How incubators are disrupting the Indian agri-tech startup landscape.

Technology has changed the way that businesses behave today. The Indian economy is home to over 56,000 startups with about 450 plus in the agri-tech space alone. There are government regulations and incentives to help these startups grow and sustain, but the dynamics are skewed towards the incubators and accelerators who drive exponential growth.

The agri-tech segment is growing at a phenomenal rate of 25% year-on-year. The fund inflow has been over $250 million in 2019 alone. The future is bright, and experts view the agri-tech innovation industry as the primary driver of agricultural economics by 2020. The multi-billion sector has a massive scope to change the face of the Indian economy. Incubators are not only funding, but also mentoring, and guiding the very fragmented businesses leading towards a cohesive structure.

The agriculture industry is fragmented and unorganized in India. There is a need to harness the potential that the sector offers to harness the growth and make it sustainable. The need for technological innovation to find solutions to everyday problems is the need of the hour. Frugal innovations in the agri-sector will help the economy grow in the long run.



The pressure points plaguing the agriculture industry is the dearth of market linkages, services, and networks that can be tapped as a cohesive whole. The experience of incubators have helped agri-tech startups to channel funds, groom entrepreneurs, provide on-ground pilot testing facility, and maximize business opportunities. The boot camp activities of the incubators facilitate the back-links to market, help in driving networks to reduce wastage, create sustainable logistics systems to promote marketing initiatives, and help agri-tech startups scale up.

The formal incubator-accelerator organizations have disrupted the Indian agricultural startup scenario over the past a few years. Incubators seed the potentially disruptive ideas of the agri-preneur intending to create a viable business model. The startups gain co-working space, structured funding, mentor-ship in the technology and financial domains as well as in-depth knowledge of the industry itself. Incubators also help to mitigate the challenges and risks in the delicate scale-up process.

Incubation is the bedrock of innovative disruption. The idea is to foster growth and ultimately commercialization of the innovation. The incubators have stepped into the gap between a good idea to a viable business. They provide necessary infrastructure, feedback, and correction advice to firm up the innovation. The hand-holding process includes mentor-ship, identification, and firming up of collaborations for the agri-preneur. Intellectual resources and advice can make or break the pattern of growth and scalability.

The role of incubators is crucial in the wider business ecosystem in India. They are integral to the shaping up process of the Indian startup network. The role of the incubator is well beyond the corporate startup office. They add value to the entire business-scape of the start-up community. The exponential growth of India as a start-up hub has opened up the potential of incubators to nurture creativity and disrupt the way traditional business works. The mentoring of the start-up will help agri-ventures transform and catapult itself to the next level.

Agri-tech startups have a vast scope to enhance livelihood opportunities in rural India. Intervention in sustainable agricultural processes, livestock management, skill development, market linkages, effective network of logistics infrastructure, sustainable pricing conventions, and robust market linkages will contribute tremendously to rural economic development and food security goals in the country. Incubators are set to disrupt the Indian startup landscape in a big way.


Disclaimer: Following article source is ET

Startups, guide your way to cloud.

Isn’t this such an exciting time, when so much is happening in the startup arena? Technology-based startups bet on their ideas and work towards giving life to their dreams over a period. Ideas which are given shape via technology and placed on the tarmac as a pilot roll-out are tested for their relevance and acceptance from the consumers and businesses. This is where the idea of a public cloud comes across as a boon for tech startups that are either testing the waters with their beta products or productionising their solutions. A public cloud offers unprecedented compute and is the perfect platform for startups to take off. It is just not about compute boxes but capitalising on unique offerings that matter the most to them from a solution standpoint.

At the time when these pilots are rolled out (with ‘beta’ or ‘trial run’ tags), there is no sense of scale or directional indicators on compute capacity. Some may invest in market studies leading up to forming an opinion on the way forward, but at best they are ballpark and based on one’s awareness of the domain. Often, the question is about the pilot creation, where the pilot travels a certain distance, but is now being challenged for it longevity while the business leaps to garner bigger deals. This is the time and phase where startups go back to the drawing board, to assess how they can stand up to the upside they are witnessing on their businesses.

Getting access to public cloud is comparable to getting access to a theme park with unlimited rides. But it all depends on how they are utilised and perceptions are formed on the basis of ones’ tryst with specific rides.  Startups look for quick ways to deploy and get their solutions/services up and running. This article presents some of the field learnings from a technology standpoint in the form of recommended practices startups should keep in mind when they begin their journey in the cloud.

* Adapt a universal component designThis is one area architects and designers need to think through. A typical approach taken by a startup is not get tied to a specific platform. Depending on factors indicated under #4 (‘Cloud credit management and cost optimisation’) below, you tend to move your workloads from one cloud platform to another. Migrations or move-overs are not easy and come with certain costs (time and effort). At times, having used native services on specific cloud platforms might make the movement harder. If you have taken a stance not to use platform native capabilities, it might work in your favour during migrations, but at the cost of not capitalising on the power of cloud beyond pure boxes (hosting workloads in VMs).

This is where the need to make your workloads universal comes in handy. What does ‘universal’ mean in this context? It is about realising the core capability (main business function) by way of using certain peripheral native services (storage, integration, and data services) to complement the core functionality. When you take this approach, the core remains independent of a cloud platform and it can only be called complete by leveraging peripheral services. So when you move from one cloud platform to another, you take the core, which is at the heart of your solution, and wire it up with required peripheral (managed) services. This is true heterogeneity in the context of public cloud. In hindsight, it is also important to establish basic know-how of at least two cloud platforms to realise this model.

* Time to market — building vs buying (adopt managed services)

At times, it is fashionable to say that we have built it all in-house instead of using any readily available solutions. While it is important to demonstrate technical prowess leading to intellectual property creation, you have to balance it to address ‘time to market’ (TTM). TTM is very important for tech startups in view of competition and this is where ‘Managed Services’ or ‘PaaS’ comes in handy. Why waste time when someone has already done it the hard way? You are better off using it and moving on with stuff which is far more important to your business than going the route of reinventing the wheel.

Don’t get bogged down and stay on the trail of demonstrating technical prowess, but demonstrate agility by using proven frameworks and softwares that are out there. PaaS offering lays out services which can be readily consumed. Hence, if you are grappling with multiple ideas, you are better off realising them sooner in your efforts to test the waters.

