The challenges of a chicken Entrepreneur in sustaining his startup

- Rupesh Kumar Shah

info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

Why Chicken Entrepreneur ?

I was once invited to speak at SP Jain (a MBA college in Andheri Mumbai). The gentleman speaking ahead of me was stating that how entrepreneurs who start at 23- 24 years of age loose steam and chicken out. He named them chicken entrepreneurs. The next turn was me. I was 23. I happily embraced the the tag since then.

info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

About the startup

InOpen is a IIT Bombay based educational startup with focus on developing high quality academic content through intense research. InOpen offers products and services to government and private schools. We are currently serving more than 2.5 lakh students directly through our products.

About the Journey

1.Graduated in 2008. Started a company in college. Didnt work. Started InOpen in Oct, 2009 with Dr. Sridhar (Prof. in CSE IIT B). 2.Serving 2.5 lacs students from 2000 in Dec 2009. We grew from 2 Employees to a present strength 60 awesome employees. Working with 4 state Govt. Opened new Ofces in Jaipur and Hyderabad. Media Visibility in around110 newspapers and blogs. 3.Raised seed fund (from F&F and Bank Debt) 2010 and rst VC round in Aug, 2011.

Happy Assumptions for a startup

Product Launch and First Customer Ship are the
same thing

Business Plan is just another document Technology is superior than content (read :
fundamentals)

Job and startup can go hand in hand. Friends are

best partners/employees
info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

Sudden Challenges
Customer Service. Too much Murphys law. Unheard
Challenges

Delayed Revenue. Cash Flow Crunch Too much time spending managing resources (read
HR). Assumptions with Friends fall at.

Raising Funds is not a PPT.

info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

Why but ? Because we assume a hell lot (ass-u-me)

info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

Key Mistakes to be avoided (1/2)

Dont get too much attached to original vision.
Accept changes and market feedback.

Dont Mix Product Shipment and Revenue Inow. Dont assume anything (ANYTHING in friends-inbusiness, product testing (validation), customer demands, overheads, blah blah)

Cash Flow is no magic. Work out the metrics

info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

Key Mistakes to be avoided (2/2)

Match Pricing to attract and then compromise on
quality (or burn cash). Its a death spiral. #Kingsher release.

Dont create overheads which you cant sustain. Dont attempt perfect. Its okay to be embarrassed at Managing HR dept. yourself. Hire a HR as soon as
you are 10 employees. 0 assumption in rewards,
info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

My Mantra : Stay Calm, Move On (sounds familiar)

info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

 I feel that enthusiasm and passion is the master key. A

Some of my learning (1/2)

enthusiastic human being with good intent somehow manages to do good and land on the correct path. When I started in my college I didn't knew that a word called startup existed and till date I get spelling of entrepreneurship wrong. Thanks to Auto correct Big problem of the past becomes ordinary in the present. Similarly the Big problem today will become ordinary issue. Just Hang on !
info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

We all face problems. But I observe a common pattern. A

Some of my learning (2/2)

I failed and faced challenges. I am no super man but I just
managed to stick. My failures taught me one thing that I don't have anything to loose from this point but gain. are sadly low on self belief. Doing immediate MBA, joining ordinary jobs and switching jobs often are some of the common trait. Don't know why but I feel that some one needs to constantly induce a belief that clarity of thoughts and patience should be discovered and practiced at priority for one self.
info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

I meet a lot of small town or city junta who are brilliant but

Imagine

Create

Deliver

Thank You
Rupesh Shah | Co-Founder & CEO | rupesh@inopen.in | rupeshkumarshah.com

info@inopen.in | www.inopen.in

About Me
My passion lies in leveraging quality content and technology for Education. Love for Open Source. My background helps me lead InOpens efforts towards creating educational solutions that focus on creating content which has universally acceptability. I love my startup and live every moment of it. Hobbies include ddling with my piano and my gadgets. I Love cooking to core and smiles when called a foodie. More about my startup can be seen here. Ofcial Bio can be downloaded from here(Copy-Paste). I can be reached out at rupesh@inopen.in : I can also be found on:
www.facebook.com/rupeshkumarshah | www.twitter.com/rupeshkumarshah