India isn't really slowing down that bad, and here's some reasons.
Of course, in the "globally integrated" (and ridiculously priced) pockets in Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, parts of the NCR, Chennai, Kochi, etc., there is a recession underway and the impacts just about started to be felt. There have been layoffs, people are on notice, fortunes have been lost and there are netither large transactions happening, nor loans available to fund them in the first place. But the "rural economy" (is that primarily the agrarian economy, or is it more a geographical definition?) continues to do well despite a not very strong winter crop. I read somewhere that its share of the GDP is 54%, yet it manages a share of 62% of consumer spending! In essence, thats what drives the wheels of our economy.
Makes one feel kind of marginal, doesn't it :)
Question : what's our "startup" world doing beyond the slick 2.0 interfaces, and its connected high end crowd ? Where is the idea for major services for this huge, if challenging, market ? Why must we do essentially what The Valley does ?
I have no answers, but I do think part of the reason is that most of the "startup" entrepreneur space is not about a business, but technologies or often just their usage for a narrow, niche and usually optimistically sized target audience. Not just this, some people even seem to take offense that there's enterprising folks outside of tech (involved in real businesses - imagine), and that they deserve funding as well!
The current modus operandi of the VC sector does not demand an upfront "completion of the business" cycle and in the Indian context, version 1.0 of the biz idea gets too expensive on its own. A million dollars! Come on, many of the big brands we have today were started on lesser.
There are surely a few great successes outside of the echo chamber. If you know a few, would be great to interrupt our heady 10x multiple fantasies and get to know about them. It might benefit us to understand how to first create a real business, and then bring in its online/mobile/whatever interface as needed - as a tool to improve/enable parts of the business. The real need is never the interface, dears.
Of course, in the "globally integrated" (and ridiculously priced) pockets in Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, parts of the NCR, Chennai, Kochi, etc., there is a recession underway and the impacts just about started to be felt. There have been layoffs, people are on notice, fortunes have been lost and there are netither large transactions happening, nor loans available to fund them in the first place. But the "rural economy" (is that primarily the agrarian economy, or is it more a geographical definition?) continues to do well despite a not very strong winter crop. I read somewhere that its share of the GDP is 54%, yet it manages a share of 62% of consumer spending! In essence, thats what drives the wheels of our economy.
Makes one feel kind of marginal, doesn't it :)
Question : what's our "startup" world doing beyond the slick 2.0 interfaces, and its connected high end crowd ? Where is the idea for major services for this huge, if challenging, market ? Why must we do essentially what The Valley does ?
I have no answers, but I do think part of the reason is that most of the "startup" entrepreneur space is not about a business, but technologies or often just their usage for a narrow, niche and usually optimistically sized target audience. Not just this, some people even seem to take offense that there's enterprising folks outside of tech (involved in real businesses - imagine), and that they deserve funding as well!
The current modus operandi of the VC sector does not demand an upfront "completion of the business" cycle and in the Indian context, version 1.0 of the biz idea gets too expensive on its own. A million dollars! Come on, many of the big brands we have today were started on lesser.
There are surely a few great successes outside of the echo chamber. If you know a few, would be great to interrupt our heady 10x multiple fantasies and get to know about them. It might benefit us to understand how to first create a real business, and then bring in its online/mobile/whatever interface as needed - as a tool to improve/enable parts of the business. The real need is never the interface, dears.
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