Entrepreneurship

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 16 jun 2015

India's technology industry landscape was earlier driven by export of software and services, but now it is undergoing accelerated transformation through mobile phones. There are 969.89 million wireless phone subscribers in India at the end of March'2015, with 862 million of them being 'active users'. About 100 million access internet through mobile devices like smartphones. Tech-driven companies attracted US$ 2.36 billion during first quarter of 2015. Recently there has been high profile mergers and acquisitions in the mobile and internet space. E-commerce is going through a boom and disruptive phase with dynamics of industries being reshaped and remodelled. Millions of users are thronging on to online marketplaces to buy whole gamut of products and goods, and avail various services with just clicks and swipes. Professor Vivek Wadhwa of Duke University says, 'India will see a technology boom over the next 5 years that will make the US dotcom boom look lame.' Software product business ecosystem is taking shape in India. iSpirt (Indian Software Product Industry Roundtable) is a step to nurture software product ideas and entrepreneurs. India evolved new ways of bridging the digital divide and create domestic demand for applications and services. This can be a lesson for companies that serve the digitally poor around the world. Read on...

Outlook: The Changing Landscape of India's Tech Industry
Author: Dinesh C. Sharma

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 13 jun 2015

With 55% increase in smartphones and numbering 140 million in 2014, India is rapidly transitioning into a smartphone driven internet and ecommerce market. According to report 'Internet Trends 2015' by Mary Meeker of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, smartphones are the main source of 65% of the internet traffic and 41% of e-commerce in India. Professor Vivek Wadhwa of Duke University explains how the next technology revolution is brewing in India with smartphones as the main catalyst. India's mobile leap is more direct and speedy as compared to the evolved transition of technologies in US, from mainframes to PCs to tablets and then finally to smartphones. According to him, 'The capability of these devices will keep increasing as prices drop. Indians will benefit from the same developments in technology as the West, with smart watches and fitness-tracking wristbands and smart glasses and connected contact lenses. Smartphones will be used to order goods, read news, monitor crop growth, access government services, report corruption and crime, and manage smart cities and health. Mobile computing will be everywhere.' To benefit from this wave of smartphone penetration, Indian developers and entrepreneurs have to find innovative solutions to old problems. He suggests, 'They need to take advantage of the unique properties of smartphones and tablets, such as the ability to gather data via sensors and lightweight user inputs, and hyper-personalisation of content and operation.' Read on...

The Economic Times: India, now get ready for next tech revolution
Author: Vivek Wadhwa

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 30 may 2015

Entrepreneurship is a critical component of economic growth and contributes to development, industrialization and employment generation. For entrepreneurship to thrive requires a facilitating ecosystem with government's proactive business policies, participation of private sector, accessible markets, availability of venture capital, readily available skilled human resources, and environment of risk taking. In 2015 GEI (Global Entrepreneurship Index) India is ranked 104th and trails all BRICS economies. The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) study in 2013 pointed out that entrepreneurial attitude is relatively low in India when compared to other BRICS countries. Only 61% of the adults (age 18-64) surveyed looked at entrepreneurship as a desirable career option. Moreover the enterprise surveys from World Bank reveals that the new firm density, described as number of new corporations created per 1,000 working age (16-64 years) individuals, is found to be dismally low in India. Although recently constituted Ministry of Entrepreneurship (with Skill Development) by the Government of India is a step in right direction to boost entrepreneurship focused policy and decision making but concrete visible actions are to be taken soon considering the highly competitive and fast paced world of entrepreneurial ventures. Amit Kapoor, President & CEO of India Council on Competitiveness and Chairman of the Institute for Competitiveness, points out the issue of entrepreneurship clusters and why India has faltered in a coherent cluster approach that enables enterprise creation. According to him, 'The fact that exports from the country have not been able to keep pace with the imports points to rising domestic demand. In addition, it also points to a failure on the part of India to 'make' and equally importantly 'market' our goods and services well in the global economy.' He further adds, 'The thrust on Make in India is thus understandable. Augmentation of large corporations with the development of MSME clusters, especially with newer enterprises and entrepreneurs, will go a long way in bettering prospects for the future.' He suggests the following key elements to nurture an entrepreneurial ecosystem in India - Education that promotes independent thinking and risk taking; Expand the funding opportunities; Technology development by talented and expert individuals; Improved access to infrastructure like electricity, internet, land etc; Social and cultural support by accepting failure as an inherent part of learning; Better regulatory environment; Stringent IP (Intellectual Property) protection regime; Collaborative environment with trust and teamwork between institutions, networks and people. He finally adds, 'In our view, specialization, innovation and marketing (SIM) should be the basis of entrepreneurship that would drive more value creation in the Indian context. Newer business models that focus on society, scale and simplicity would better the outcomes for India in the future.' Read on...

