Sudeep D'Souza

Customer Service is defined as " the assistance provided by a company to those people who buy or use its products or services. ". In the digital age we live in Customer Service goes much beyond how we greet and serve our customers. It also includes how and where we serve them. 1. Go to your customer No longer do customers have to come to you to buy a product or a service, technology enables us to go to the customer and provide them with the product or service they require. At the very least, its important to have a good technology platform both on the web and mobile where customers can get their service or product at the click of a button.  2. Provide services in a predictable standardized manner  From the colors used on the website/app to the navigation to each service, its important to be standardized and at the same time the company needs to be very predictable in how the service is delivered. This is where automation plays a big part, reducing human intervention in the pr...

Over the last few months I have seen a lot of business ideas that base their revenue generation through advertising. In my experience this is a very dangerous strategy for a startup. Let me narrate my experience about implementing this strategy on a website that Inforica had developed called mindqjobs.com . We launched this website in the last week of december 2012 with much fanfare with the assumption that we will get the traffic to monetize through advertising. The assumption was made on the fact that the website was to be used by the students of a software training institute Mindq Systems  which number in the 1000s every month. We started off by putting Adsense and the pennies started to flow in almost immediately. Thats right, all we got were pennies which added up to a few dollars every day, an amount barely enough to pay for hosting the site on a shared server. One of the reasons is because the traffic was from India and not the west, so you end up making very l...

Was reading this small write up in the times paper about the NASSCOM initiative to create 10000 startups and over the last one month I have been part of 3 startup events in Hyderabad focused primarily towards students and encouraging them to take the entrepreneurial plunge rather than take up a campus recruitment offer. Startup Weekend University Startup Weekend University is similar to a regular startup weekend event except that the combination of students to experienced professionals is 70% students and 30% professionals. We had about 75 participants and the event was held at the beautiful BITS Pilani, Hyderabad campus over 3 days with many students staying on the campus. The students were primarily from BITS, IIT, IIIT and Vignan University, Guntur with a few students from other colleges in the city.  The event was a highly successful event in showcasing that students can build products over the weekend that have a business side to them. There were 13 startups for...

Life can be challenging for an entrepreneur. The inherent risks of running the venture are high and thus each day presents their own challenges. The risks are there as the number of people that can do a job is limited, the money available on hand is limited, the number of customers you have is limited and vendors do not give you attention as you are small. Any one of these can change every day and you will notice that you have ups and downs in quick succession - just like you are going on a roller coaster. This can play with the mind of the entrepreneur in a very significant way. The important thing is to keep evaluating your position with respect to your employees, customers, suppliers and money flow as often as possible and take actions accordingly. There are days when it would seem impossible to manage all of this and you feel like throwing in the towel wondering if it is all worth it. It is at this time you have to go back to your vision and believe completely in your...

Inforica in collaboration with Mindq Systems launced http://www.mindqjobs.com . Mindqjobs.com is a website that is going to cater to the needs of the student community. Here are 10 reasons why every graduating student that is preparing for a job or for higher studies has to join Mindqjobs.com . Browse the job board for up to date job information that is curated and posted.  Create a professional looking profile by using the Resume Builder. Once your profile is ready share it as a standalone URL to everyone and then track who has viewed the profile. Use the online material to prepare in various topics such as Quantitative, Logical, Programming languages and so on. Take tests in different topics and see how prepared you are in terms of speed of answering questions and also accuracy.  Connect with others through the discussion board and discuss common topics. Find solutions to common programming problems in different programming languages. Many technical interviews in...

As an entrepreneur one always goes through ups and downs and there are times you second guess yourself and wonder if you are really doing the right thing. There are little things that happen that boost your confidence and give you big time encouragement to forge ahead. These are small triumphs that give you this new energy to forge ahead. What I find important is to be able to break down things so that one can achieve these small victories that provide validation for what one is doing that gives you the motivation to keep going. A task not broken down keeps going on for a long time and looks so intimidating that it becomes very hard to keep one motivated right through the entire task.

Many of us are mostly developers for most of our careers and then move into project delivery roles. But very rarely do we have the opportunity to come up with a product idea, build it, market it, sell it and make money. But as an entrepreneur that is what one needs to do and if you can't define products and services and make money consistently it becomes impossible to sustain.  How do we come up with a product or service that a customer is willing to use and pay for it? The key I feel is to have a very clearly defined product or service in "bite sized" portions that are easily consumable by the end customer and provide a satisfaction to the customer that he does not think twice to pay for it and is willing to talk to his friends and family about it. This product or service should be given to the customer in bite sized portions so that he can easily understand and value. It is kind of like a restaurant - I have found that restaurants that have a very simple menu, the ...

