all about, it is the amazing story of Anand Milk Union Limited (AMUL) and journey of Dr. Verghese Kurian as India’s Milk Man.If there was anything which is a box-office and smashing hit in the Indian Cooperative Movement, it is the story of AMUL. I am definitely not going into the details of the book, but would want to highlight the key aspects of the Operation Flood.
What made me read the book non-stop is how bureaucratic our country has been in accepting the Cooperative methodology. India is a country with more than 70% of the population living in the villages. Since the independence, we have had many Government’s which came and went and also we saw a lot of development in many areas of life. In fact, I would not hesitate to say that no other country has come this far in the first 60 Years of Independence (comparing to countries which have been ruled by some other nation). However, there is a long way to go.
During the course of this book, Dr. Kurian emphasizes the importance of making farmers responsible for their produce, marketing and returns. What this simply means is giving the ownership and the Government playing the role of ensuring appropriate avenues are available. Well, to be very honest, this is the most difficult thing which any country can achieve. But, Dr. Kurian proved that with commitment and dedication we can definitely achieve this. What you need is the Will and the Belief in your dream.
I personally understood one aspect – The Primer Minister’s are people with a dream, and believe me, only people with that commitment get to the position (there are definitely exceptions too). In this book, Dr. Kurian writes about his personal interaction with almost all Prime Ministers since Jawaharlal Nehru to P V Narasimha Rao (after which Dr. Kurian retired). The key aspect is the team which surrounds this super power of our Country.
If you are an aspiring Entrepreneur/Social Entrepreneur, I highly recommend you reading this book.
Also, in this book, Dr. Kurian jumps deep into how Operation Flood, one of India’s most successful cooperative project came into existance and how long it took for them to succeed.
Yesterday, after a long time, went on a trip to Lepakshi. It is exactly 117 KM from Hebbal, Bangalore. The road until the Bangalore International Airport is fantastic, however after that, they are still constructing the road and there are many de-tours. We took around 2 and half hours to reach and while going, we missed the turning to the place. Unfortunately, there are no sign-boards which give any directions. We overshot around 20 KM to realize that we missed the turning.
When going from Bangalore, you would need to check out for KR Check-post, which is the Karnataka-Andhra Pradesh border. This is around 95-98 KM from Hebbal. After the check post, go past 3 KM and you will find a junction where you need to take a left turn. Keep an eye on your odometer and ensure you ask someone if you want about the check-post and the turning. After you take the left turn, it is around 17 KM drive through few villages before you reach Lepakshi.
This small village is really very small and there are hardly any decent hotels to eat. If you are like me who does not mind eating even on the roadside, then don’t worry, you can definitely survive 🙂 Else, please load sufficient food.
The temple architecture is marvelous and it is definitely worth a visit. You can take pictures inside and spend some good peaceful time. If you are very much interested in the history, hire a guide, else you can take a tour of the temple yourself.
You may check out few pictures here.
I wrote a very big post earlier and it failed. The trial version of Wavelog does not allow me to save and hence had to exit the editor and come back to write.
Well, to begin with, I got a new Nokia E71. Yesterday, tried to search for blogging clients for Symbian and i found two – Scribe and Wavelog from Telewaving. After unsuccessful attempts to install Scribe (certificate error), I now installed Wavelog. This tool is really cool. It is very easy to install and use, but costs $16.50. Well, i don’t mind as long as its working. I found two hitches, there is no Support/Contact us information and the license is only for one phone. Now that i am going to use my E71 for long time, am planning to buy. But before that I have a month to try out.
I feel all features of the application should have been given and the duration of the trial could have been reduced. You cannot save and once you exit the application, you need to create your login credentials again 🙁
I was searching for a central repository of Social Entrepreneurs in India to understand various social concerns which are being addressed. Unfortunately, when I searched for the above text “Social Entrepreneurs in India”, I could not get the relevent links, except for one link which gives me a simple, small list on Wikipedia.