moneylife: Building an entrepreneurial ecosystem in India
Author: Amit Kapoor

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 24 apr 2015

For organizations to continuously innovate and provide better products and services, it is imperative that innovation and creativity becomes part of the workplace culture. Dave Ranson, MD of Moog India Technology Center (MITC), says 'A workplace culture wiped clean of fear of failure has the best climate for innovation.' He suggests the following to encourage innovation - (1) What It Takes To Innovate: Right people; Right processes; Right resources; Discipline in strategy, planning and execution of innovation programs; Leadership support. (2) What Leaders Must Do To Foster Innovation: Drive away fear of failure from workplace; Knowing when pursuing innovation and give it the best; Continually reinforcing courage to take risks; Encourage the practice of learning from failure, adjust and move on; Recognize and reward innovative behavior; Judge innovation projects with two questions (Is it producing valued and tangible outcomes and is it creating valuable new knowledge). Read on...

The Economic Times: What business leaders do for workplace innovation
Author: Amrita Premrajan

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 01 apr 2015

For long-term success and continuous growth of their businesses, corporate leaders focus on innovation, performance excellence and risk management as their priority agenda. Their innovation strategy includes 10 types of innovation - product, service, platform, structure, process, business model, network, channel, customer engagement and brand. According to Andy Boynton, Bill Fischer and William Bole, co-authors of 'The Idea Hunter', as a long-term success mantra, corporate innovators need to cultivate habits of curiosity, deliberate observation, diverse information seeking and engagement with other creative people. Peter Sims, author and entrepreneur, explains 'In addition to idea flow, enterprise innovators need to nurture habits of taking 'little bets' via creative play, prototyping, learning and pivoting.' Jeff Dyer, Hal Gregersen and Clayton M. Christensen, co-authors of 'The Innovator's DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators', suggest 'At an individual and organisational level, corporate innovation calls for skills in questioning, observing, networking, experimenting and making associations. Gerald Tellis, Director of the Centre for Global Innovation at University of Southern California, says 'In an increasingly competitive and globalised economy, it is only 'unrelenting innovation' that can help companies sustain a long term advantage.' According to Madanmohan Rao, research director at YourStory Media, large corporations can seek innovative ideas and creative solutions by partnering and collaborating with entrepreneurial startups in variety of ways. This will help them save time, money and effort that goes into in-house innovation. He provides 15 tips and suggestions for big organizations to tap startup innovation - (1) Acquisition (2) Accelerators (3) Calls to Collaboration (4) Hackathons and Hackdays (5) Startup Competitions (6) Conferences and Local Meetups (7) Startup Hotspot Visits (8) Customer Engagement Models (9) Thought Leadership Via Startup Media (10) Special Interest Groups (11) Startup Networks (12) Entrepreneurship Networks (13) Incubators (14) R&D Grants to Entrepreneur-focused Universities (15) Entrepreneurs in Residence. Read on...

YourStory: 15 innovation tips - how large corporations can successfully engage with startups
Author: Madanmohan Rao

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 25 mar 2015

The recent rise of India's e-commerce industry with names like Flipkart, Snapdeal, Quikr etc making headlines in the media, rush of just-out-of-school entrepreneurs to create start-ups and venture capitalists pumping money in internet-based companies, there is much talk of the development of India's start-up ecosystem. But there are critics who point out that India's laws predate the start-up and e-commerce culture. They argue that even though billions of dollars are being invested in the sector, there are lack of clearly defined laws, regulator, ministry or watchdog. As e-commerce companies look to take the IPO (Initial Public Offering) route and seek listing on stock exchanges, there is news of SEBI's (Securities and Exchange Board of India) working towards making the norms easier but at the same time safeguard interests of investors. One of India's top investor, Rakesh Jhunjhunwala, in a recent interview with CNBC-TV18 commented that Indian e-commerce sector is in a bubble with high valuations of companies and lack of profitable business models. Read on...