I went back to Delhi after almost 6 years for Startup Weekend Mobile Delhi and it was really a wonderful experience. Delhi as a city has changed quite a bit for the better - for starters I am super impressed with the metro, it is very convenient, nominally priced and well connected. It was very easy to go around the city on the metro. The broad roads and the flyovers around the city was a very welcome change from Bangalore and Hyderabad where there are so many traffic bottle necks. The event by itself was very exciting in Delhi. There is a stark contrast between the same event in Hyderabad and Bangalore and some of those differences are We had only one round of pitches for ideas in Delhi and got close to 70 ideas. In Hyderabad and Bangalore we got through at least 3 rounds of pitches to get the same number of ideas. The participants in all the 3 cities was just about the same. The number of actual demoable products presented on the 3rd day was a lot more with almost every team ...

The saturday before last, I was invited to give a small informal talk at Startup Saturday (SS). SS is organized by the Headstart Network Foundation - a non-profit organization focused on creation of a startup ecosystem in India. The following video gives a clear idea about what Startup Saturday is all about. This meeting was held at LaMakaan and there was a very interesting mix of attendees. There were a few students but a lot of attendees were from either those interested in starting up or those having just started up. There were also a couple of reporters of startup related websites. There were some members from angel investor organizations or incubation centers like the IIIT Incubation Center. The theme of the session was registration, compliance & finance for early stage startups. Every month there is a theme and experts are invited to talk about that theme. It started off with each of the attendees giving a short introduction and then there were a couple of sess...

IT companies have a reputation of paying very well but they still suffer from very high attrition. Why is that so? I was watching some videos on youtube and came across the one below that validates my thoughts. Motivating employees is not just about paying them well...

The recent pirate attacks on a lot of ships off the coast of Somalia in the Gulf of Aden has been in the news. This made me wonder if the pirate attacks are something new or is it something that keeps going on but has just made the headlines because of the volume of attacks. I found this website - ICC Commercial Crime Services that has a Live Privacy Map that lists out all the pirate attacks that have been reported in the recent past. Each map point represents a reported pirate attack and you can click on the map point and read a whole report about the pirate attacks. In the same website the page Piracy prone areas and Warnings gives details of the areas that are to be avoided and it is interesting to note that all the areas happen to be around South East Asia, Indian subcontinent and the African coast. I am not sure if this is because of the sea routes that are taken or the number of developing/underdeveloped countries in these regions.

Some of the questions that have been haunting me ever since the economic crisis started are What is this so called economic crisis and how it is caused? What is the meaning of all the terminology that they are using such as inflation, credit crunch, etc? How will the economic crisis effect us? How is money created? Are the governments around the world doing the right things? Is there a relation between the oil prices and the current economic crisis? Can the problem be solved and if it can be solved for how long will it go on? I have been looking around for these answers and came across The Crash Course by Chris Martenson . It is divided into the following chapters and it goes on for a total of a little more than 3 hours. Chapter 1: Three Beliefs (Time: 1:46) Chapter 2: The Three "E"s (Time: 1:38) Chapter 3: Exponential Growth (Time: 6:20) Chapter 4: Compounding is the Problem (Time: 3:06) Chapter 5: Growth vs. Prosperity (Time: 3:40) Chapter 6: What is...

Prof K Ramachandran of ISB gave a wrap up on all that we discussed during the full day session. Eliminate customer dissatisfaction, always. Dynamic business plan. Strategy is easy, execution is tough. Have detached passion. VC money: Be ready to have a bumpy ride. Documentation is huge. Constantly build resources. Resources are behind opportunities. Stretch them. Most critical resource is time. ROTI - return on time invested. Usually a lot more effective than ROI which most people use. Innovativeness is needed everywhere. Working capital is life blood. Working capital should be low. Compress cycle time. People and system key to growth. Share vision, build passion. Develop and maintain networks. Listen to others pick up signals. Related posts Notes from TiE-ISBConnect - Amit Kishore Prasad, SatNav Technologies Notes from TiE-ISBConnect - Samir Kumar, Inventus Notes from TiE-ISBConnect - Sandeep Singhal, Nexus India Notes from TiE-ISBConnect - Sh...

Amit Kishore Prasad is the founder CEO and MD of SatNav Technologies based in Hyderabad. Amit spoke about Execution - Building a team. Ensure you have bosses that the employees look up to and trust. People need to repose confidence and faith in the entrepreneur. Choose employees that have the willingness to learn and are willing to play multiple roles. Employees who have qualifications/experience and also bring an attitude with it will create a problem.  In an organization it is good to have written communication. It should be clearly outlined what is the carrot and stick when doing tasks. When someone comes with a problem ask them for a solution. Give feedback immediately but not publicly. Weekly action plans work well Retaining people - Involve them in the decision making process and keep them in the loop. - Defend your team in front of others When going for VC funding be ready to answer tough questions regarding your team such as are they qualified enough, can the d...

