7 Post-it notes for entrepreneurs

Free, unadulterated, unsolicited, self-explanatory compilation of advises from the side-lines.
Yes, we’ve all known these all along, but still… :)
Why 7? Because 42 ;)

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“Scale is over-rated, profitability is under-rated”

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“Survive long enough and you will arrive soon enough”

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“Your enterprise will most likey die due to the same mistakes that others did”
a.k.a. If you see a banana peel, just don’t step on it

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“Get the smallest, able, agile and committed team and aim for the largest, achievable and sell-able goal”

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“Net-satisfaction, net-happiness, net-worth, all are important”

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“Work smart not hard/ get a life. Help others. Be kind. Stay humble”
There was a reason why mama taught these virtues :)

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“You can do it :)”

William Kamkwamba: Building a windmill

The following is the 2009 TED talk by William Kamkwamba who simply set up a windmill in his backyard. Inspired by two library books (more by the cover on one), from a really constrained background, with a scrapyard for raw materials and despite the local skepticism and superstition, William did what he set out to do.

His simple message - to never give up. Do also scroll down to view his 2007 TED appearance.



And heres his TED appearance in 2007:



TED is simply amazing!

I think it would be great to have a TED equivalent on prime time media in India instead of some of those really crappy shows and weepy soaps. Imagine how many little sparks this could ignite across a country like ours (and indeed in many other countries as well). This enthusiasm needs to be made infectious.

Patient Capital - Sunflowers in the desert

The poor need tools more than charity.
People providing these tools need more support and capital than mere aid.
And most importantly, the folks supporting these people need
a deep understanding of social capital and delayed monetization.
Jacqueline appropriately calls this - Patient Capital.

Another great TED Talk by Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO Acumen Fund:
(Courtesy: Guy Kawasaki)

Related: "Poor Aren't Lifeless Bricks"

Breakeven

Ever wondered why almost all projection sheets always predict company breakeven in three or five years (odd numbers ;) )?

Whats so great about the numbers 3 and 5 that have caught the collective fancy of investors and entrepreneurs alike? Any ideas on its origins? Does it have anything to do with the average lifetime/ working-life of a person?

myMobile extends myMemory { reQall () }

"Imagine being able to talk to your phone while it intelligently organizes your utterances into your Calendar, Notes or To-Dos."
Disclaimer: I'm just about to give all iPhone and Blackberry users an big dose of ego boost and everyone else a sense of envy (apologies).

I have a confession to make, I am an extremely forgetful person. I mean, if my wife asks me to buy a pack of bread, a dozen eggs, a pack of butter and toothpaste; I'd most likely forget the toothpaste. To take care of this I'd begun to jot notes - Post-It style. That mostly used to work, except when I'd forget to take the Post-It notes themselves! :). That said, I do not recall having forgotten to take my mobile phone - ever; its almost become an extension of me - a part of my identity.

"Imagine being able to simply right-click on this webpage and add this post to your list of The-Greatest-Posts-Ever-Made list (just kidding ;) )"

In my 'phone of the future' vision, my handset would seamlessly extend the function of my brain and one department of my brain which could do with some serious extension is my memory.

Let me cut the chase and get to the point. A few days ago, I was pleasantly surprised when I read somewhere about reQall. While they do not claim to have any direct neural interface to my brain yet, they claim to be able do be supplement my memory!

In their words, this is the 'simple' problem they'd solved: "Ever had a brilliant idea while driving, but couldn't write it down? Needed to remember something, but didn't have a pen?"

Being a Blackberry user, I downloaded this cool app from http://www.reqall.com/blackberry [Note: reQall for BlackBerry requires OS version 4.2.0 or higher.]. It integrates seamlessly with my device. So now I can fire up the app click the 'Add by Voice' Option and speak "Meeting with John Doe, prepare the presentation". reQall transmits this voice signal to its server where it does a voice-to-text conversion and sends me an email apart from adding the event to my calendar and reQall interface! And the best part - it works.

reQall gave me a pleasant deja-vu as well! Back at TinfoMobile we'd developed a similar app which won us an award at the Reliance-NASSCOM Developer Contest. We'd made an app that helped the visually impaired by reading out SMS and Call History in Voice. We did the exact opposite of reQall. We transmitted the SMS text over GPRS to a server where a Text-to-Speech engine converted it to Voice and this was played back by a Media-Player instance on the phone (it worked even on a very basic and cheap Reliance Java Black-and-White handset).