I decided to make a central repository of all Social Entrepreneurs and Enterprises in the country and highlight their work and dedication. I started with Ashoka list which is available on their site and compiled a list of 247 Ashoka Fellows. I do not want to put up the list here, but want to highlight the area’s in which they are working:
HeadStart has been our annual event for showcasing Startup Talents in the country. We started organizing the annual event since 2008, along with ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) Bangalore Chapter.
Why HeadStart and ACM?
HeadStart is a community of Entrepreneurs, Investors, Industry Professionals and Evangelists. We came together to contribute back to the community which has brought us to this level and given us lives.
ACM is a focused group which concentrates on future of technology and how it fits into today’s world.
As an Entrepreneur, it is very important for us to understand the Business Model, writing the Business Plan, speaking to Venture Capitalists and Angel Investors, bringing the product/service to the end user, legalities in building your organization, employee management and last but not the least – the future of your innovation.
You have a cutting edge idea and you are excited about it. You speak to various stakeholders and lo! you idea has hit everyone. What next? You are starting up your baby. That’s great news. One important and key aspect you need to consider is what is the future? Today, we see many Insurance companies advertising –For your retirement solutions and your child educational / child future plans, do contact us. In the same way, you need to understand the future of technology to ensure safety and security to your baby (your enterprise) and yourself. We feel safe when we have life insurance and few plans for our children, but we ignore our tomorrow.
Yesterday, I met an aspiring entrepreneur and he invited me to be his Devil’s advocate (I am not going into details of his idea or our conversation with due respects to him). He shared his idea with me and I honestly did not see a tomorrow in that. I did not see a strong bonding of the idea with the stakeholders. But he is passionate. Passionate about the idea and his tomorrow. I am sure he would succeed in what he is doing, but definitely few of my questions have kept his bells ringing.
During HeadStart – Compute 2008, we had two eminent personalities from GE to speak on the future of Database. The two scientists shared their research information on how the future of Database would change. This is what is needed for an Entrepreneur.
A classic example of not looking into the future is the Y2K. Many organizations realized and started working on this issue a bit late in the 90’s. What if these organizations had the guidance to think about this earlier during their startup stage? Things would have been different. If everyone took the necessary precaution, I am sure there would not have been many people who would have got job’s in the west during late 90’s.
HeadStart and Compute are dedicated to create the perfect ecosystem for Entrepreneurs. If you recollect the Project Triangle, then it is very easy to relate to what we do. We do exactly the same – Ensuring for a healthy startup focusing on the key parameters – Technology, Capital and Eco-System.
Be there on the January 09-10, 2009 and participate to help create the ecosystem for Startup’s.
I wrote about how the “Auto-Rickshaw” saw stagnant innovation in the last two decades of playing active role in commuting across the country. In this post, I will be short and sweet on my observations in mobile space.
I am fortunate to be part of HeadStart, a not-for-profit organization working towards building entrepreneurial eco-system in India. We have been active more close to one-and-half years and during 2008, I interacted with many entrepreneurs and budding entrepreneurs.
Quite a few of the entrepreneurs and wanna-be entrepreneurs I met are into mobile space and working on one feature or the other. Many are quite optimistic of the solutions they provide and how the end-user can benefit by their innovation. Even the potential investors are very active in mobile space.
Well, being an active GPRS user, I am happy to try various applications and how friendly they are to me. I love the BTIS map on my mobile and the Google search tool bar which really helps to me quickly search for what I want. There are a whole range of mobile products which come in handy too. Fring is one application which is useful for people who which to be connected to friends all the time and Twitter has made its mark.
There are other useful applications being developed too. Take a look at Numo, a mobile platform for BulkSMS and SMS Reminders for key aspects of life (Health, Pet Health etc).
I do not have a list off my finger-tips to share with you the other innovative ideas, but would like to focus on a simple case study and Destructive Innovation coming from a major player in search – Google.