* DevOps

This is the most talked about but less adopted stream in the startup world. A sense of urgency is at the centre of any startup and an essential ingredient for them to compete. Down the line, you may realise the aspect of disciplined approach to execution, and the lack of it in your effort to release something quickly. As your business grows, you will realise that TTM is increasing and you lack agility in the process followed. This is where the need for DevOps is felt and an essential ingredient in the overall SDLC. The sooner startups bring in this culture, the better would be their road ahead when it comes to scaling their systems and being responsive to business demands.

* Cloud credit management and cost optimisation

Major public cloud vendors provide usage credits to help startups jumpstart. It may last for a while, and is considered a major cost saver in the startup world. However, one should be mindful of the fact that these credits have an expiry and at some point, they must shift this cost into their routine burn rate. One crucial recommendation for startups here is to leverage these credits and invest in experimentation. You have to invest time to explore ways and means to scale, secure, grow, and instil value into your overall offerings.

In addition, the experimentation should also lead you into discovering the most cost-effective way to run your solution. This is critical to address the reality when credits run out and you have to pay from your pocket, because you are assured that you have the most economical solution in place.

* Minimise tech breakdowns

 Cloud provides more than one solution to a problem. Hence choose the one that justifies the cost as well as meets your performance requirement. Be it B2B or B2C, your differentiator may eventually be ‘availability’ and ‘responsiveness’. Hence it is important to build your system considering they would fail. Transient failures are evident and ensure you know the failover or recovery path in times of crisis. Your systems should carry the tag of ‘fail safe’, since factors like ‘availability’ and ‘responsiveness’ have a direct impact on the perception your users will have of your product and the reputation.

Cloud is evolving and so should startups. Cloud platform vendors are offering innovative solutions and a great amount of effort is going into democratising the software for application developers. Startups face a plethora of challenges and have to ensure the boat sails with certain stability. Based on my observation of the field, startups need to give thought to the above described areas. It is always desirable to do it right the first time, though learning from failures gives great insights on the way to success.

Disclaimer: - Following article come from YOURSTORY

How Entrepreneurs Made A Comeback After Business Failure.

Sydney entrepreneur Laura Moore came back from disaster to launch a successful health coaching business.
Running a small business can be one of the biggest, and most rewarding, challenges you can take on.

Imagine then, pouring your heart, time and life savings into developing, launching and growing your business, only to watch it either come close to failure, or worse, go under.

"I put on weight, was experiencing extreme fatigue, constant bloating and poor digestion, brain fog and erratic moods, which was seriously affecting my performance both personally and professionally," she said.

"To the world, it was business as usual, but behind closed doors I was battling with trying to exit the franchise, constantly worrying about my team and clients and how I could ensure they were impacted as minimally as possible, and struggling daily with my health. I now realise there was still a big part of me that felt like a failure."

Moore said she now uses what she learned during that dark time to help others through her new performance and health coaching business, Uppy.

"I learned how to manage and overcome the thoughts and behaviours that had led me to that point in the first place -- perfectionism, unrelenting standards, self-sabotage, fear of failure, fear of not being good enough, procrastination, over-working," she said.

"I've always wanted to run my own business and this setback wasn't enough to kill that dream.

"The fire was kind of a blessing because it allowed me to get amazing insight very early on into my business career, so I now know the key areas I need to improve on (or delegate!) in order to make my new and future businesses run efficiently and successfully, and in a way that serves me personally too.


"I'm sick of seeing people struggle because they've been misinformed or they don't know there's another way, so I created Uppy as I believe everyone has a right to the knowledge and support that can help them live more."

Even experienced entrepreneurs can face failure. Entrepreneur Pawl Cubbin had to completely re-think his marketing plan when his Canberra nightclub started to flounder

Pawl Cubbin, serial entrepreneur and founder of advertising agency ZOO Group, also faced the burn of a failing business 12 years ago when the shine wore off his Canberra nightclub Academy 11 months after opening.

"It was a massive endeavour to get it going: Canberra's not a big place and we opened this nightclub in an underground cinema," he told HuffPost Australia.

"It had heaps of atmosphere and the novelty value was big, so it went well for the best part of 12 months -- everybody came and it was a big deal. We killed it.


"But after 12 months the novelty wore off; everybody had been multiple times and even though it was unique in Canberra, it was reduced to a certain demographic and that wasn't enough to sustain it."

Cubbin said the business floundered for three months before he could come up with a plan to save it.

"It was an expensive project ... we'd invested too much to close it," he said.

"It did too well too initially for us to close it. You've got to identify what you're doing wrong -- you've got to take some blame.


"One of the guys I worked with said 'I think this is the demographic we want, let's put that out there and promote that' and we did. And it was the right thing at the right time, so we were lucky."

Disclaimer: - Following article come from THP

The Richest Entrepreneur Under 40 in Hurun's India Rich List for 2016.

BENGALURU: Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma's wealth surged by 162% in the past one year, making him the richest entrepreneur under 40 in Hurun's India rich list for 2016.

Sharma is worth about Rs 7,300 crore, up from Rs 2,824 crore a year earlier. The rise in wealth can be attributed to Chinese e-commerce behemoth Alibaba investment in the company and subsequent funding rounds that have raised Paytm valuation. Sharma holds about 21% stake in the company.

After Sharma, Indigo co-founder Rakesh Gangawal has seen the biggest increase in wealth of more than 150%. His wealth stood at Rs 15,900 crore, thanks to the share price performance of the airline post its IPO last year. 

Anas Rahman Junaid, MDIndia of Hurun Report, a monthly magazine that focuses on high net-worth individuals in China and India, said subdued investor interest in e-commerce and online businesses had reduced valuations of e commerce unicorns in 2016. Several mutual funds with holdings in Flipkart have lowered the valuations of those stakes in the past few months 

Bhavish Aggarwal of Ola, the youngest in the list at 30, is worth Rs 3,000 crore, up from Rs 2,385 crore in last year's list. His co-founder Ankit Bhati is no longer in the list, which looks at those with wealth of Rs 1,600 crore and more. Last year, Bhati's wealth was exactly the same as Aggarwal's. Hurun's Junaid said Bhati does not have as much stake as Aggarwal does at present.

Disclaimer: - Following article come from ET

Business on a Budget: 5 Money Saving Tips for Every Startup Entrepreneur.

The failure rate of startup businesses is not news to anyone in the world of entrepreneurship. And it's equally sad to know that if you sift through the carcasses of these dead businesses, you will definitely find startups that were founded on great business ideas.

