XLbang Happy Hours on Friday - Feb-1- Century Club

Dear Xler,

Kindly confirm your participation either on the XLBang events on facebook or by sending the sms per the details here below:

XLers are blessed with intellect, drive, ambition, connections and exposure; yet very few of us ever use these gifts to create our own enterprises. What stops XLers from making this leap into uncharted waters; where success leads to financial independence, a deep sense of fulfillment, employment generation, and a significant contribution to our country economic progress?

Is it because the outcomes of those who have made the leap are mixed? Is it the lack of inspiration despite the presence of XLers that have started extremely successful companies like Mindtree (N Krishnakumar, BM-81) and Ma Foi (K Pandiarajan, KPR, PM-84). Do our MBAs wire us only to serve large organized behemoths? How do we breakout and follow our dreams?

The XLBang Happy Hours on Feb 1 is a special session on Entrepreneurship to try and find out some of the answers to these questions. I will be hosting a discussion with some of our very own alumni who have made it, making it, and helping make it. The panel includes

 

Amit Bansal (BM-97) who started PurpleLeap with two other XLers (Vinay Nijhawan and Hemanth Somani). He first started with children’s education programs before changing track to finishing schools for college grads. His firm was later acquired by Educomp. 

 

Richik Nandi (BM-06) who follows what now seems to be the favoured route of marketing and product management with a leading software company before partnering with a friend to start Poshvine.com, an internet start-up aimed at cashing in on the growing market of food experiences.

 

Bharati Jacob (PM-83) has the envied job of meeting new start-ups every day and evaluating business ideas for investment worthiness. She has invested in some well-known ventures like Vaatsalya, Printo and RedBus; and has an inside track on what drives entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship. 

 Are you sitting on the fence with a great idea? Is the economy and business climate right for starting out? Join us to hear from those who have dared to make their dreams come true.

When
Friday, Feb 1st, 7:00 PM

 

  Where

Century Club (Sampige Village)

Cubbon Park, Bangalore

 

Registration
SMS the following details to  8880006603

< Name>

Eg. Vijaya 08 2

 

More Details
Dinner @ 200 per pax

Drinks @ 100 per drink

XLBang Happy Hours

Special session on Entrepreneurship

UK Based Indian Artist Arifa Khan (BMD 95) Launches Niddoo, a Social eCommerce Portal for Art Lovers

From yourstory

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niddoo.com is a pre-beta stage startup, started by Artist Arifa Khan. Niddoo is a social ecommerce portal where art-lovers can discover, buy, commission great art and art accessories from artists around the world. Arifa has successfully exhibited her paintings in London and received critical acclaim for her artistic endeavours.

Faced with the pressures of an artist to financially break even while creating prolific art, she set out to solve the problem for artists around the world by creating a market-place for artists and art-lovers. In a very early stage yet, Niddoo will try to enable artists to create a virtual gallery, communicate and forge relationships with buyers, and raise funds for art projects on the portal.

Arifa is raising funds for the same on Kickstarter- the crowd funding site launched in UK on 31st Oct 2012. “The Poetry of Being Woman” is among the first kickstarter projects launched in UK by niddoo.com. The artist is raising funds on kickstarter by selling art accessories, and targets GBP20000 by November end. Funding is all or nothing.

The funds will be used to organise art exhibitions in Europe to aid in the development and marketing of niddoo.com.  Arifa says, “Raising a successful round on kickstarter would not only provide proof of concept and early traction needed for a subsequent VC round, but also help build opt in lists of art-lovers who are voting with their wallets. A formidable marketing arsenal for a startup.” You can choose from a range of Christmas gifts starting from GBP8. Rewards include designer accessories like calendar of paintings for GBP8, themed T-shirt and featuring in an ipad app for GBP20, designer scarf for GBP40, prints from GBP80, real oil paintings, custom-made haute couture and custom-portraits of backers hand-painted by Arifa.