There are a dozen other things you could do with reQall and I'm sure it would increase your productivity one small notch higher. Do give it a shot. Its innovation at its best and is powered by Indian brains. Its a company called QTech founded by Sunil Vemuri and N. Rao Machiraju. Three cheers for the duo!

VC with a Funny-bone

We have seen (/ at least heard of) VCs of different shapes and sizes - tall, short, dark, fair, frank, unfrank, angel, devil, good, bad and ugly. I hereby reveal a VC with a funny bone! Yup, finally, a Venture Capitalist with a good sense of humor :) - its called Tandem Entrepreneurs.
(Disclaimer: I only know them through their website)

Their website is peppered with Cartoons that get the point across to the reader without wasting words and time. Cute, to-the-point and well - very visual.
The following image, for instance hogs their front-page (courtesy: tandementrepreneurs):


Appearances could be deceptive! but I couldn't resist talking about them here. Full marks for 'engaging' a potential entrepreneur's attention, appearing friendly and approachable.

Eko nominated at Tata NEN Hottest Startups

Eko has been nominated for the TATA NEN Hottest Startups awards. Brought to you by National Entrepreneurship Network and TATA Group, in association with Helion, Mint , Seedfund and Wadhwani Foundation, it is India’s only community-chosen awards for Indian start-ups.

Vote for Eko online by clicking the link below: or via sms.
SMS HOT[space]85 to 56767.

If you are a startup yourself and want to be nominated, go right ahead and nominate your venture. I guess the last date is mid October.

A big thank you to all! Let the voting begin.

Every startup needs a Turk Salesman

Salesmen are a different breed altogether; Jayadev used to say - "...folks who can sell Ice to an Eskimo" :). Unfortunately, most technology startups entirely ignore the need for someone in this role.

Techies, especially the startup types, are usually an egoistic bunch - nerds, who scarcely care to see much beyond the 100 lines of code on their PC screens. They think that putting together a software package that can solve some stupendous equation for non-linear-geometric-nth-dimension-extrapolation-of-whatever-crap is the ultimatest thing on the planet. They think - just make the stuff and hordes of buyers will descend on their shop-front to purchase boatloads of it giving bucket-loads of cash - alas! I used to be one of them, almost.

The truth is, when you start, it really does not matter how good your product/ services might be. What matters is how best you can package 'it' and how best you can sell it - and how fast.

The truth is, actually, it is fine even if you DONT exactly have what you're trying to sell as long as you can convince a potential buyer that you have something he wants (Microsoft had sold DOS to IBM even though they never made it/ had it. Do read this BusinessWeek article: The Man Who Could Have Been Bill Gates).

The truth is, you need a real salesman in your team - and he better be one of the best talkers in town. A litmus test might be to ask such a person the size of his/her linkedIn network and to rattle off the names of 50 influential contacts in rapidfire (Now, if this person is able to convince you and do all this stuff, and you come to know that he does not even have a linkedIn account - hire him!).

Sales people on rocket boosters are guys who can be chief spokesmen - 'Sultans of Spin'. Do watch this funny movie: Thank You For Smoking, to get a taste of the required attitude and aptitude.

Experience has taught me to have immense respect for these folks who sell well. Now, if these guys can sell ice to Eskimos, imagine what they could do if asked to sell 'em hot chocolate!

That brings me to the story of the Turk Salesman. I was led to this story by a reference from Guy Kawasaki's blog. I'd been reading about the art of persuasion and this article titled: What I learned Buying a Rug in Turkey, just about packs in all about it. Well, do read it and if you haven't already - get a Turk salesman in your team - ASAP!

PS: Now I know why they call the program on CNBC - 'Young Turks'.