Sandeep was Co-Founder and CEO of Medusind Solutions, one of the leading healthcare outsourcing companies in India. Sandeep is also the co-founder and Managing Director of eVentures, a leading Venture Capital firm focused on early stage investments in India since 1999. Sandeep has held senior roles at McKinsey and Company, Digital Equipment and EDA Systems. Click here to read more about Sandeep. Sandeep spoke about developing differentiation Important to make your product/Service unique - This allows you to price better. - It is easier to sell. - It allows you to figure out where to focus. - Helps in prioritizing your resources. Sources of differentiation - Technology or patents - Processes - Business model - Marketing How to differentiate? - Build the right team. - Surround yourself with people brighter than you that will question you. - Develop a deep understanding of the target market. - Choose the sources of differentiation. - Execute fla...

Samir has been an early stage venture investor in India for the past six years.   Prior to co-founding Inventus, Samir built and led the India venture team for Acer Technology Ventures - a $260 million cross-border venture fund investing in early-stage technology and services companies across India, the U.S. and the Asia Pacific. Samir was an early member of two startups in India, and was part of the early team at Wipro. He helped Wipro grow revenues from ~$4M in 1989 to over $200 million in 1998. Click here to read more about Samir. Samir spoke about Marketing Strategies for a startup. Think big and execute in small steps It is important to have a good team. Very few VCs will invest in a single individual. Product Most important thing the entrepreneur needs to focus on. It needs to be thought through very carefully and diligently. Think from outside in. Look at it from the view of a customer. Important to include customers when conceptualizing the product. U...

Shantanu Surpure is Managing Attorney at Sand Hill Counsel, a law firm with offices in Mumbai and Silicon Valley. He focuses on venture capital and private equity transactions. Shantanu holds a BA from Brown University/London School of Economics, an MA Juris from Oxford University and a Juris Doctor from Columbia Law School and is admitted to practice law in India, California, New York and England and Wales. Shantanu spoke about Negotiating with VCs. Be organized and document everything properly. Hire a lawyer when negotiating with a VC because they will have one of their own. VC's will do a valuation and will ask for anything between 25% to 40% of the company in the form of preference shares. When the VCs have an interest in investing they will give you something called a term sheet which will have all the terms and conditions. VCs usually look at a 3-5 year investment horizon. In the term sheet there will be anti dilution terms which means that if the valuation of the co...

DD Ganguly is co-founder and CEO of Dimdim, Inc. Previously, as Vice President of Product Development at CA (NYSE:CA; $ 3.5B) he built and led an organization of 1000+ members. He joined CA in 2001 upon its acquisition of Boston based AIM, Inc. where he was founder and CEO. Click here to read more about him. DD Ganguly spoke about his Fund Raising Experience for DimDim which is a free web conferencing service where you can share your desktop, show slides, collaborate, chat, talk and broadcast via webcam with absolutely no download required for attendees. Funding When looking for funding look for people that like you and what you are doing. Angel investors invest in your business because the align with how you think and what you do. Try and get journalists and bloggers to write about your product/service. This will help in popularizing and showcasing your product to potential VC's. You need to click with the VC for them to invest. Choosing a name The .com webaddress should ...

Professor K Ramachandran is the Associate Dean of Academic Programmes at the Indian School of Business. He has been a professor of entrepreneurship, family business, and strategy at the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad since its inception in 2001. He is also the Thomas Schmidheiny Fellow of Family Business and Wealth Management at the ISB. Professor Ramachandran spoke about Entrepreneurial opportunities and Organization Building - A Road Map. He spoke about identifying the type of opportunity, the graph of time against turnover for a startup and elements of a business plan. Opportunities are identified through a pent up need or customer dissatisfaction in the existing offerings. By mapping the pent up need (Discontentment) on one axis and Criticality (dissatisfaction) on the other different kinds of opportunites can be identified. Any organization needs to balance Financial Needs, Technology Needs, Marketing Needs and Entrepreneurial Capability. If an entrepreneur can manage t...

Sateesh Andra is a Venture Partner with DFJ India. Sateesh started his Silicon Valley career in the early nineties and has extensive background in general management, marketing, product strategy, and technology development. Prior to DFJ, Sateesh was the fo founder and CEO of Euclid Software, a leader in the IT Governance space. He has also served in product marketing and engineering leadership roles at Tsqware (Conexant), LSI Logic, VLSI Technology (Philips), and Wipro. You can read more about Sateesh here . Sateesh spoke about the Spirit of Entrepreneurship - My Journey. Here are my notes from that session. Have passion in your idea for a period of time. Dream big. Study your idea. Understand the stated value proposition vs the implemented value proposition of your idea.  Is your idea a pain killer or a vitamin. In times of hardship people stop using vitamins but the do not stop using pain killers Raise money from the right people. Do not just take money...