Population of Bangalore is around 62 Lakhs (6.2 Million). For benefit of this illustration, let us consider that 100% of the population carries a mobile. In the 100%, let us assume that 50% (3.1 Million)use GPRS service. In the 50% user base of GPRS users, how many actually take time to search for a particular service / product in the area they are currently located? I am not under-estimating, but let us assume that around 50% of the 50% GPRS users use the service, which brings the number close to 1.5 Million (1,500,000). This is a classic example of the Bottom of the Pyramid concept. We are looking at the top of the pyramid user base and estimating the idea to be changing the way we live. What we need to remember here is the middle and bottom of the pyramid users who are not even knowing about the service. So, the target population for a value added service on mobile (with GPRS account) is very less.
Google, on the contrary came up with an innovative solution – Voice Search. This search is already launched in Hyderabad, India. We have other search companies like – Just-Dial etc, and differentiating the search is up to you, as a user. Now, this is what I call Destructive Innovation. Just look at the outreach for this value added service – it is 100% of the users. Added to the service, the number users have to call is a toll free number too. In simple words, without spending a single penny, any mobile user can use this service. How different!
Innovation is just not about an idea reaching the end user, but how well it dissolves in the DNA of the system is what need to be identified.
I am writing this post with an intent of sharing my thoughts on small innovation gap’s which I commonly see (I will definitely not be able to list many gap’s, but if you notice a gap, then please post it as a comment for this post).
Wikipedia has a good introduction to Innovation and hence, will not go in detail.
What inspired me write this post is the amount of attention Innovation is getting these days and the number of aspirants thinking of doing something different from others.
Auto-Rickshaw
Let us look at a common example – For how long have you been seeing an auto-rickshaw, aka ‘auto’? (If you not an Indian, probably its a good idea to search on google for some pictures of auto). Well, let us say for our understanding that it has been close to 20 Years since there have been autos. Search for some pictures of the earlier auto’s and when you compare the look and feel to the current day’s auto’s, you will not find any major changes except for few ‘look’ changes. Every time we get into an auto, we know how dangerous it is and also few times, very uncomfortable. Try speaking to any auto drivers, you will understand how frustrating it is for them too. You sit in the auto for couple of minutes to reach your destination, but just imaging the plight of the driver who drives it all day long – during summers, rains and floods. There are not many options to customize the auto too (even though we have more auto’s in the country than cars, which have quite a number of re-design / re-model shops). Now, I am not speaking of extravagant modification’s, but bare minimum things.
An example I can quote here is the wiper on the windshield. Did you notice that the wiper is not automatic unlike the car? It has to be moved using a small handle inside to clean the glass. First of all the vehicle is a three-wheeler with a handle. Gears on the left side and accelerator on the right side with also the front break. Is there a way the driver can leave the handle on one side and continuously keep cleaning the glass? Its not only a pain, but the most dangerous.
When you look at the drivers seat, you also understand that there is no appropriate care taken to design the same. The distance between the seat and the handle is a bit longer and it poses great health issues to the driver, especially if he/she has a moderate body structure.
Do you think auto’s have suspension? Well, if you think so, check it out next time. There is suspension for all the wheels, but only because they have to be and not to address the actual reason for having them 🙂
If I go on, there are even more – the headlight is as small as a moped (miniature version of a bike) and there is no luggage space too.
This is what I call “Innovation Gap”.
There are various factors which govern the Innovation Gap – Competition, acceptance, target audience market saturation are to list a few.
Out Auto example above is a classic illustration of how Target audience and Market Saturation drive Innovation. Also, there are not many companies which manufacture auto’s and hence the existing manufactures have no motivation to enhance the product. I agree that over the last 2 years, there have been 5/6/8 seater auto’s coming into market, but the design is sill the same (well almost, the handle bar is replaced with a steering wheel).
I will conclude this case study here, but assure you that there is more to come..