6+ Essential Software Tools for a startup that cost zero

If you're a startup starting up or planning to be one, here's a handy list of stuff that could help you bootstrap - the bare essentials. Trust me, its just another one of those lists - but one that I can vouch for. So if you have a better one, you're welcome, just add a link to your list in the comments section. My advice - don't use pirated software, either buy original stuff or search the web for a free alternative (there always is)

1. The Ubuntu way.
If you have a decent PC and zilch account balance, just close your eyes and take an Ubuntu leap of faith. Ubuntu is a great Linux distro that more-or-less works straight out of the box. Just check out how you could get it for free! The best part is that if you go the Ubuntu way - you might as well stop reading right here cause it packs in quite a lot of the 'good' stuff you'd need.

2. The WindowsXP way.
I'm no fan of Windows Vista to put it mildly, if you intend to go the Windows way, better take the simpler and well trodden path of Windows XP. This option of course comes with a price tag.


a. Mozilla Firefox
The best free browser - period. Trusted by millions others, one of the best outcomes of the open-source world. Get Firefox here. Its an excellent replacement for the slightly rusty Internet Explorer (which has been desperately trying to play catchup).

b. Mozilla Thunderbird
A real lightweight email client for your desktop, of course, sans the bells and whistles of the Outlook Express clan. But, it works and it works real fast and real good. Get Thunderbird here.


c. OpenOffice
Of course it lacks the bells and whistles of Microsoft Office! But, come on, you're a startup and don't have a boatload of cash to spend on purchasing licenses. With a document editor, a presentation maker, spreadsheet util and other few other tools thrown in - OpenOffice is a real bargain for the price you pay for it (ZERO). Whats really good about it is you can always read documents that had been saved in MS formats and you can Save As MS .doc, .xls, .ppt. Also, you can seamlessly export any document as .pdf with a single click!

d. Google Apps

Welcome to the connected world. To get your startup off its feet and into the mindshares of potential employees, investors, partners, clients and customers, you need a communication and collaboration tools. Thats what a set of apps - Google Apps does.
The best thing about google apps - gmail for your company. Its a really reliable mail server which gives your team a fully functional, online, yourname@yourcompany.com kindof email suite (which you can use with Mozilla Thunderbird as well). Goodbye tinkering with boxes trying to set up your own mail server and wondering why your email never reached its recipient.

e. Tortoise, Subversion
Now, this one is for those who might be slightly tech oriented, but trust me, this is one tool that can save you bucket-loads of tears when things go wrong with your PCs or you do things like SHIFT+DEL with that critical source code file or you accidentally delete your most famous quote from the document that you had put in a day before (these things, let me assure you - they will! - amen, says Murphy)

So, viola! we have a free version control system. What this means is that you can now track all changes you made to any file or folder, have multiple people modifying the same file but in different geo-locations and still maintain perfect sanity.

It essentially consists of two parts:
- Subversion, - the server, which you can install either on your own computer (that means it will only function as a limited tracker - sorry folks, no collaborations this way- to each his own) or on a server that could be accessed by all folks in your team.

- TortoiseSVN. A Windows client shell that makes all your subversion tasks as easy as a right click on any file you might want to be 'subversioned'.


Integrated Development Environment
This ones for all ye developers out there. If you're already a developer, I'd bet you already have your fav toolbox with you. But in case you're still undecided or want to choose a uniform one for your organization; pls make a pick else, as google reader often tells me - you'd better land here.

f.1 Netbeans
It says its the "The only IDE you need! Runs on Windows, Linux, Mac OS X and Solaris.... Supports: Ajax | C/C++ | Databases | Debugger |Java EE | JavaFX | Java ME | Java SE | JavaScript | Mobile | PHP | REST | Rich Client Platform | Ruby | SOA | SOAP | UML | Web | WSDL | XML". We'd used it extensively for mobile app development and apart from the fact that it needs a good amount of RAM, Netbeans rocks!

f.2 Eclipse
Eclipse is considered a more mature IDE of two and has its loyal base of users with many companies coming up with their own custom Eclipse IDE to do different things.

Well, that brings me to the end of my list though there are a couple of tools that only a pure techie would need and would rather try n figure out on his/ her own. I think with this you have just about everything essential to get started. So - get started!