You may wonder why businesses built on brilliant ideas still fail. The answer is usually fairly simple. Having an idea for a business and having an idea about how to run a business are two entirely different things. The reason most startups fail centers around two things -- management skill and financial skill. A dearth of any of these two can kill your business.

I want to focus on the latter reason, financial skill. Let's say your capital base is robust enough to deal with all your business expenses. If you do not know how to be disciplined and frugal with spending, the amount of money you have in your business’s kitty will not do you any good.

If you are a startup entrepreneur, here are a few tips to help ensure that you maintain your capital base, and enhance your profit margins as soon as possible.

1. Postpone personnel rewards.
Starting and running a business is already a herculean task on its own. Think of how much worse things will be if you start dolling out exorbitant amounts of money on unnecessary employment benefits and expensive salaries. You can avoid depleting your capital by avoiding these practices. Set your employee salaries reasonably and augment it with performance bonuses.

If you must have employee benefits, limit them to only those that are critical to motivating employees to achieving the set goals and objectives. Beyond helping you save money by breaking even and turning profit sooner, this practice will help you develop a culture of frugal and disciplined spending in your business.

2. Keep personal and business finances separate.
You are the founder of your business. This implies that you own the business. The problem comes up when you mistake this to mean that you are the business. No  successful business can be run with such a mindset.

Always keep your personal and your business finances separate. Money made from the business is for the purpose of maintaining and growing the business. If you do not separate these two, you will soon find yourself dipping your hands into the business’ coffers for reasons that are only of personal benefit.

It helps to have you on the payroll of the business like every other employee. This ensures that you are making money from your business while also preventing you from depleting business funds.

3. Spend cheap with coupons.
Don't ever buy stuff because you can afford to. Having enough money to make a purchase does not mean that you should make it. Develop the habit of looking around while shopping -- especially online -- to ensure that you get the best possible deal.

One way to spend cheaply is by using coupons. You will be amazed how much you can save. I have always used coupons whenever available for important business purchases. When I purchased the first set of PCs for my ecommerce startup, I was able to save a good amount of money by using the coupon codes I got through Promocode watch. The fact is, coupon codes have remained one of the main reasons some businesses have been able to start up and stay afloat.

4. Skip the real estate.
You do not need a corner office to run a successful business. Many businesses that are successful today started in awkward locations. Just ask the founders of Google.



Do not spend money on real estate that will not directly benefit the business. You can turn part of your house or any other free space you have into an office. From there, you can run your business with your small band of employees.

Let the business grow and expand organically so that when the time to spend on real estate comes, you will know about it and better still, you will be able to afford it without putting a financial strain on your business.

In essence, drop off whatever won’t be missed if they are taken out. You can start cheap, and scale up later. I started my first six figure ecommerce business on free WordPress themes. I scaled up from there.

5. Purchase key person insurance.
In every business, you will find that there are certain people who are invaluable to its success. One way to protect your business is to purchase key person insurance on such a person. As a business owner, you certainly belong in that category.

Key person insurance is a fancy way to describe life insurance on you, co-founder or key employee on whom the continued successful operation of your business depends. The business is the beneficiary under this policy. This insurance coverage is important because it ensures that if anything should happen to the key person, rendering him/her incapable of working, the business will have other options available to them besides filing for bankruptcy.

The business will be able to use the insurance payoff to cover operating costs and pay off debts until they can find a replacement for the key person.

The ability to adequately align your business with strict budget discipline is critical to its survival. Since finance is the life-wire of most businesses, every startup entrepreneur should focus on how to efficiently manage his/her business budget.

Disclaimer: - Following article come from Entrepreneur

Investing in a Startup Isn’t as Dumb an Idea as People Say It Is.

Are you thinking about investing in startups, but are hesitant because of all the fear mongering around startup investing out there? I’m sure you know what I am talking about. There are plenty of people out there who will tell you things like:

“When you invest in startups, expect to lose all your money.”

“Your returns as an angel investor are typically negative, so don’t bother.”

“Angel investing is stupid… don’t do it (even though I made 5X returns angel investing).” And I quote this from an actual conversation.

If startup investing is so risky and so dangerous, why do you hear about so many Silicon Valley millionaire and billionaires getting rich doing it? And why are these typically the same people telling you not to bother getting involved?

The answer is simple: they have learned to do it the right way, and they don’t really want anyone else infringing on their turf. Why is that? Well, it’s because they want to keep the secret intact. The secret to investing in startups the smart way.

If you want to get involved in startup investing and actually generate out sized returns, you need to work at it. That means taking the time to educate yourself completely about this highly complex and variable asset class. You need to get up to speed on how to perform due diligence, how to evaluate a term sheet, how to understand different deal structures, and just to have an overall awareness of current trends and developments in the startup market. It can really be a full time job. This is why venture capitalists exist and are often handsomely paid.

You need to develop relationships, help people who can do nothing for you, offer tons of free advice, make introductions, accept coffee meetings, read everything, and most importantly, get to know A LOT of people. During that time you will probably meet a few who are special. It’s almost like they vibrate at a higher frequency. Once you get used to knowing what to look for, you’ll get pretty good at spotting them right away. These are the folks you want to invest in.

So what things do we look for when selecting companies for investment on 1000 Angels, the company I co founded? Here’s a short overview:

— Stellar founder. If you don’t feel something that excites you when you get to know the founders, they are probably not the right person to invest in. The reason you have that special feeling is because this person has some really unique skill, vision, or vibe that is seriously impressive, and you are subconsciously aware of it. Listen to your heart.

— Attractive market. A market that has relatively few competitors, and in which the founder can establish some sort of competitive insulation or advantage is key. I shudder inside when I hear someone has invested in the 20th “me-too” company in a particular space. Recipe for disaster.

— Traction. What has the team actually accomplished? If they are just coming to you with an idea on paper or a binder-thick business plan, run for the hills. Invest-able companies are those who have proven they can acquire customers, provide value, and maybe even generate revenue. Your investment dollars are hopefully being used to fuel growth of a tested business model, not to make costly mistakes.

— Deal structure. Uncapped convertible note? Forget it. $15 million pre-money for a company that has no traction? Run the other way. There are a million reasons deal structure can torpedo a deal, and learning about all of them usually involves experience, and doing your homework. There have been plenty of cases where investors have bet on companies that resulted in multi-million dollar exits, but no return for early investors who took a ton of risk. You could write a whole book about these cases. Maybe I will…

These are just a few important tips on how to make smart startup investments that can be a great addition to your portfolio. And while I won’t tell you should should invest your child’s college funds in a startup portfolio — and you should realize you could lose all of your invested capital — if you are careful, diligent, and leverage the resources available it’s not outrageous to expect a decent return on your investment. The goal of startup investing is to build a portfolio and develop wealth over time through smart investing in people that you trust and believe in.