Check out the Kickstarter page for the project!

XLRI enters into partnership with business funding agency to boost entrepreneurship

From The Times of India


The Fr. Arrupe Centre for Ecology and Sustainability (Faces), a centre based at the premier business school XLRI, has entered into a partnership with Freemont Partners, India's first global incubator and accelerator providing mentoring and seed funding to entrepreneurs. The partnership envisions working in tandem to identify, incubate and invest in start-ups which have a sustainability-centric business model. Freemont's experienced management, global access to mentors, partners and alliances provide a value proposition for new and upcoming start-ups before their major round of funding.

Freemont Partners expects to invest in about 25 to 30 companies over the next three to four years, including a few which have a sustainability-centric business model using technology.

Faces is a multi-disciplinary centre at XLRI which envisions providing thought leadership to promote policies, practices and dialogue, which have an impact on holistic and sustainable development of society and enterprises. The center is in the process of building an incubator to support start-ups in this space." Partnership with Freemont Partners will provide young students and entrepreneurs a great platform for mentorship, besides facilitating seed-funding to build a sustainability-centric business," said Faces chairperson Professor Madhukar Shukla.

The centre which has been working consistently on issues concerning social entrepreneurship for years, had organized a meet on the National Rural Livelihood Mission, (NRLM) in July jointly with the India unit of World Bank to get an overall understanding of the NRLM agenda.

The co-founder of Freemont Partners, Ronald D'Souza, said, "Young entrepreneurs in India are looking at building a sustainable ecosystem with innovative products and technology. In partnership with Faces we hope to support this emerging ecosystem, which will have a long term impact on the way we live, work and play." Freemont Partners provides mentorship, strategic direction and access to local and global mentors and partners, said a company functionary.

Jasper Infotech buys Grabbon (co founded by 2007 batch Xlers)

From The Economic Times

Jasper Infotech buys Grabbon
Move Signals Growing M&A Interest In Business Of Providing Online Discounted Deals To Consumers  
Sarah Jacob BANGALORE

    DELHI-based marketing solutions company Jasper Infotech has acquired a Bangalore based group buying firm, Grabbon, signalling growing M&A interest in the business of providing online discounted deals to consumers.

    Senior Jasper executives told ETthat the company purchased Grabbon last week in a cash-cum-equity transaction. Financial terms were not disclosed. Group buying is an online retail service that aggregates demand from consumers to negotiate unbeatable discounts from merchants across restaurants, spas and other entertainment avenues. Last month, Group Buying Global, and Harish Bahl, the founder of internet solutions company Smile Group, acquired Mumbai-based WanaMo.com. The daily deal site was rebranded as Deals and You in order to integrate it with the German firm’s lifestyle product portal Fashion and You, which targets the same consumer.

    “There are around 10 group buying firms in India and the segment is gaining momentum because it can be easily monetised by the power of social media. Group SMS service providers may also enter this segment by linking together advertising with deals from merchants,” said Arvin Babu, partner with Greylock Partners. Unlike pure play e-retail which has failed to deliver across the 50-million internet user base in India yet, group buying is a low capital expenditure business. Its resultant high margins coupled with the consumer draw created by substantial value offering has led to a mushrooming of firms in the past nine months. Venture capital’s interest in the sector is also aiding growth. Greylock and Battery Ventures have committed $8.75 million to another Bangalore-based site Taggle.com, in tranches. The founders of private equity firm CX partners have also angel funded Delhibased Mydala.com.

    While merchants gain by optimising capacity at his outlet and leveraging the branding on social media, the group buying firm picks up a marketing fee of around 20%-25% on each transaction. Many players now intend to extend this model into mobile phones to tap into a bigger base of impulse purchases. Part of the sector’s attraction lies in the nature of the business. “There are very few transaction-based businesses online where monetisation is directly through revenue and not just advertising,” Mr Babu added. Jasper, which uses its relationships with 15,000 merchants through its other businesses to offer discounts through Snapdeal, sees potential in developing a network of group buying firms. Founded by Kunal Bahl and Rahul Bansal, Jasper is the holding company of group buying arm Snap Deal and Moneysaver which offers co-branded discount cards and coupons on mobile.

