KACHARAGADLA

“We need to know that we are doing something that’s fun”: Divyank and Bhavin Turakhia. Credit: Eric Millette for Forbes Anyone can play a video-game. But can you create one? That was the challenge that motivated brothers Divyank and Bhavin Turakhia to begin game programming when they were still in primary school. The challenge came from their father, a chartered accountant, who also bought them books on how to create games. At age 13, when Divyank had a computer project at school, he and Bhavin, who was 15, spent an entire year developing a business-simulation game. It starts with an animation sequence on how a commercial partner has cheated the player and taken over a company. So, with no money in hand, the player is charged with building a rival business from scratch. The ultimate aim is to gain 100% market share. The player must handle money and employees as well as create and manage budgets, allocating across departments like human resources, research, sales and marketing.

With 4,200 tech startups, India is the third-largest tech startup hub in the world. But the steady increase in startups and a range of initiatives by the Indian government to spur growth does not mean the challenges for entrepreneurs are any less. In India, 40% of startups failed since 2014, while in the first five months of this year, over 18 businesses have shut down, according to separate surveys conducted by startup tracker Xeler8 and tech media platform Inc42. “As many as 997 of 2,281 startups in logistics, e-commerce, food tech and analytics collapsed since June 2014. The average age of these failed ventures is just over 11 months,” says Rishabh Lawania, founder of Xeler8. Last week, Indian retail mogul Kishore Biyani raised eyebrows among Indian entrepreneurs at the  Economist  India Summit in New Delhi when he said a majority of the startups lack long-term vision and were created with the aim to sell themselves off to larger companies. “Ninety percent of startups

At any life stage of a company, being truly open and transparent about your finances can be intimidating. If you’re doing well, you may be happy to show them off. But if you’re starting out or going through difficulties, you’re opening yourself up to scrutiny. What if our accounts show we’re wasting money? What if we’re not making enough money? What if our competition finds out and is doing a lot better than us? It’s understandable to be paranoid. At last week’s XeroCon in San Francisco, Xero’s inaugural conference, the idea of being financially transparent emerged in a conversation with founder and CEO Rod Drury. For startups raising money from an investor or a bank, sharing financials is expected. But with Xero’s online accounting software, customers can share a read-only version of accounts in real-time with anyone all the time. Xero accounting dashboard “ Startups  should be capturing data to build up value. They should have a clean set of financials to get funded

If you find problem-solving to be energizing, you could be the next great entrepreneur. On the other hand, if facing unforeseen problems annoys you and causes ongoing stress, don’t quit your day job. Creating an innovative new business is guaranteed to test your skills, patience and determination, and you need to derive satisfaction from the journey, as well as the destination. Contrary to a popular myth, problem-solving is a talent that can be developed. To do it well requires a focus on several key activities and practices, including the following: 1. Maintain a positive attitude, since startup problems are normal. If you feel angry or exhibit a negative attitude to the team about problems, you will jeopardize the potential success of your startup. Successful problem-solving is often more a state of mind than any particular skill or process. 2. Remember that learning requires listening more than talking. The first challenge for many aspiring entrepreneurs is to put asid

Kaushik Mudda and Navin Jain graduated from RVCE Bangalore in 2014 as engineers in the field of electronics and communication. In their final year, the duo already had jobs in their kitty. Kaushik had got through to KPMG, a dream job for many. But a year earlier, in their sixth semester, the duo had started working on a pet project which kept their minds and hands full. “Navin and I used to build small robots and hovercrafts while in college,” Kaushik told me over an email while pitching his startup. While working on these machines, they realise that they needed more precision in their cut parts to make their robots better. They needed a CNC (computer numerical control) router for that but the cheapest machine in the market was about INR 6–7 lakhs. “Since we couldn’t afford this high price, we decided to build our own machine. We have never looked back since then. What started as a solution to our own problem has ended up becoming a solution for our clients as well,” recounts Kaushik

India comfortably ranks third globally in the number of startups according to the latest Nasscom report. The number of startups in India is crossing  4,200 and still counting.  The report further says that the Indian startup ecosystem  will see funding worth $5 Bn by the end of this year.  Out of these thousands of startups, some are poised to completely redefine their sectors. Customers are readily accepting the new ways to travel, shop, make payments etc. Technology based innovative startups are seeing much traction from both the investors and customers. Having said that, the success metric for your startup is based on how you are not only improvising but also improving the existing mechanism. In today’s startup scenario, the word innovation & disruption is akin to survival. A true disruption is a business model innovation riding on the back of a technology innovation. So while this innovation is attracting investor attention and positively impacting the lifestyles of custome