There are a lot of resources out there that can help you get started. Startup investment groups and platforms, blogs, webinars, and masterclasses can point you in the right direction. And don’t forget, diversification is key to this strategy. You can’t just invest in one or two companies and hope they work out. It’s really hard to pick the winners, but with some careful attention, you can try to avoid the losers. And avoiding the losers is a key part of making sure that your diversified portfolio performs well.

Disclaimer: - Following article come from FORTUNE

Success Is Not A Matter Of Luck — It’s An Algorithm

How does someone like Jack Dorsey go from a 14-year-old computer science nerd to serial entrepreneur, the co-founder and CEO of Twitter and Square? How does 3M consistently innovate, developing simple but iconic products like post-it notes? It's not a matter of luck. It's an algorithm.

So what exactly is ENGAGE?

ENGAGE is a six-step process for discovering what drives you and using it to succeed in your career. Many people's careers stall because they see strategic, high-level thinking, like knowing what their purpose is or what values drive them, as a "soft skill." They don't prioritize it. But that kind of thinking is exactly what enables entrepreneurs to launch successful startups, executives to get promoted and politicians to be elected. You can progress in your career without following this model, sure. But you'll eventually plateau.

If you want to be not just good, but the best, ENGAGE is for you.

E: Explore your meaning
Whether you think you can, or you think you can't — you're right. — Henry Ford

What's the first step explore your meaning? Identify your top three core values, then define steps you can do each week to embody that value. You value creativity? Set 15 minutes aside to doodle. You love adventure? Visit one new place every week.

N: Narrow your goals
Life is short, fragile and does not wait for anyone. There will NEVER be a perfect time to pursue your goals.

What's the first step to narrow your goals? Even more important than identifying your smart goals and writing them down is knowing the things that you will NOT do. Learn to say no. One key to achieving your goals is being selective with your time so that the bulk of your energy goes to what counts.

G: Generate a plan
A goal without a plan is just a wish. — Antoine de Saint-Exupery

What's the first step to generate a plan? Business executives spend 90 percent of their time in meetings and answering emails. Set aside time to center your efforts on the people who matter. Find the one person who can help you accomplish a goal and create a plan on how to reach out to them.

A: Anticipate roadblocks
Everyone has a plan 'till they get punched in the mouth. — Mike Tyson

How do you start anticipating roadblocks? Break down your goals into steps. Want a promotion? Then you need to 1) complete an important project and 2) bring in new clients. Go over what can go wrong in the process: missed deadlines, only finding one new client, etc. Now remember that even if that happens, it's not the end of the world.

G: Gain persistence
If you want something you've never had, you must be willing to do something you've never done. — Thomas Jefferson 

How do you gain persistence? When you feel like giving up, switch things up instead. Do something totally out of your wheelhouse — it doesn't even have to align with your goal. Are you struggling to get recognized at work? Learn how to cook a new recipe, change the route you take on your commute, try a new sport, or simply spend your lunch break with someone you haven't met before.

E: Elevate yourself
To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart. — Eleanor Roosevelt 

How do you start elevating yourself? Start by acknowledging one person who helped you get where you are or who positively shaped your life. Showing respect inspires others and builds influence.


E.N.G.A.G.E. will help you design experiences that promote "successful thinking". However, the formula doesn't work unless you do. Your potential is there waiting to be discovered!

Disclaimer: - Following article come from CNBC

Entrepreneur from Aurangabad - A startup story

Sachin Kate is the founder of Clear Car Rental and I had no clue about the magnitude of impact this 28 year old had created when he walked into our office at YourStory.in. Yes, Clear Car is just another car rental company in India but there are a few points that justify as to why he needs an ovation.

The man has a story to tell

Sachin Kate hails from the small city of Aurangabad in Maharashtra where the concept of starting up is pretty much alien (yes, setting up a shop is also starting up but we’re talking in conventional terms of starting up). The region where Sachin resided doesn’t have schooling available after grade 4 but Sachin’s parents were firm on providing him with all the needed education and hence sent him to a friends place in a nearby region from where a school was more accessible. Sachin started selling newspapers since money was always a challenge and luckily for him, he got a job of an office boy in 11th grade at a computer institute.

Always fascinated by computers, Sachin took advantage of the situation and progressed to become a computer instructor in one year. After 12th, Sachin shifted to Aurangabad for higher studies along with a part time job in a travel agency. “This job gave me my initial exposure in travel business. On a part time salary I started working full time because slowly I started getting access to computer and could show my computer skills,” says Sachin. He was pursuing his BSc. in computers and he had an inclination towards how SEO worked. This came in handy for the travel agency he was working for.

Gaining in confidence, Sachin tried moving out of his zone in terms of location but his family wasn’t very comfortable. He decided to come back and take up web development assignments. He focused on the travel and hotel segment and has developed more than 600 websites till now along with his team. This is how InfoGird and NetMantle had come into existence.

And then came in the big break.

Sachin was always associated with the travel and hospitality industry and was aware of the needs of the industry. “The technology was being developed for airlines, hotels booking etc., but last mile connectivity which is mostly road travel in tourism sector was in a way neglected,” says Sachin. And thus was launched Clear Car Rental in July 2010. This was the time when the Meru Radio cab service and a couple of others had settled in.

Clear Car Rental provides both local (packages for full day, half day and transfer) and outstation travel (packages for round trip, one way drop and multi city travels) solutions. CCR provide car rental services to 150+ cities within India and has a home grown team of about 100 that manages the operations.

And all this without a penny of funding

We’ve seen the car rental companies getting funded at will and the justification for the need of huge funds for a business like this. Surprisingly enough, Sachin has been able to scale the company to 150+ cities without raising a single penny of institutional funding. CCR holds inventory of 14000+ cars with a 1000+ vendors on board. Apart from the domestic, foreign tourists and corporates, OTAs like Makemytrip, Cox & Kings and Thomas Cook have also partnered with CCR. “We’ve focused a lot on Tier 2/3 cities. The average purchasing power has gone up and even people from smaller cities are hiring cabs now,” says Sachin. They have a strong share in the metros as well but they’re banking on the smaller cities for growth.

