DARE - Because Entrepreneurs Do

In the month of November, HeadStart achieved yet another milestone—of reaching out to the masses and sharing knowledge with entrepreneurs from different places across the country, even those living in remote areas where there is a lack of proper guidance and dearth of much needed inspiration. With the November Startup Saturday event in Mumbai being covered by ET Now (to be aired on its show Starting Up), HeadStart is well on its way to create an entrepreneurial revolution in the country

Mumbai - Starting Up @ Startup Saturday
The theme of Mumbai Startup Saturday was “Social Media.” The event had social media experts come and share their experiences.

The first speaker of the day was Gaurav Mishra who made a great case on how it’s the right time for start-ups in India to focus on “Invention” rather than “Tweaks.” Later, Rajiv Dingra of WATMedia (http://wat-media.com/) spoke about the use of social media for start-ups.

Startup Saturday, Mumbai, was marked by the unveiling of the Starting Up show on the ET Now channel.

Three start-ups introduced their products, in 90 seconds each. Rakesh Deshmukh presented MoTrade, a mobile trading platform with secure transaction as its USP. Avinash Anandan introduced Qureka, which helps you discover people with your interests, and Samir Palnitkar presented his start-up ShopSocially, a social shopping experience site. Sudhir Syal of Starting Up moderated a fun Q&A session with the three founders answering questions raised by the audience.

This fun session was followed by a talk by Naman Sarawgi, head of Product at Freecharge.in (http://www.freecharge.in), on the problems solved by them using social media. Dina Mehta then spoke on 10 tips for establishing “Personal vs. Professional Brands on Social Media.” Next, Rohit Varma of Interskale Digital Marketing spoke about how social media is a great tool for start-ups to reach out to targeted groups interested in their products.

The session ended with a talk by Mahesh Murthy on how mammoth companies like Google, Amazon, and Yahoo took off solely through word of mouth and without much advertising.

Startup Saturday, Bangalore
The Startup Saturday, Bangalore, was based on the theme “What business is right for me?”

The session began with an informative talk by Amit Singh, one of the founding members of HeadStart Network who also heads Startup Saturdays across India. Amit spoke about the idea behind HeadStart, its initiatives like Startup Saturday, the people behind the initiative and the future goals of HeadStart.

Amit’s session was followed by an entertaining speech by Shastri Divakaruni, Chairman and CEO of
Silk Media (http://www.silkmedia.net). Mr. Shastri emphasized on the importance of perseverance and the need to focus on profits and not just the idea of business.

The next talk was by KA Srinivasan, cofounder of Amagi Technologies (www.amagi.com) and founder of ImpulseSoft. Mr. Srinivasan shared his experiences about starting ImpulseSoft, how it got acquired, and what they focused on in his venture, Amagi. He advised aspiring entrepreneurs to focus on doing what interests them. He also emphasized on the need to be flexible and change one’s ideas if needed, to avoid learning the hard way.

Karthee Madasamy from Qualcomm Ventures (http://www.qualcomm.com), a VC firm, then spoke about inflection point (the point at which the growth of the product/industry is typically exponential in nature). The session ended with a talk by Manish from Saarthi Consulting (www.saarthiconsulting.com) who spoke about “Success Chakravyuha” or the 7 factors that decide the success of a start-up.

Startup Saturday, Hyderabad
The theme of Startup Saturday, Hyderabad was “Cloud Startups.” Different concepts like building solutions in SaaS model, building tools and infrastructure for the cloud, and key challenges in the business models for cloud solutions were being discussed in the event.

The first speaker was Satish Madira, founder of Yasu Technologies, and an angel investor in Hyderabad. In his engaging talk on cloud-based business models, Mr. Satish Madira spoke about the online gaming industry free gaming consoles, and subscription-based games.

Chiatanya, from Ozonetel, spoke next about the product KooKoo. KooKoo is a next generation inbound and outbound IVR telephony platform that allows users to build and manage their telephony application using a web technology of their choice.

The Hyderabad event ended with a talk by Ripul Kumar of Kern Communications who spoke about a new cloud-based LMS solution being launched recently.

Startup Saturday, Kolkata
Startup Saturday, Kolkata, tried a new format this time. Instead of speeches it had an open discussion session by entrepreneurs, aspiring entrepreneurs, and other professionals on serious issues that affect start-ups and businesses day in and day out.

The session started with a discussion on “should a start-up focus on one core competency or should it take up every small assignment that comes its way just to survive?” Aji and Manoj suggested that it is a good idea to take up what comes your way while dedicating a certain percentage of resources in building a product or a particular service. Pallav Nadhani, another attendee, said that the resources of the start-up should be allocated only to its long term, medium term, and short-term projects.

Another debate that sparked at this point was “how to differentiate products and services?” Many emphasized the importance of developing products to succeed. It was pointed out by several attendees that it is difficult to be a 100 per cent product company as even giving a product may entail providing some services ancillary to the main product, such as installation or user training. The event ended with a discussion about hiring and retaining talent.

Startup Saturday, Chennai
The first speaker in the Chennai Startup Saturday, Vivek from Interview Street, made a simple yet powerful presentation. Satya Prabhakar of Sulekha.com then shared his experiences by giving a glimpse of the challenges faced by an entrepreneur. “You need to be fully involved in an idea and at the same time enjoy the vagaries of life,” Satya pointed out in his talk.

Startup Saturday, Pune
The theme of the Pune Startup Saturday was “Mobile Application Development.” The first speaker was Sachin Murgunde of Savvy Infocenter who gave a good overview of the mobile market with a lot of statistics. Sagar from Optinno Technologies spoke next. He spoke about the complexity and difficulty of product development and market analysis. This was followed by an insightful talk by Shardul from Webonise on the world of mobile products. Shailendra from Mobisoft was up next. Later, Surojit Nandy introduced his company IncuCapital (http://www.incucapital.com) that works with start-ups and helps them with their scale up. The event ended with a talk by Jignesh Jain from XTPL on mobile product development.
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Startup Saturday happens in eight cities every second Saturday of the month. Join us there if you have the faintest inclination towards entrepreneurship and start-ups. We can assure you that these sessions will leave you inspired. The audience comprises of entrepreneurs, aspiring entrepreneurs, academicians, corporations, students, and even curious passersby. Signing off folks; let’s create more start-ups and make the existing ones more productive. Join us @ www.headstart.in or follow us on twitter @headstarters. Contributed by Ruchika Abbi (audience at SS Mumbai), Ramesh, Ramanuj, Ram, Vaijayanthi, Prakash(audience at SS Chennai), Sarang Lakare (audience at SS Pune), Swati (editor) and HS content team.

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