    In Grabbon, Bahl said he saw a brand that had geographical strength in Bangalore and was built by a team founded by XLRI graduates Tony Navin, Jackson Fernandes and Balamurgan Balasubramanian. The founders will continue to manage the company. Jasper intends to expand to Singapore by August and is exploring inorganic options across markets such as Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and Philippines. “It’s a buyers market internationally as most players are at the same stage of growth. The team becomes the clincher,” said Kunal Bahl. Group buying is also seeing some M&A activity in western markets where it is very well developed. Pioneer and the world’s largest group buying site Groupon, reportedly valued at $1.35 billion, entered the European market by snapping up German competitor Citydeal in May.

Ankit Kumar (2011 batch) starts Green Leaf Energy Private Limited

I have started my company, "Green Leaf Energy Private Limited", working in the renewable energy space. The company objectives are to provide employment opportunities, arrest migration, alleviation of poverty, improve the living standard in rural Bihar and produce renewable energy.

The company has been provided support and guidance by the XLRI Entrepreneurship Development Centre. I am presently working on Bio-diesel and have set up a nursery of Pongamia (Bio-diesel yielding plants), growing 1.2 lakh plants in Kothwara village of Gaya, Bihar.

The company has conducted awareness programs in rural areas of Bihar for utilization of wastelands by doing Pongamia plantation.The company has also formed a contract with 200 farmers over 500 acres of area in Gaya, Bihar. We are looking to scale up the plantation area to 1 lakh acres of wasteland in Bihar.

The company will set up its Bio-diesel extraction unit to produce Bio-diesel, as per the National Biofuel Policy. The company will also set up Bio-gasifier power plant unit generating power from the shells of Pongamia plants for rural electrification.

The project has already been appraised by NABARD, Indian Oil and PNB for technical and financial support.

Connect with Ankit on Facebook

2nd National Conference on Social Entrepreneurship @ XLRI (Jan 29-31, '10)