And building a company from Aurangabad

We’ve seen companies being built from small towns and this is yet another success story from a place you’d not expect a startup to scale from- Aurangabad. As always there are pros and cons,

Sachin believed in what he was doing and his grit to be successful opened up doors for him. Local newspapers have written about it and a blog post he wrote- “Aurangabad Calling” encouraged many youngsters who were studying outside to come back home and find employment.

A local hero in Aurangabad, Sachin Kate has been hidden from the bigger picture and we hope this post gives the man his due.

Website: Clear Car Rental

Startup with $10 million in funding shuts down: “From first bite to the bittersweet finale”

An on-demand private chef startup that had secured more than $10 million in funding has shut down and issued a dire warning for other tech companies operating in the food space.

Silicon Valley-based Kitchit offered a platform where chefs could visit users’ homes and cook for them, and has served 100,000 meals since its launch in 2011.

The startup raised over $US8 million in total, including a funding round it closed in December 2014.

But due to an increasingly cut-throat market and a lack of investor interest, Kitchit has shut down, another in a long line of similar startups calling it quits.

Startup Problems? Contact Us!

In a lengthy and insightful blog post, founders Brendan Marshall and Ian Ferguson detail the startup’s journey from “first bite” to the “bittersweet finale” and the reasons behind its demise.

It begins with the team’s plans to create “the world’s largest – and its first decentralised – restaurant” and their early success with these plans, with 30-40% gross profit margins.

“An accomplishment that was unrivalled by many food companies at scale, to say nothing of food-tech startups,” the founders say.

“We believed that these were the early indicators of the venture-scale business we’d been searching for.”

But it all started to come apart, with the founders saying the company’s funding runway ended just as the industry faced some troubling times.

“We’ve navigated five years and made the most of every dollar raised,” they say.

“Nevertheless, investment runways are finite, and unfortunately ours reached its end at a moment of substantial upheaval in the food-tech world.

“While Kitchit’s business fundamentals have always been strong, our scale has been too limited to outshine the tumult around us.”

It comes as several other startups playing in the food space have been forced to shutter operations, including SpoonRocket in March due to a lack of funds, Competitor Dinner Lab earlier this month and Kitchit rival KitchenSurfing.

The founders’ blog post concluded with an ominous warning for other startups operating in the space.

“So we close our doors with a mix of sadness for our customers, chefs and employees on one hand, and on the other a recognition that our market is simply not ready to sustain a venture-scale business,” the founders say.

Disclaimer: - Following article come from SC

Food Startup Flips Business Model To Cut Down Costs, Maintain Growth.

This is a case sort of belt-tightening across different startups sectors that cut across e-commerce to food-tech companies. Faasos - one of the most highly-funded food startups, which so far retailed only self-branded food from its own kitchens - around 175 odd ones across top 15 cities - is the latest one to flip strategies to keep costs down while maintaining the pace of growth. 

The company flipped its business model last year to enlarge food variety on its menu by tying up home chefs - around 100 on its rolls now.

 

The model had limitations, though. Food from home-chefs can get high-on-demand but home chefs do not have the ability to address the consistent point in order volumes. "We will be using the strength of home-chefs for bulk party orders that we started on with about a month ago," said Revant

Bhate, Head of Marketing at Faasos.

Start Your Business In Kuwait

Faasos which handles around 12,000 orders a day is now hooking on to restaurants and independent caterers to sell their best selling products to customers, in a bid to further expand its menu without bearing the cost of setting up kitchens.

"At the end of the day, it does not matter to the customer where the food is coming from," said Bhate. At present, the Faasos menu has broadly 7 to 8 segments -north Indian, biryani, signature rice, curries, wraps, pizzas, desserts, chai and snacks and all-day breakfast.

Restaurant tie-ups are aimed at getting into other cuisines such as Chinese, salads, pastas, continental and south Indian dishes. The move will help Faasos which recently completed tie-ups with 500 restaurants across metros and tier 1 cities to double up order volumes without investing big on new customer acquisition. "The idea is to move up from 3 orders a month per customer to 6 orders from the same set of customers," said Bhate who hopes to close fiscal year March 2016 with revenues somewhere close to Rs.100 crores which was the set target for the company.

The company founded in 2011 by two friends Jaydeep Barman and Kallol Banerjee counts leading venture capital firm Sequoia Capital as its early investor and had last year raised two rounds of funding -$20 million led by Lightbox Ventures and $30 million led by Russian firm ruNet which valued the firm at around $130 million.
Disclaimer: - Following article come from ET

The high cost of entrepreneurship

So you are ready to start your own business! It’s a time that is both exciting and possibly nerve-racking. But there are so many reasons to do it, right? To be your own boss. To set your own hours. To realise your dream. And most of all, to provide the kind of financial reward and security that working for someone else can rarely offer. And you are re right, of course, in principle. Successfully starting, running and ultimately exiting a business can deliver on all of these promises.

However, before jumping into the waters of entrepreneurship, there are other sides of the coin you should be prepared for as well. Upon setting out on your new venture, gone will be the safety net you may well have become accustomed to: the regular salary. If you are funding the business yourself, you will hardly be able to pay yourself a salary. And if you are seeking outside funding, the last thing investors want to see in the “use of proceeds” table is a comfortable salary for you.

Without outside employment, you now also have to consider things like health insurance. The cost of being self-insured is becoming increasingly higher. Once your company may qualify for a small business group rate, it helps. But remember, you are the company. If you have the company pay your insurance, it is still you paying for your insurance. Every dirham or dime spent, is less money you have to work with in growing your business.

And as you no longer have someone to pass problems up to, be prepared to be the receptacle for all of the company’s problems. With the addition of employees, even good ones, you will also take on the role of parent, guidance counsellor, marriage counsellor and confessor. Which takes an inordinate amount of time.

But lest you get the idea that I am dissuading budding entrepreneurs from pursuing your dreams, I would assure you I am not. For many (myself included), the benefits mentioned in my first paragraph far outweigh the obstacles and challenges listed in the next three. But it is a decision that should be carefully considered before committing. Especially as one of the biggest changes you are likely to experience in starting your own business is one that is often the least anticipated: the change in lifestyle! In making the shift from employee to entrepreneur, you will be moving from enjoying a regular salary and the ability to budget your time and expenses in the pursuit of happiness to wondering what each new day will bring.

Let’s start with the budgeting of time. At the helm of your new enterprise, evenings and weekends become extended work hours where they used to be time for relationships and recreation. Whether it be business opportunities or operational issues, right now will always be the right time to handle them. So an unhappy client at 9pm can be a once-again-happy client at 9:30pm with a little handholding. 

