Building an Enterprise through an Idea
Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower," said Steve Jobs, and went on to create Apple Inc. Entrepreneurship is not about being original but being innovative enough to find a right gap and to be able to have a perfect solution to match the gap.
As a young student, I always found myself inclined towards starting something I could give shape to and nurture as my own. It was this feeling which I realized is the first step to recognize a budding entrepreneur inside you. Unlike what most people believe, one does not have to be from a business family or have the prior knowledge of setting up businesses to be able to grow into an entrepreneur. Till his retirement, my father served as an engineer with a big multinational, but once I passed out from my college I immediately tried to set up my own business.
My first venture failed, but I never stopped dreaming of creating a business someday. Someone said "Obstacles are things a person sees when he takes his eyes off his goal." And I was very sure my goal was to establish myself as a successful entrepreneur.
"If you nurture your mind, body and spirit, your time will expand. You will gain a new perspective that will allow you to accomplish much more."
One failed attempt to start my own business led me to the doors of GP Group, where I joined as a trader. Coffee trading wasn’t really easy to manage. I was travelling every two days and trying to up the sales. The trading job involved creating contracts, managing risks, accounting for the stocks and much more. I realized that not only were the processes time-consuming, but in the absence of adequate technology, the growth of the business was not to its optimum level. Delayed decisions and unmanaged risks would often obstruct business operations bringing the growth rate down.
I saw a gap that technology could fulfill and that is what I learnt from my job, , to recognize a gap. For an entrepreneur, the key to entering any new venture is to assess the need for it. And the gap led me to the idea for my new venture. I was once again ready to transform into an entrepreneur.
If your business is going to be an enabler to create more wealth at a faster rate for your client, then there is every chance that your business will grow to be profitable. But the explanation should also come with an essential ingredient—a risk-taking appetite.
This is one disposition which is common to all entrepreneurs.
Golden rules for every new entrepreneur to succeed:
- Learn to take and manage risks. A person who wants to play it safe always will not be able to start his/her own venture ever. Risk-taking ability is not about being reckless but about being able to foresee a difficult phase ahead and plan to live with short term inconvenience to benefit in the long term. It is also about moving out of the comfort zone to pursue something
- To take risks, keep your personal expenditure at minimum. The more liabilities you live with, the less you will able to focus on your core purpose that is your own venture
- Living with uncertainties: This is little different from a risk-taking ability. While taking risks can be based on certain business intelligence and analytics, living with uncertainties is more about a mental make-up. It’s an attitudinal need to be able to cope with adversities and living with minimum resources.
- Ideas matter. It’s important to work on a grass root level idea. Ideas that work in one geography may not work in another part of the world. When starting out, it’s important to see the need and viability of your business proposition for your audiences. Knowing the needs of your target audience is most critical in all cases. Do not be led by success in another part of the world.
I considered all the above factors when I started Eka Software Solutions. The gap in the commodity market was huge and still is. There are very few technologically advanced products available that understand the dynamics of this industry. I saw a huge need for Eka products. I also realized that the Indian commodity market was still not organized enough to derive higher profits from technology enablement through an Eka product. Even though we had the right product for a more organized global commodity market, the challenge was to convince the world about India’s ability to build a world-class product. It’s good to know your audience and your challenges—that gives an entrepreneur an edge when defining his strategy.
A good strategy and a well-defined plan is only the framework. For your business to breathe, the oxygen is certainly the funding.
Finance: The key component to sustain a business
Availability of capital is the most restricting factor that disables any project from furthering its growth. However strong the idea may be, it’s important for an entrepreneur to partner with a good investor. The investor not only should believe in the project, but his funds should be able to take the project through to all critical stages of growth. Most good ideas don’t materialize into a business because of unplanned financial support. Today when the investor market is opening up again, one should be quick enough to take advantage of the available resources. Whether a loan, venture capitalist or an angel investor, you have to build a valuable relationship with your funding partner. The relationship has to benefit both and yet the bigger goal for both parties should always remain the venture itself and not individual gains.
When your investor is qualified, it always value adds to the business, as together the USP of the venture can be better nurtured.
USP – the big idea – the key differentiator
If the market demands, then multiple vendors of the same product can co-exist and the challenge is lesser to manage such ventures—retail being one example where the business is purely defined by the market demand for a category of product. However, when the offering is for a niche audience, then the stress on specifics of the offering has to be high. The product differentiators in such products are its additional/unique features. More the distinguishing features, higher are the values of the product. Therefore, when starting a business based on technology, one has to consider future technology advancement and especially invest in research and development to ensure the product’s constant upgradation. For an entrepreneur it’s important to stay ahead on the learning curve always. The best lessons any entrepreneur can get about his business are from his own experiences in running that business. Therefore, it’s critical that an entrepreneur consciously makes all the decisions while constantly keeping a record of what didn’t or doesn’t work.
"The most valuable thing you can make is a mistake; you can’t learn anything from being perfect."
Today, the economic downturn may have impacted many ventures and dreams of many to start up on their own; yet this is an opportunity for all the aspiring entrepreneurs to take time to assess their project’s viability, understand the market, garner funds and take the risk to make that million dollar idea a reality.
Manav Garg is the Founder and CEO of Eka Software, a Bangalore-based software product company focused on the Commodity Trading and Risk Management (CTRM) space.
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