Hello folks! Season’s Greetings from XLRI! I am happy to inform you that we are the 2nd National "Working Conference" on Social Entrepreneurship @ XLRI during Jan 29th-31st, '10. This mail is both to inform (in case, some of you would like to attend), and with a request to pass it on to those who you think may be interested. The theme of the Conference is "Solutions for Inclusive Development" and it aims to provide a common space to the practitioners (social entrepreneurs, CBOs/NGOs, Government Agencies, Academics, Funding Agencies, Support Organisations and Corporate) for interaction and learning from each other. We were greatly encouraged by the participation in the last Conference, (http://social-entrepreneurship-at-xlri.blogspot.com) which was attended by about 160 practitioners from the development sector as participants. This year's event is designed as a "working conference" which would allow the participants to not just listen and learn, but also to share, discuss and co-create solutions/alternatives as a take-away, by actively and collectively engaging in solving real, live problems, which are of their interest and concern. Based on our interactions with practitioners in the field, we have tentatively identified a few broad themes/groups for the working groups in the Conference. In each group, we also plan to have Resource Persons, who have made significant contribution to the space, and would help bring greater value to the group, and lead the discussions. · Market Linkages: Mainstreaming the Marginalised Producers · Employment & Livelihood: Organising the Unorganised · Universal Primary Education: Investing in the Future · Financial Inclusion: Creating an Equitable India · Healthcare & Hygiene for All: Making a Healthier Society · Access to Technology & Societal Resources: Empowering the Masses · Grass Root Innovations: Supporting Rural Entrepreneurship In addition, the conference will be interspersed with panel discussions on relevant themes (I am pasting below the tentative schedule of the Conference for your reference). We are working on the registration details for the conference (that being the function of sponsorship – if we can get those :0), and will share the same soon. We expect about 25 Social Entrepreneurs and Development Sector Professionals to participate in the Conference as Resource Persons. I am also happy to share, that as of now, the following have confirmed their participation as Resource Persons - Mr Arbind Singh (Executive Director, Nidan) Ashoka Fellow & Social Entrepreneur of the Year '08 http://www.nidan.in/ - Mr Arun Diaz (Trustee & Member of Investment Board, Aavishkaar India Micro Venture Capital Fund) http://www.aavishkaar.in/ - Mr Ashish Rajpal (Co-Founder & Managing Director, iDiscoveri) http://www.idiscoveri.org/ - Dr Ashwin Naik (Co-Founder & CEO, Vaatsalya Healthcare Systems Pvt Ltd) http://www.vaatsalya.com/ - Dr Balaji Utla, (CEO, Health Management & Research Institute) http://www.hmri.in/ - Mr Chandra Shekhar Ghosh (Chairman & Managing Director, Bandhan Microfinance) Senior Ashoka Fellow & winner of Microfinance Award '09, http://www.bandhanmf.com/ - Mr Devendra Shukla (Director, Jaipur Rugs Foundation) http://www.jaipurrugs.org/ - Mr GN Murthy (General Manager – New Initiatives, ITC- Business Div) http://www.echoupal.com/ - Dr Joe Madiath (Founder & Executive Director, Gram Vikas) Senior Ashoka Fellow & Skoll Social Entrepreneur http://www.gramvikas.org/ - Mr Niraj Subrat (Vice President, Marketing, International Development Enterprises-India) http://www.ide-india.org/ - Mr Paul Basil (Founder & CEO, Villgro) Ashoka Fellow http://www.villgro.org/ - Mr Pravin Mahajan (Executive Director, Janarth) Ashoka Fellow http://www.janarth.org/ - Mr Samit Ghosh (Founder & CEO, Ujjivan Financial Services Pvt Ltd) http://www.ujjivan.com/ - Mr Sandeep Farias (Founder & Managing Director, Elevar Equity) http://www.elevarequity.com/ - Ms Saloni Malhotra (Founder and CEO, DesiCrew Solutions Pvt Ltd) http://www.desicrew.in/ - Ms Sohini Bhattacharya (Director, South Asia Partnerships, Ashoka Innovators for the Public) http://india.ashoka.org/ - Mr Soumen Biswas (Executive Director, PRADAN) http://www.pradan.net - Mr Upmanyu Patil (Managing Director, Sakhi Retail Pvt Ltd) http://www.sspindia.org/resources/SRPL_profile_09.pdf ======================== Tentative Agenda of the Conference January 29th 2:00-3:30 Inauguration, Design of the Conference, Inaugural Address 4:00-5:30 Panel: Social Entrepreneurship & Inclusive Socio-Economic Development January 30th 9:00-10:30 Panel: Inclusive Growth: Challenges, Opportunities and Impediments 11:00-6:00 Working Group Discussions - Themes: · Market Linkages: Mainstreaming the Marginalised Producers · Employment & Livelihood: Organising the Unorganised · Universal Primary Education: Investing in the Future · Financial Inclusion: Creating an Equitable India · Healthcare & Hygiene for All: Making a Healthier Society · Access to Technology & Societal Resources: Empowering the Masses · Grass Root Innovations: Supporting Rural Entrepreneurship January 31st 9:00-12:30 Sharing/ Presentations by Groups 2:00-3:30 Panel: Scaling the Impact 3:30-4:00 Conclusion ================================ Dr Madhukar Shukla Coordinator - 2nd National Conference on Social Entrepreneurship (Jan 29 -31, '10) & Professor (OB & Strategic Mgt) XLRI Jamshedpur CH Area (East) Jamshedpur 831001 (India) ph: 91-657-398 3333 mailid: madhukar@xlri.ac.in / seconference@xlri.ac.in/