But push them off to the morning when you may prefer to call them and they could well be on the way to becoming an ex-client. This weekend’s operations issue, if left to fester until the work week, could cost you far more than a few hours it may take to address it immediately. This is not to say you’ll never have free time to relax in the evening or on weekends. But your business will demand that you are always on call. Even travelling takes on a new complexion as you will undoubtedly spend an inordinate amount of your time on your email or phone handling business affairs.

Now on to the financial impact on your psyche and daily life. As an employee, you generally know how much you’ll make each month (apart from commission-based sales jobs of course). And you know your core expenses of housing, etc. So you have a reasonably good idea of how much you can place against your culinary, social and recreational interests. Well, now it is “disposable income, goodbye”!

If you are committed to building your new venture and you are placing all available resources against this goal, then discretionary funds for fun take a hard back seat. When I started my business in Manhattan, in 1999, I chose self-funding at the onset to preserve my ownership stake and to test the market before seeking outside funding. As the business started developing, I committed more and more funds. Within a few months, I had cashed in every account and mutual fund I had set aside over the years to fund operations. And all during this time without any income.

So my daily life changed significantly, in ways I struggled to cope with. Such as coming home at the end of each month and telling my wife: “No, I couldn’t take salary again this time.” After having provided very well in my past life as an employee, this was a rather bitter pill to swallow.

I also recall a conversation with my executive vice president (EVP) of sales and marketing a few years ago. When I hired him initially, he was fresh out of college, without experience and hungry to sell. We had a small team in those days, and they tended to go for lunch at one of the nearby delis in New York. 

They would often ask me to join, and I always politely declined. Now that this young salesman was an executive and had known me for several years, he spoke about the early days of lunches and said at the time that the staff thought I was being elitist in not joining them for lunch. I told him it was not at all the case.

In fact, I would have been happy to, but I could not let myself spend $10 (AED 36) a day on a sandwich when I had no income and was living on credit cards. So from my perspective, it would just be more debt. Clearly, I put a good face on it, since they thought I chose not to eat with them. But internally, I was distraught at not being able to do something my young staff took for granted.

I only point this out as an example of how one’s lifestyle can change in making the move to entrepreneur. Unless you are independently wealthy, things you once took for granted, like joining the beach club or having that expensive dinner, should suddenly be viewed through a new lens. And seldom have I seen a place as lifestyle-oriented as Dubai. Golf, beach clubs, and flashy cars are the expected norm. So preparing yourself mentally for not having the time or money to pursue these Dubai standards will be key.

So where am I going with all of this? I’m certainly not suggesting you forgo your dreams of starting your own business. The rewards are well worth the pain, as I myself discovered. But no great accomplishment comes without great sacrifice. And in the early days, the most profound area you are likely to experience in terms of sacrifice is in lifestyle. Expect to compromise in having the time and the funds to enjoy many things you take for granted currently.

And a parting bit of advice, if I may. Before committing to your new venture, make sure you discuss this at length with your spouse or partner. It’s important to have them on board with the commitments of time and funds that will be required, and the change in lifestyle that comes with it. Because it will be changing their lifestyle as well.

CITATION FROM : ARABIAN BUSINESS - http://goo.gl/9zRm6h

Tech startup investor David Jackson launches P2P fintech platform FundX

Prominent Sydney-based venture capital investor David Jackson has branched out from advisory positions and founded FundX to help small and medium-sized businesses get funding.

Mr Jackson, was an early stage investor in businesses such as Ingogo, Hey You, Crowd Mobile and Drive My Car and is well known in the local tech start-up industry. He is part of fintech incubator Stone & Chalk, tech accelerator BlueChilli and a board member of angel investment group Sydney Angels

Despite only being in beta testing since October, his peer-to-peer lending site has processed $1 million in loans and rejected another $5 million. FundX uses big data, machine learning and predictive algorithms to assess the risk of funding SMEs, which may have failed to secure financing from banks.

The launch follows news last November that Tyro Payments had acquired a banking licence and raised $100 million from prominent investors including Atlassian's Mike Cannon-Brookes and Tiger Global in order to take on the banks in small business lending.

Mr Jackson told The Australian Financial Review he was inspired to start FundX after finding the loans process frustrating at his 10-year-old business S2M Recruitment.

"[As well as full-time employees], we put a lot of contractors out and you have to pay them each week. We were growing a large book of contractors and we kept having to look at the cash flow in the business," he said.

"We wanted to reinvest in the business and expand into Asia, so I spoke to GE Money and realised the process in Australia is very archaic.  It was time-consuming, they wanted a lot of information and it just seemed to take a long time. If we were in a difficult cash-flow position it wouldn't have helped solve my problem."

There is a Difference Between Giving Up And Starting Over

Funding loans

It is these situations, where businesses have a good receivables book but they're waiting on cash from debtors and need money quickly, that have caused the rise of the invoice-discounting, or factoring industries.

This practice of loaning money based on the amount of income that the business is waiting to collect is not common in Australia. But Mr Jackson said it was used by about 30 per cent of small businesses in Britain.

To fund the loans, FundX raises money through sophisticated and institutional investors. But rather than let the investors pick which loans to fund, it pools the money and then decides on the loans based on a predictive risk algorithm developed in conjunction with KPMG.

Mr Jackson said there was a large opportunity for start-ups to capitalise on the banks' failure to provide short-term loans to strong small businesses.

He said Reserve Bank of Australia data demonstrated about 25,000 small business loans valued about $20 billion were being rejected needlessly by Australian banks each year. He said this was because banks did not know how to adequately assess the risk profile of the companies.

Banks struggle

"The banks are well-placed to service consumer loans and big businesses, but they struggle with start-ups," he said.

"Fintechs have two unique selling points – we use data a lot better than banks and we have a frictionless customer experience."

The FundX loans must be paid back in instalments over a maximum of 12 weeks.

The high demand from small businesses for these loans has meant that Mr Jackson has had to turn down some large deals until he raises more capital and the platform officially launches in March.

"We're talking to some high net worth individuals and family offices at the moment to organise a $10 million facility to fund the loan book," he said. "In six months we think we'll have hit the $5 million mark in loans."

It is also embarking on a capital raise to expand its small team.

FundX charges anywhere from as little as 1.5 per cent interest up to 4 per cent, based on the risk assessment.

The money is in a client's account within 24 hours and the process is automated, with the FundX platform linking directly with all major accounting platforms such as Xero, MYOB and Reckon. It has also partnered DocuSign so all contracts can be signed digitally.