The Real Steve Jobs - iStuff

This is a pretty popular (over 2 mill views), a bit old (2k6) but a pretty motivational clip - the kinda stuff that fuels inspiration - iStuff.



Be inspired!

Randy Pausch

Here's a post dedicated in memory of Randy Pausch who passed away on 25th July 2008. Like millions of others, I came to know about this personality through a YouTube video and have been struck by his words at the 'Last Lecture' titled 'Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams':


True, we never think of dying - that inevitably, one day we will simply 'fly away'. Randy was keenly aware of that fact and made sure he left behind a legacy of hope.

Related links:
1. His page
2. CMU page dedicated to his lecture

Who can be an entrepreneur? Part II

(Continued from part I)

In my last post on this subject I presented my reading on the Grameen Bank initiative by Muhammad Yunus and found that entrepreneurship as a yearning is innate in all and that success is relative. In this post I'd take my study further on a slightly different viewpoint.

This viewpoint is based on this article that I'd come across a few months back by Clay Shirky titled, The (Bayesian) Advantage of Youth.

It postulates that entrepreneurship is a byproduct of inexperience, youthfulness and an idea. Or in other words - it is the result of not having a preconditioned mind and an ability to unlearn some things and start from scratch.

The author argues that experience, that comes through age is all about being exposed to a set of conditions, knowing its limitations and thus calibrating oneself to 'learn' how to handle the same or a similar situation based on this learning. Now, this process of 'learning' is by nature a process that aims at minimizing risk and moving towards stability and away from unknown territory.

While such experience might be advantageous in certain situations, the author further argues that the predictable-reactionary nature that experience brings is a contra requirement to entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is mostly (not all) about making that dangerous leap that the experienced might think foolish or feel scared to. A beautiful analogy based on Bayesian logic is also presented in the article.

Another interesting book that I had read was The Ten Faces of Innovation by IDEO's Tom Kelley (thanks to Jayadev). In this book the author says that in most organizations, many an innovative idea is killed by people who love to play the Devil's Advocate. The 'idea-killer' role is kinda addictive, it kinda becomes a part of you once you've made a 'kill'. Unwittingly, while you might pride yourself in your devilish skills, some bright spark might get silenced forever.

While I subscribe to the fact that youthfulness coupled with wild imagination and creativity does lead to innovation, I would also like to have it tapered slightly (only slightly) with some expert advice. Which is to say - have a young person as the key ideator but make sure he has an experienced adviser. An adviser would be the dampener, but every useful coiled spring knows the importance of damping factor! Remember the dot com vagaries (ah... thats the devil's advocate in me speaking again - hushhhh!). Am I getting too old for the game ;) ?

Who can be an entrepreneur? Part I

Lately I've been reading on 'who' can be/ is an entrepreneur. Perhaps a better way to phrase it would be - what normally/ usually is the profile of a person who becomes an entrepreneur? Is it an 'in-the-mind' phenomenon? How much do external factors influence? What roles are played by family, upbringing, education, society and others?
And finally, which of these factors influence success? And what is 'success' in the first place?

Whew! quite a few questions in one breath and none new. I'm sure these have already been dissected and studied elsewhere to the minutest details - I'm also learning, my way. I'd first attempt to review some articles written by different people and analyze them and then maybe, over a period of time try and answer at least some of the questions I'd started with.

I'll start with this recent interesting article that appeared in the businessworld magazine written by none other than the Nobel laureate and founder of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh - Muhammad Yunus.
Here is the link to the online version of the article.

Muhammad Yunus provided me a really wonderful insight - entrepreneurship is innate in almost every human being! Whats even more interesting about this 'gyan' is that it is a demonstrated fact and not a mere management-guru rhetoric. And demonstrated at a scale that should silence even the staunchest shadow critics - 90,000 'part time beggars' transformed into entrepreneurs with nothing more than 20$ worth of seed funding in each. Excellent!

Two things worth pondering
1. Definition of success. It shows success is relative. (I guess the happy beggar is in his own way as happy as Bill Gates - at least almost ;-) )

2. Incentive for the investor. I cannot but accept the fact that one common thread that runs through most entrepreunial stories - someone who acted as the catalyst - supplying either the push or the money and expecting something in return. All such catalysts also set their sights on 'returns' to be rightly expected. Will all investors be satisfied with the kind of returns that say, 'the Bangladesh experiment' brings, coupled with the higher level of micro-management that might be involved - I don't know. Again, the 'success' criterion on returns are different for different investors.

