May

12

Death of the Newspaper?

May 12, 2007 | Leave a Comment

Livmint has published two articles that have contradictory headlines - first about readers, advertisers and analysts abandoning newspapers and second about the increase in newspaper circulation.
The panelists and participants at the Web 2.0 Expo had no doubts in their mind - the Internet was killing the newspaper, and the newspaper readers are a dying breed.
Some [...]

Apr

29

From the makers of the ubiquitous Stag umbrella

April 29, 2007 | Leave a Comment

Fast Company has an interesting write up on the change in strategy by the makers of the Stag umbrellas. If you’re from Mumbai, you need no further introduction to the ubiquitous, black Stag umbrellas and the reasons to own one.

Threatened by cheaper products from China, the company switched from a low cost strategy to [...]

Apr

29

Imagine India: Macy’s brings Lord Ganesha to SFO

April 29, 2007 | Leave a Comment

Walking around Union Square in San Francisco, I was surprised to see a huge Lord Ganesha sitting on top of the Macy’s sign. Apparently, the SFO Union Square Macy’s has a flower show every year. The theme for their 61st annual Flower show was “Imagine India”.

They got it mostly right - 20 feet Ganesha in [...]

Apr

14

India Unleashed 2007

April 14, 2007 | Leave a Comment

Notes from the The South Asian Business Association (SABA) conference at Columbia University:
India shining:

50% of India’s population is under 30 years old
India #1 in milk production and #2 in fruit & veg production
Hindalco - World’s #1 Aluminium producer
Mittal - World’s #1 Steel producer
Reliance invests 22M in Chevron, Dow Chemicals and few other US based companies

Challenges [...]

Apr

1

What do investors look for in a start-up?

April 1, 2007 | Leave a Comment

I attended an entrepreneurial forum at Stern recently. It had 5 VC’s on the panel sharing their wisdom and experiences on what VCs, angels and private equity investors look for when investing in start-ups. Some takeaways:
Quality of Idea

Defensibility (Intellectual property)
Revenue addition or multiplication (little equity required)
Huge profit margins to accommodate startup mistakes [...]

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