"We're funding healthy businesses, we're not a last-resort lender," Mr Jackson said.

Disclaimer: Following article come from AFR

$100 Million Startup Reveals Innovation Weaknesses At IBM And Oracle

A $2 billion market is small potatoes for a big publicly-traded company like IBM. But it can be a gold mine for a startup.

After all, if the startup can get a mere 5% of that market, its revenues will hit $100 million and that could make it a candidate for an initial public offering.

Moreover, by focusing all its efforts on winning new business from a market that big companies neglect, that startup can grow much faster than its rivals.

This comes to mind in considering the $2 billion to $3 billion (annual revenues) identity management software market – from which Austin, Texas-base SailPoint owes half its revenue to deals it says it has snagged from the likes of IBM, Oracle and CA Technologies.

How so? SailPoint is winning business because its product and customer service are better than rivals’ at enabling companies to grant and revoke employee, partner and supplier access to a company’s computer systems as they join, move, and leave.

In declining to comment Oracle cited its quiet period.

IBM believes that its security business is going well. According to IBM spokesperson, Ian Colley, “IBM’s innovation in the security market has propelled it to $2B in annual revenue and its position as the fastest growing enterprise security business in the world.”

With hackers costing CEOs their jobs — think Sony and Target, the seemingly mundane job of identity management can go a long way to making sure that only the right people can get access to a company’s systems and more importantly — the wrong people are blocked from such access.

The True Entrepreneur Is A Doer, Not A Dreamer

While the loss of identity management software market share is of little concern to investors in those tech giants, what it reveals about their inability to innovate is bad news for Warren Buffett and other owners of IBM stock. The same applies to investors in Oracle and CA Technologies.

SailPoint was founded in 2005 and it hibernated through the financial crisis. In a February 19 interview with Tivoli alumni, CEO Mark McClain and president Kevin Cunningham, explained that the company has taken ”nearly $50 million in business away from IBM, Oracle and CA Technologies through ‘rip and replace.’”

They told me that SailPoint is “highly profitable with over $100 million in revenues, 530 customers and 550 employees with plans to file an IPO in 2017. In August 2014 private equity firm, Thoma Bravo, bought out our original investors. They offer us excellent advice that helps us grow at 30% to 40% a year with 10% to 15% [earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization]

What should be of concern to Oracle and IBM investors — where McClain and Cunningham worked after their companies were acquired (IBM bought Tivoli for $743 million in 1996 and their next startup, Waveset, was bought in 2003 by Sun Microsystems which Oracle acquired in 2009 for $7.4 billion) – is how difficult it is for these big companies to come up with new products that customers love.

Innovation for a successful startup means listening to customers and responding quickly with product improvements that help customers alleviate the real pain they are feeling.

When it comes to identity, companies needed a much less technically complex way to present the information so that high-level executives could make clear choices about which access to provide, change, or eliminate for which users, according to McClain and Cunningham.

They claim that it is very difficult for IBM and its peers to innovate in that way. “These big technology companies acquire companies that make point products. Their product managers focus on making the acquired products compatible with their other products such as database software and middleware. Their product managers don’t spend enough time listening to customers and if a customer wants new features, they struggle to get the engineering resources to respond.”

To be sure, these technology giants do have a major competitive advantage — long-standing relationships with senior client executives.

As McClain and Cunningham said, “A Gartner analyst estimates that 75% of the identity management deals are bundled into with much bigger contracts for database and other kinds of software and are not put for true competitive bids. In those deals, we will sometimes get asked to participate but our contribution is ‘column fodder’ — that is not seriously considered by the customer.”

In the 25% of identity management deals where SailPoint is seriously considered, it claims to win a whopping 80% to 90% of the time. “We have 530 customers and a 96% customer approval rating. Potential customers want to see a proof of concept and we welcome the opportunity to shine,” said McClain and Cunningham.


Disclaimer: Following article come from Forbes

Small investors could be excluded from start-up tax offsets.

Small investors risk being locked out of the digital revolution, thanks to a government proposal to limit access to a 20 per cent tax offset for early-stage, start-up investments, to so-called sophisticated investors.

Restricting the tax incentive to investors with net assets of at least $2.5 million and annual incomes of more than $250,000 would help prevent inexperienced investors from being lured into risky investments.

"Investment in innovation companies is inherently risky. Many investments will lose money, while others have the potential to make large gains,"
The proposal has split the startup community, with some entrepreneurs arguing smart retail investors should have the chance to invest in young companies.

"Not all mum and dad (small) investors meet the sophisticated investor requirement, yet many are very intelligent and capable of understanding the risks," said Clare Hallam, acting general manager of Pollenizer, a company that helps build business incubator programs.

​"For Australia to become a truly innovative nation, we need to commence this education and not exclude mum and dad investors," she said.
Cautious response

Others erred on the side of caution, believing the incentive should be restricted to sophisticated investors.

​Brosa co-founder Ivan Lim said limiting the offset to sophisticated investors would be a "double-edged sword".

"It's good because it ensures that capital is being invested in high-quality companies that have been assessed by sophisticated investors as having a strong chance of success," he said.

"Having said that, there is also an advantage for early-stage startups that need to raise money from friends and family to keep working on their business before they're ready to approach a venture capitalist – in circumstances like this the tax incentive could be helpful."

The 20 per cent tax offset was first flagged as part of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's lauded Innovation Statement in December last year.

But the offset will not be available to all start-ups, with the consultation paper proposing limiting it to "innovation companies" which were incorporated in Australia in the last three years, have assessable income of $200,000 or less in the prior income year, have expenditure of $1 million or less, and is not listed.

Keep Calm and Get Your Startup On

Treasury said in the consultation paper the option of using a "sophisticated investor" test would limit it to people that are "more likely to be able to evaluate offers of securities and other financial products without needing the protection of a disclosure document".
Ineffective tools

Trimantium Capital managing director Phillip Kingston said income and expenditure tests were not effective screening tools to uncover innovative companies.

"Similarly, building a business that will have a material impact on the future of the country will take a long time, so a three-year time limit is too restrictive. Five years would provide a better runway," he said.

"A set of principles that determine the definition of an innovation company make sense. Anything too prescriptive certainly won't incentivise innovation and may have the opposite effect."

Mr Kingston also took aim at the government's proposition of excluding companies in certain industries.

"Some of the exclusions floated in the government's consultation paper are alarming and should be removed.