Thats all for now, part II continues this journal focusing on a different article.

Entrepreneurship and me

My tryst with entrepreneurship started on a rather weird note. Back when I was in school, it was an incredibly twisted word with an equally twisted pronunciation. From the time that I can remember, I've been a creative person. So as kid, cardboard boxes lying around would get wheels added and get turned into toy buses; There'd be NO electronic or electric or mechanic device in my house that I'd NOT opened and put back together (mostly in one piece) ever after I'd found how to use screw-drivers. By the time I was in high school, I was playing with diodes, LEDs, capacitors and soldering irons. But there was one tool that I'd admit had provided a really wide canvas - the humble PC. I would've been eleven when I wrote my first program in BASIC - all I can remember are the green pixelated dots that formed the characters on the 'screen' of its monochrome display (I'd reckon, most mobile phones today have screens and processors that are an order of magnitude better than those). Anyways, by the time I graduated as an electronics and communications engineer, I'd made my mark as a hobby programmer (thanks to a few of my seniors who'd introduced me to C++ and VB), I even got offers from a few schools near our college to develop custom software for them (While I did a few demos, none of the 'deals' materialized) and it felt good! I had a dream of being able to do this as my vocation - but then it had to remain a dream. Personally, it was an intention to completely express a God given talent - creativity. I consider myself compulsively creative - almost a software artist and so when I got a chance, I thought that the best way to express it would be in the freedom offered by an entrepreunial context. Creating, understanding and solving give me an 'adrenaline rush' - my highs. My choice of not joining a regular IT company (I was even placed into one through campus recruitment) was more providence than a real 'choice' because at that time I really did not have anything else to chose from. My association with Tandem Infotech (a 30-40 member strong IT company which was a part of my friend Jayadev's Tandem Group) was supposed to be a stop-gap arrangement till I'd found something else (I'd even written the GRE). My initial role there, as a consultant, was to come up with an anti-piracy solution for their cafe management software. Along the way, I got to work on a few mobile games as a part of an international project and then in late 2002/3 (after a brief crisis), it was decided to spin off the then nascent mobile arm into an independent division and eventually into a separate entity in which I'd also be a significant stake holder (if not, I'd probably have looked elsewhere for a living). And thus started my real rendezvous with entrepreneurship (though the new company Tinfo Mobile actually got registered only in 2005). Its been a wonderful journey. I have learned a lot though I'd admit I haven't earned as much ;-). Here's a gist of my most important takeaways: 1. Be optimistic, but expect failures - they are bound to come - in droves. 2. There will be the occasional good times - most projects do go right, media spotlight etc... 3. Not every entrepreneur ends up with a money-spinning juggernaut of an enterprise. 4. The entrepreneur's role gives one a chance to work against all conventions and established norms. 5. Money does not grow on trees. Ideas alone cannot seed money trees. Ideas can grow into revenues, if combined with - people who can implement it - people who can sell it - money to fund the above two - money to market it - lady luck / divine providence. 6. Abraham Maslow was right. 7. Work towards customer delight and at the same time NEVER promise what you're not confident of delivering. 8. A satisfied customer is your best asset and an unsatisfied one could prove to be your undoing. 9. Let go when you must! Nothing lasts for ever and there are no guarantees. 10. Avoid getting emotions involved in taking pure business decisions. 11. The core team must be dedicated to a plan and a goal. People with other commitments and other goals will inevitably stall progress. 12. While one needs to multi-task, there would be one thing that one is really good at. Just creating an environment where people are free to do what they are best at is a good strategy. 13. Factors like aesthetics, design, location and packaging do matter. 14. Never stop learning. And finally, as I'd mentioned in an article earlier: An added advantage of being an entrepreneur; borrowing Edison's words after thousands of failed attempts at his inventions - "At least I know 10,000 ways this will not work!" :-) (In my next article, I plan to review another article written on why certain people might be more successful entrepreneurs than others.)