Some people may find it annoying, but I think I must write about this.
Almost a month back, I received an Email from NEN for participating in the hottest startup contest. I looked at the website and was impressed by the participation. What was annoying was the classification of a “startup”. I could see companies founded in 2003 with 70+ employees nominated by NEN with expert rating 8+ ??
Today I was planing to fill the form sent by NEN and suddenly I see an email from an unknown “startup” –
 I, on behalf of my company, request you to find few minutes out of your busy schedule and vote us for Tata NEN Hottest Startups 2008 contest. Your vote matters!
The TATA NEN Startups Awards are the first ever people’s choice Awards to recognize the highest-potential startups in India: young companies with great potential to grow; with the ability to change their industries; companies that will create jobs and drive economic growth.
You can vote a***.com online at http://www.hotteststartups.inviewandvote.do?method=fetch&businessFn=viewandvote&startupId=2**
…. More SPAM <snip>
CEO and Chairman …
XYZ
And I swear to God, I hate spams. Specially from a CEO and on a Sunday morning …
IMO, this raises some questions –
- What distinguishes a “startup” from a “businesses”. Can a new Kirana shop call itself a startup ?
- Is “People’s Choice” genuinely a good thing or just means of involving people and promoting spam ?
- Shouldn’t mentorship be an important part and motivation factor for such competitions ?
- Is cash rewards a good thing to offer. I can see Eureka has it, But I also feel that it again leads the BPlan makers to project arbitrary stuff on paper ?
- Shouldn’t entrepreneurs be judged by entrepreneurs and not “respected jury” from some college or MNC ?
Jaspreet
- India’s Hottest Startups - September 7, 2008
- The case of SonimTech – And lessons we can learn - August 23, 2008
- The Druvaa Story – III - July 14, 2008
Wondering, why can’t a new Kirana shop call itself a start up. It’s all depends on the vision of the founder. Kishor Biyani started with a shop which looked like another ‘Kirana’ shop in those days. C’mon guys, Start Up is not all about technology
They should create a share market and ask people to vote by buying shares using real money. Then we’ll see the real interest.
To me this is an attempt at bringing startups together (you never know who you can team up with) and an attempt to glorify entrepreneurship. Who cares if it’s hyped to the moon and back – it’s all good because it’s happening, and it’s worse if nothing is happening.
It’s not the efficiency of what you do but the fact that what you do generates a lot of interest that is key. What comes out of it could be anything – the end goal for a participant isn’t likely to be the prize; it’s all of the other things that can happen.
The reason looks like cheap publicity. Though it is not known they are reaching real customers. It may reach investors though.
I totally agree with what you have written Jaspreet. Somehow I find the idea of a people’s choice in case of startups rather strange. Sounds more of a gimmick. Most people are not even aware of start-ups or the definition of a startup.
Glad that somebody has raised these qns.
At the end of the day, customers choose what a hot startup is – based on the product/service (and not the fact that it’s a startup).
Reality shows like these are just leading to more spams –
As one of the serious startup told me –
“why any self respecting start-up would give time to a ‘reality’ show and spend time away from execution beats me…”
Hail on mediocrity!