"Innovation in fintech, B2B and agritech provide some of the greatest opportunities for entrepreneurs and investors to build the future of Australia."

These thoughts were echoed by Unlocked chief executive Matt Berriman who said the consultation paper's suggestions were too restrictive.

"It means investors would only get an incentive for investing in businesses that are really just at concept stage, continuing to over-index incubator and seed investment and widen the already existing problem of series A, B and growth round funding in Australia," he said.

"We're not going to grow another company like Atlassian if you cap the incentives at the levels being indicated."

Disclaimer: Following article come from FinancialReview

Managing Your Startup In 2016: New Rules For A New Environment.

It’s a new environment for startups in 2016. Financing will get harder. Valuation inflation will dissipate. Profitability will be in vogue again. And old-fashioned business fundamentals will balance out the disruption frenzy of the past five years.

Given the new investment climate, what’s an entrepreneur to do? To answer that, let’s first examine the factors behind Silicon Valley’s climate change.

First, public market valuations for relatively young technology companies have been declining of late — especially for those that remain unprofitable. For example, we’ve seen valuation multiples for unprofitable SaaS companies drop by more than 60 percent from 2014 to today (see below). Valuation multiples for profitable SaaS companies, by contrast, have dropped by less than 30 percent.

Second, recent IPOs (Atlassian aside) have generated less than stellar returns for late-stage investors. Square, Box and Etsy are good examples of this trend, where early stage investors were rewarded with strong multiples on their long-term investments, while late-stage investors suffered mixed results. TechCrunch has referred to recent tech IPOs as the new down round.

Third, we’ve seen Fidelity and others publicly mark down their valuations of private company investments, from Dropbox and Snapchat to Zenefits and Dataminr.

In short, public and private investors aren’t simply discussing bubbles and valuation concerns like they were in early 2015 — they’re taking action.

Given that new world order, here’s my advice for early stage and late-stage entrepreneurs to navigate the shifting sands:

Old Ways Won't Open New Doors.

Accelerate profitability: Build a financial plan that gets the company to profitability on 50 percent as much capital as you may have wanted to raise six months ago. If you were planning to raise $100 million previously, build a plan that gets you to profitability on $50 million. If $50 million, then $25 million and so on. We’re already seeing the profitability premium kick in with public SaaS companies, as outlined above.

Prepare insiders to step up: Over the last two-three years, outside investors did not expect earlier inside investors to participate at any material level in later-stage financings. Early stage investors thus benefited from other firms’ capital in later rounds. In the new environment, I anticipate new investors will expect existing investors to contribute significantly to new rounds, providing up to one-third or one-half of the new funding.

Be willing to have multiple new investors in the round: Beyond valuations, the risk tolerance of late-stage investors is changing. New investors will want to write smaller checks to mitigate their risk and exposure — and to reserve capital if the company does need a new round (because external capital is not a given). As a result, entrepreneurs should be prepared to bring together multiple investors at the $10-$15 million level as opposed to finding one lead investor willing to put in $25-$50 million.

Adjust your expectations: Recognize that a clean deal at a flat valuation should be considered a “win” in this environment. Let’s consider a company that last raised at $200 million valuation on a $10 million run rate two years ago — and has now grown to a $30 million run rate (a super healthy tripling of ARR). Absent the new climate, the company might expect to raise a new round at 10x to 12x multiple for $300-$360 million valuation. However, if you factor in that public SaaS multiples have been cut in half or more, a price of $150-$180 million would more fairly reflect the market. Thus, a flat round at $200 million would be a win despite the company’s fast growth.

Prepare your employees: This may be the hardest challenge, given how actively some startups pursued unicorn status to accelerate recruiting efforts. Now, despite two years of massive progress and growth, you need to tell employees that the next round may be flat — and convince them the company isn’t losing market momentum. Professional investors understand all too well that external financings will fluctuate — two years ago, the price was probably too high; today, it may reflect market reality; in the future, it may be too low. It’s important that your employees understand the cost of capital will go up and down based on market dynamics (not just company performance).

The silver lining

The climate change in late-stage private markets will cause some challenges for entrepreneurs and their teams — and result in a higher cost of capital. However, history tells us there is a silver lining for the smart startups that adapt, focus on fundamentals and extend their runway.

That silver lining is a “flight to quality” that typically occurs during periods of multiple compression and financing downturns. As a result, the financing arms race will hopefully subside — and the best startups in each category can grow more efficiently knowing it will be tougher for the No. 3, No. 4 and No. 5 companies to raise capital.

Disclaimer: Following article come from TC

Startup PR Mistakes To Avoid In 2016

January is a time for New Year’s resolutions and so drawing on my experiences of a year spent networking, hearing pitches at events like the HoxTech Angels, Hipster Hackers & Hustlers speed-pitching (everyone should try this event!) and many others, as well as helping companies spread their gospel, I want to air my feelings about what startup companies doing PR for the first time should urgently try to avoid doing. Plus a few things I believe they should be doing.

London’s tech scene is booming with nearly $10 billion of venture capital investment being pumped into the city since 2010, and it’s all thanks to the efforts of entrepreneurs, who make the startup scene so special. So stay bold, make time, keep strong, and read on.

Make sure to get your timings right!

Every new business should have a clear set of internal milestones; and a clear idea of when they will be achieved. First 1,000 users, first paying customer, date of app release, first hire. But because they are internal, these timelines are not set in stone – it may take more or less time than you envisaged, and that is ok – no harm done.

Any timelines that a business communicates externally however – to investors or customers for example – must be achieved before or on deadline. Imagine the brouhaha if Tim Cook announced the launch date of a new iPhone – and then subsequently announced he was moving the date back one month. Questions would be asked, speculation would be rife – what are they playing at – stock value would plunge, and competitors would jump at the opportunity to stick the knife in.

The same goes for a startup launching a new app or product – in fact failure to stick to a public deadline will be received even worse because a startup doesn’t have a track record of success to fall back on. It’s absolutely crucial that your first interaction with the outside world goes smoothly. The world is waiting to see if you as a business can do what you say you will do – trapped in your own world scrapping with a back end teething problem you may not notice the attention you are getting– you may not feel the growing anticipation. It might be clear to you the reasons why you need to delay – so you can release a better, less buggy version of your product – but your audience will not see it like that.

And there’s really no excuses – after all you get to set the deadline – so make it achievable, factor in delays, talk to as many of your staff as you can. Give yourself the leeway you need. You set the expectations – so make them realistic.

Disclaimer :- Following article come from Forbes