Agreed very much. But the problem i see is that, there are good techies here in India, but they are bad marketers. What we need is a consortium or a panel, which guides all these guys for creating products/services for specific verticals/markets and helps them to understand market realities & expectations.

Without that i strongly believe, any great technically sound product will brutally fail in the market place.

Posted by Narain

Yes, very true. But, in India we lack the appropriate channels and the environment needed. We don't have many garage stories like in silicon valley nor many incubators or angel investors to encourage such environment. Also, putting $100k itself is a substantial amount in India and not everyone would easily go for it.

Even when we think of outsourcing development or hiring on contracts, we still need a small dedicated team to get a good product to launch. But in India, there are not many people who would work only for stock. The equity story is still not that popular. India needs more garage stories, business plan competitions and mentor-ship from the experienced ones for more start-ups to come up.

Posted by Sachin

We are waiting for "THE ENTREPRENEUR", their vision and ambition to bring India out of all the politics and a policy to avoid brain-drain.

Posted by Sheetal

Well..Rajesh...While it is quite true that ideas abound (as always), I think the key question is whether there is a local market for IT based entrepreneurship. It is all fine in paper when one provides a service for an offshore MNC through call centers. But I believe true transformation can come only when traditional business models are adapted for local markets through the use of innovative IT.

As an example, I am thinking along the lines of Barron's innovation of selling Akai TVs in India in 1995-96 at dirt cheap prices. Mulchandani turned the business model upside down and many TV companies went out of business when he accelerated the change. While it is true that he didn't use IT then, surely there is a similar opportunity in other sectors today?

e-choupal is probably a more contemporary example.

www.rajagopal.com
--
ps: I was an entrepreneur once, and you were a judge in a b-plan competition in which I pitched my company.

Posted by Raj

Still..It's a more accesible path than it was a few years ago.

Posted by Alkaa

Also i think like in US, indian companies & MNCs here should also support small companies with innovative solutions.

Posted by SkillMeter.com

Even though the amount of money needed to start an internet business has decreased, in India even getting that capital is hard. The garage stories have been quite rare. Try opening a garage company in India and ask good people to join, its just too hard. With salaries sky-rocketing, good people are hard to find and team is what makes a great product and a great company.

People fear from taking risk and even if they take risk, they don't see any avenues. Even though I feel joining startup is not a risk, but not many people agree!
http://enventure.blogspot.com/2005/07/is-joining-startup-really-risk.html

Posted by Sunil Goyal

I am a little late to this comment party, but nonetheless here are my views:

Its not that we dont have enterpreneurs. We have plenty of rags to riches enterpreneurial stories like Dhirubhai Ambani, Karsan Patel (Nirma) etc. Look at us. We know a million reasons why something wont work. But the two gentlemen named above, not only overcame those one million reasons, they went ahead and created markets where none existed before.

I've always believed in the adage "If you build it, they will come". In today's connected world, you can be either in Bangalore or Boston. Thanks to the ubiquity of the net, you can pitch your product directly to the target audience. No need for middlemen. Its a great time to be an IT enterpreneur (or join one whose vision matches yours), as the barriers of entry have come down considerably in this new flat world.

Posted by Anand Jain

So true !
forwarding to boss, and going home to increase my efficiency.

Posted by Amitabh Ranjan

This is always drummed into our head, through maternal admonitions.
"Early to rise, Early to sleep makes Man healthy, wealthy and wise".
I too confess, when I sleep at 4 in the morning, my abilities do go down the next day.

But, I keep listening from my friends in Finland that people hardly sleep in Arctic Region.

Even during Gujarat Quake, I had read about "some Foreign Actiist wondering why indians sleep so much?".

Hey, when life is so short & there is so much to do, How can you sleep? :)

Posted by Mallikarjuna