Bernard has a great article on state of innovation in India. Some thoughts on the same. The article speaks about the risk-reward equation being balanced – I beg to differ. Big still means safe. Its not a matter of reality but perception. Like capital, talent flights to safety in downturns – especially as the support […]
Canaan invests in Chakpak.com
Happy to announce our investment in chakpak.com – the largest online community for Indian entertainment. We are excited to partner with Accel in financing the company, largely because: Entertainment is a high usage and engagement category – As per Comscore, 18 million visitors in India already access entertainment content. Add to that the NRI base, […]
Social Mutual Fund
Interesting company kaChing – of course there are challenges around sustainable returns, building credibility, and marketing. But a very interesting disintermediation effort between capital and investment managers. Would you use something like this?
Canaan Entrepreneur Pitch Workbook
Here is a short presentation that outlines the information that we, at Canaan, like to see in business plans. It is also a useful tool to think about what questions one should try and answer, besides just ensuring that a certain format is used. Personally, I don’t fancy paper copies much, especially when all of […]
Citizens in Governance
One of the areas where some of us have been thinking of late is how to increase awareness of citizens regarding policy and administration – things like which new bills are being introduced in parliament or state legislature, and what options are being considered? What are the relative merits/demerits of the options? Which way are […]
Lessons in Customer Service – Power to the frontline – Sucks, Kool, Am
In continuation of looking at my own experiences for learnings, this post tries to identify a common thread in four different recent experiences. Let me describe them briefly: SOTC: In April, I booked a trip for my parents on SOTC, where the sales guy offered a minimal cancellation fee upto 30 days of departure. Unfortunately, […]
Racing under the Yellow Flag
Great article on innovation in tough times. Caution: ensure survival first, then read this.
Rediff Enterprise Value $24M
Interesting coverage on rediff – its now at $24M enterprise value. As much as for a long time, Rediff commanded high valuations that few could explain, it now seems to have gone in the other direction. Would love to get people’s views on whats happening here. As a bellwether for Indian internet industry, these numbers […]
Lessons in Service Management – The Airtel mChek fiasco
(UPDATE: Sanjay Swamy has posted that they have fixed this problem) This is first in series of posts where I will share some of my (unfortunately, mostly negative) experiences with brands, with a purpose to highlight my learnings in designing services and managing customer experience. Will welcome contributions and experiences from others as well. This […]
TiECon 2008 Delhi
TiEcon Delhi 2008 scheduled from October 22nd – 24th, 2008 at Hotel Maurya Sheraton would be one of the largest conventions for entrepreneurs and is the eighth consecutive TiEcon hosted by TiE Delhi. The theme of this year’s conference is “Entrepreneurship Comes of Age” TiEcon’s in India have attracted people who are CEO’s, successful entrepreneurs, […]
Tighten up
I had done this post six months back with some experiences from the bust, and a promise to come back with more if things worsened. That the financial world is in turmoil is old news now. Recapping some lessons for startups from a crunch: Cash is king – raise money if you can; don’t vacillate […]
Dare Interview – Recapping Canaan in India
Krishna has done a good interview to recap how Canaan is looking at India, over two years after we entered the market. I am not easily given to cross posting my own interview :), but this one was successful in bringing out some new elements: No change is good news – over past couple of […]