Business Standard: India's startup ecosystem needs a Sebi of its own, and now!
Author: Itika Sharma Punit

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 13 mar 2015

'Make in India' concept has the potential to do for manufacturing sector what economic reforms of 1991 did to the information technology industry (IT services & BPO). Jugaad is an inherent Indian trait to find a fix or an instant solution by applying unconventional and non-standard processes. According to Banmali Agrawala, president & CEO of GE South-Asia, 'The Make in India campaign has been getting a lot of jugaad reaction, particularly in the case of capital goods, to raise import barriers and to go around World Trade Organization norms to impose forced localization. Jugaad is at best a stop-gap measure. To move forward, encouraging creativity and innovation at an affordable price point through serious research and development must become the cornerstone of this campaign.' He points out factors that drive global investments in manufacturing, namely domestic demand, skilled workforce and efficient governance. He further explains and analyzes these three factors in Indian context and concludes - India's domestic demand is modest, requires thrust from government spending, support through competitive financing for exports, production efficiencies and quality output at competitive prices; India have skilled workforce but to leverage its full potential needs focus on innovation, research, design, engineering and high end of value-added manufacturing. Indian companies have to invest more in such manufacturing related activities; Although India has strong institutions in place but there is room for improvement in achieving better and efficient governance with transparency and predicability. Read on...

Livemint: Making in India beyond jugaad
Author: Banmali Agrawala

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 02 mar 2015

Indian society is facing multiple challenges like high poverty rates, child labor, female foeticide, illiteracy, malnutrition etc. To overcome these issues, considering the substantial population size, requires mobilization of large amount of resources, social innovations, entrepreneurial spirit and commitment from government, private sector and civil society. Philanthropists, alongwith NGOs and local level community and grassroots organizations, are trying to tackle old problems in innovative ways. And there is still large untapped potential that is waiting to be harnessed to make required changes for the betterment of Indian society particularly in the rural and tribal areas. Santanu Mishra, co-founder and executive trustee of Smile Foundation, explains how an initiative by Rajasthan government 'Padharo Mahari Lado' to protect the girl child is bearing fruit due to the collaborative efforts of Department of Health, Barmer, National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), Cairns India Limited and Smile Foundation. According to him, 'When a social innovation is intended through collaboration, it is very necessary that it features a common agenda, unbroken communication, effective measurement systems, and the presence of a core organization.' Read on...

Business Insider: How Indian NGOs are marrying Philanthropy with Social Innovations?
Author: Santanu Mishra

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 20 feb 2015

Government of India's Union Budget 2015-16 is now just around the corner and business community is eagerly awaiting to find out what is in it for them. India's entrepreneurial ecosystem is evolving and going through structural shifts with incubators, accelerators, angel funds, startups, entrepreneurs etc getting more attention then before. The new generation of startup successes is inspiring young entrepreneurs to get into the startup mode. Moreover government itself has shown its commitment through Prime Minister Narendra Modi's 'Make in India' and 'Digital India' concepts. Also last year Finance Minister Arun Jaitley himself announced the setting up of Rs. 10000 Crore fund for startups and small & medium enterprises (SMEs). V. Shankar, mentor & investor with Chennai Angels, says 'The good news is that start-ups are on the budgetary radar, and we hope that all the above and more promotional measures are put into place to generate a vibrant start-up culture.' Dipti Gore, co-founder of Techstory.in, lists and explains some of the expectations that startups and entrepreneurs have from the government - (1) Specifics of the Rs 10,000 crore startup fund declared by the government. (2) Favorable taxation environment for startups. (3) Elimination of Angels Tax. (4) India's low ease of doing business ranking of 62 out of 125 countries, is a cause of concern for businesses, particularly for entrepreneurs as the speed to launch an idea into business is a critical element of their success. Administrative aspects of doing business have to be optimized in favor of startups. Read on...

Techstory.in: What Startups expect from Budget 2015?
Author: Dipti Gore

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Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 14 feb 2015

Entrepreneur mindsets are key to create innovative and thriving businesses. India's entrepreneurial ecosystem is in its formative stages to attract young minds and provide them with tools, skills, environment and market to succeed in both technology and non-technology businesses. Chirag Kulkarni, serial entrepreneur and CEO of C&M Group, has interacted with around 500 founders who are building startups and noted some often repeated beliefs that seem to be a cause of concern. According to him the following 5 mindsets have potential to hinder the progress of Indian startups - (1) We can't do anything unless a VC invests in us. (2) I need to follow an existing model of success. (3) We can't build a successful company, unless we move to Silicon Valley. (4) Screw marketing, business development, culture, and anything other than engineering, sales, and operations. (5) We don't have the potential to be a billion dollar company. Read on...

VentureBeat: 5 mindsets that may hinder Indian startup success
Author: Chirag Kulkarni

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