I never tried drugs but I doubt they if they could be as intoxicating as talking with a bunch of passionate wannepreneurs ( wannabee entrepreneurs) and hackers on a lazy Saturday evening.
Ok, may be that was a little hyperbolic analogy , but I think it very well sumup experience I had in OCC meet last Saturday, where I joined 7 other wannepreneurs to talk on topics ranging from busines model in startups to startup ecosystem in India.
First thing that draw my attention was the confidence and enthusiasm displayed by first year undergraduate students (Akhshay and Apoorv). I was impressed with their strong understanding of web and passionate interest in startups ( doing own stuff , own way) . There is a revolutionary change in the attitude of young graduates. At my time the only objective of graduating candidate was to work as hard as possible to get straight A’ ( a honors degree to be precise) and then hunt for highest paying ‘MNC’ job. At that time nobody even talk about doing startups. And here is these guys talking RoR and startups in the very first year of ther graduation.
Another thing that I find rather unique and interesting was their agnostic attitude toward ‘business’ part of startup. They were representing first crop of true indian hacker who love coding amd creating cool programs and who are least bothered about job or money. This herald a sea change in Indian startup ecosystem in next couple of years.
We were join by an veteran entrepeur from Nepal , Ujwal Thapa, who is managing his web business in Nepal from past 7 years. He is looking for partners to expand is bussines in Delhi. Talking like a sage he kept conversation grounded and shared some really inspiration stuff on entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship.
There were three guys who left there secured job this month (yeah you wanted to know if this is the right time to start a venture. Now you know, it is 🙂 ) to start their venture. Ajay and two of his friends are all set to start a new venture in real estate domain. Atul is looking forward to do a startup in education domain.
Quotable quotes:
“Entrepreneur are crazy people. We do not do stuff just for money. We do startups becoz it is the only thing we understand and love doing. Nobody understand this including our family and friends.”
Ujwal Thapa
“Life is short and we live once so lets do things we love. ”
Ujwal Thapa
“In internet business we first build product and then build business around this. This is how facebook got created ”
Apoorv Khatreja
“Business main thoda baoot compromise to chalta hai.”
Atul kumar Bucha
“Indian startup community is growing at very fast rate specially in banglore. If you have right idea and right team you can get angel and VC money”
Ajay Yadav.
“You can start a business with passion and idea. Money may not come into mind as motivator. But when you have 100 people working for you and who depend on you and your startup ‘s survival, ‘business’ part of startup kicks in”
Manish Malik
“Why you are so much into money and business. lets create stuff we like. Business will come later”
Akshay Gupta
Venue : CCD (in front of sindhia house) ,Connaught place Delhi
Date & Time : 31 Jan 4.30 – 7.30 PM
Agenda : Indian startup community, Web (business +models)
Participants
Manish Malik Product Manager @Mobisoc www.mobisoc.com
Ujawal Thapa 7+ year vetern runnning web business from Nepal. Looking for alliance in Delhi to bring some of the web business in India.
Ajay Yadav NSIT 2007, Trilogy, FlightRaja. Left job this month to start own web startup in real estate business domain.
Akshay Gupta First year CS student @ MSIT and wannabe hacker.
Apoorv Khatreja First year IT student @DCE. Web developer and wannabe hacker.
Atul Kumar Bucha software Engineer @ Aricent Looking forward to start own venture in education domain.
Satpal Parmar (yeah that me).
Nilesh said
Nice summary.. 🙂
Rajeev said
Satpal
Great work. As I said in the past meetings, youngsters even during their start of career should start thinking some thing of their own. And am happy to see people like Akhshay and Apoorv working on same. My best wishes to both. For them its better and easy also since they don’t have any family burden to support and being student their families are already taking care of their monthly needs. My wishes to the 3 new members who left their jobs and stating o their own.
And Satpal, thanks for the summery.
RAJEEV