13th was a VC event on sidelines of TiECon. Key highlights: 1. Most people accepted the gap in early stage (series A) funding, but depending on who you believe, something around 10 funds are being raised to cater to this. People clearly see the opportunity here, and belief in Indian product companies is beginning to […]
Always Mange More!?
Madhu has raised some interesting, and perhaps, furstrating, questions regarding what really VCs want. A fair description of the same has been outlined by Chris Wand. Still being more of an entrepreneur than a VC, one learning I have is that VCs are not a homogeneous entity. Some key parameters as you look to choose […]
TiECon 2005 this week
TiE India is having its flagship event TiECon later this week. Am chairing the same, and must tell you there are some very good speakers coming there! More details here. 0
ContentSutra Mixer – Invite for VentureWoods
Sahad has been kind to invite all VentureWoods members to their Dec 21 Mixer in Delhi. Limited registrations 0
Angel Employees
Interesting article on a service that tries to find angel employees. Would love to get feedback on this — if there is interest, I can try and get an “angel employee job board” put up with venturewoods? 0
TeNet group at IITM
Met with some folks at TeNet and related companies at IIT Chennai. I think this group has some of the most amazing innovations sitting in there, with a vision to bring connectivity and applications to rural India. While the success of CorDECT and Midas is well known, its the vision in entirety which gets most […]
Innovation Trip
Just came across this interesting item. To help Indian leaders spark innovation and creativity in their organizations while revolutionizing work culture and reducing employee attrition, Innovation Trip announces a 7-day tour of innovation and inspiration in America. Highlights of the tour are : 1. A workshop at Harvard Business School on Disruptive Innovation 2. A […]
Big picture vs Tactical Entrepreneurs
Recently came across a couple of entrepreneurs who have built significant businesses on back of very tactical opportunities — great ability to spot that niche and move aggressively to service it. Now these entrepreneurs want to go to the next level — in a bid to do so, they need to transform themselves from tactical […]
What should a VC be like?
Munjal Shah profiles some of the traits that he likes amongst VCs. Amongst them: Genuinely and aggressively support the entrepreneur High level of understanding of the business Be straightforward Ability to get into detail on the ground, rather than “armchair feedback” Would love to hear about what else entrepreneurs value. From my own experience as […]
IIT Mumbai Incubator
SINE — the incubator at IIT Mumbai, seems to have made better progress than a couple of other initiatives I have seen around. The core strength seems to be the ability to merge institutes’ strengths in technology (through students and faculty members) with experience from industry. A fair number of startups seem to involve experienced […]
Context of advertising
One of the reasons why Google is so successful at Adwords, and not so successful at Adsense, is that the context in which advertising is placed is extremely important. When people are looking, they also look at ads and click on them if they seem relevant. If someone is reading an interesting news article, it […]
Businessweek – China & India
There is a double issue of business week highlighting China and India, and some of the online extras are good. Check it out! The Asian cover story is on hot growth companies. 0