AMITY BUSINESS SCHOOL

ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND NEW VENTURE

CREATION

Case study

Name:
Foreword:
"If you decide that you’re going to do only the things you know are going to work, you’re going to
leave a lot of opportunity on the table." - Jeff Bezos

What is an entrepreneur?

entrepreneur

/ˌɒntrəprəˈnəː/

Learn to pronounce

noun

a person who sets up a business or businesses, taking on financial risks in the hope of profit.

"many entrepreneurs see potential in this market"

But an entrepreneur isn’t only this, he is a far sighted human. He is a person with an idea and actions
to “create”.

Some say there are some traits ones need to inculcate to be in and entrepreneur like:

Motivation.

Creativity. ...

Persuasiveness. ...

Vision. ...

Versatility.

You don't need to have all the traits associated with entrepreneurship to be a successful entrepreneur.
The main quality you need is a determination to make your business venture succeed. The rest of the
qualities necessary to be a successful entrepreneur you can learn.

In the modern world people can no longer expect large enterprises to guarantee them jobs for life.
Individuals are increasingly expected to seek out their own opportunities, actively create value and
behave ethically, rather than faithfully follow rules and routines set by others. In particular, today's
young people need to learn to be enterprising, both when working for others and when setting up their
own businesses. Being enterprising involves taking responsibility for decision making, becoming
increasingly self-reliant, pioneering, adventurous, daring, dynamic, progressive, opportunist,
ambitious and holding your values, as well as being able to initiate ideas and see them through into
action.
Case study.
Introduction:
This case study is on a person who is an entrepreneur, starting and holding a successful business as an
owner of a publication and a printing house.

He started his own venture in the field of education and now successfully expanded it into full book
publication entity; from inception of a book writing process till its production, printing and marketing.

Entrepreneur Profile:
Name: Prabhat Kumar

Age: 46

Location: Muzzafarnagar, Uttar Pradesh

Education: Janta Janardhan Intermediate college (10+2) 1993

Bachelors in Science (Chemistry, Botany, Zoology) D.A.V College, 1994

Masters in Science (Chemistry) D.A.V College, 1996

Mr. Prabhat Kumar is the owner of Sri Balaji Publications. He is also a Lecturer and teaching faculty
of Shri Ram College, Muzzafarnagar for Chemistry.

He is the penman and the author for Organic Chemistry and inorganic Chemistry books for his
publications. He is known for his dedicated support to students, faculty and regularly feedbacks his
penmanship to improve further and provide best teaching material through his books to its user.

Company Name: SRI BALAJI PUBLISHING CO. PVT

CIN: U99999MH1987PTC044843

Established: 24th October 2003

 Website: https://shribalajibooks.com/company-profile/

Company Profile: Shri Balaji Publications is a publishing house based in Muzaffarnagar (U.P.)
having an experience of more than a decade in the field of Books publishing. The Publishing
house inherits best books for various state boards and competitive entrance examinations written
by the experienced authors/board of authors in the field.

Published Books Ratio

COMPETITION
64%
CBSE BOARD
26%
ISCE / ISC BOARD
22%
UP BOARD
88%

Interview Date: 22nd August 2019

Time: 11:30 P.M

Medium: Audio call (23 minutes)

Side note: As heard in the audio, the interviewee is acquitted to the interviewer, thus the communications is at best; semi-formal. This was
done to make the audio interview comfortable and at ease.

Story:
Prabhat Kumar belonged to a family who was predominantly farmers. He belongs to Jatt community
of Muzzafarnagar, Uttar Pradesh. The community, though noted for its strong agricultural and
zamindari background in those area; was not much into educations. The men at that time striving to
continue their family business of farming only and had at best basic education.

Prabhat Kumar’s father: Mr Dharamvir Singh was teacher along with his farming. He is used to teach
maths and history in Janta Jhanardhan intermediate college.

As stated by Mr Prabhat, his father was a man of intellectual leaning and used to encourage his
children in field of science and history. His encouragement for his children to read and learn in their
childhood brought forth and logical and intellectual leaning towards his kids to acquire knowledge
and a logical and scientifical inculcation in their rational.

He was the person who introduced him to science and to the field of leaning.
Mr. Prabhat excelled in his academics and extracurricular activities and came out with a distinction.

During his college days, as he was good in chemistry and biology; he used to provide tuitions to
college and school kids. he was quite successful, used his learning in his class to start a tuition with a
decent amount of students paying to learn from him.

This was the inceptions to him that maybe he can make teaching his profession and he realised was a
good teacher.

After Mr. Prabhat completed his school and college education (as stated above) he started his teaching
first job as a lecturer in his alma mater as an assistant faculty for Chemistry.

During his teaching he realised that there is wide scope of books in the market for students. Students
purchase various books outside of their prescribed curriculum to prepare for various entrance exams.

JEE and AIIMS being the biggest of them. Lakhs of students gives these entrance exams to get the
best colleges in India. The examination has a strict competition, so students have to have their
subjects (esp. Science and Maths for JEE and AIIMS) on their fingertips.

To fulfil their needs students, purchase extra course material like: entrance exams and supplementary
course books to further brush up for these competitions.

Mr. Prabhat realised that there is a huge market for publishing and producing with this content and he
has the right knowledge and penmanship for it.

As he was also a teacher, he realised that he also has an edge. As being a teacher, he can better
empathize with students, as to how to crack the subject and had in-depth knowledge as to where
students face difficulty and various trends.

During his tenure as a faculty he met Mr. P Bahadhur, of Kirti Publications. Mr. Bahadhur was the
author for entrance exams books on Chemistry and was impressed with Mr. Prabhat as a teaching
faculty for the same subject. He contacted him and invited him to Co- Write a book on Organic
Chemistry for Intermediate Level (10 +2).

The first book was published in 2001 for Mr. Prabhat in 2001 by the above mentioned publication
and was promptly followed by other authorships on Organic and inorganic chemistry for college
entrance exams and school.

During his association as an author for Kirti Publications Mr. Prabhat was praised for his books.

As he was very keen on improvement in his writing, he regularly sorted feedbacks from faculties,
students and coaching centres. He helped him to improve his quality of his product; his books and
improvise in further editions.

He was invited by the other publications to write and public on their behalf for Chemistry books.

He accepted these offer against royalty on the said books and made a decent fortune out of it, which
brought an ire to his main publication house, Kirti.

The publication house started limiting his books and as claimed, “the office politics and policy were
not good” so, he left his association with Kirti Publications and ventured out to start his own
publication house.
He started writing and publishing books for other publications. On side, visited the market and made a
survey study as to how publication books are written, published and distributed in the market.

He studied the market and analysed as to how to set up his own venture and realized if the content of
the book is good and appraised and liked by the student there would be a market to sell it.

He left Kirti Publications in 2002 and started making an arrangement for his own publishing house.
He met with market executives and started formulizing the pan.

He took a loan of Rs. 25 Lakhs. Made arrangements for an office and printing of books for the
publication.

On October 2003, he started Sri Balaji Publications. With a team of 6 people, 3 rooms and an office,
he released his first book on AIPMT Exams for Chemistry.

“I was confident that my book will be good for the student and the Publication house will start”

The first book was very appreciated and was well sold. It created the name for Mr. Prabhat Kumar as
an author for chemistry books and penned the market for him.

It also brought him into lights of Rival publications house such as Batla Publications, which was the
leading house in that city. K.N Sharma was the author on the same subject (Chemistry) for Batla
Publications. His book in Organic Chemistry sold well.

This rivalry later compounded to a litigation case regarding copyright and content stealing allegations
up to Allahabad High Court. Mr. Prabhat and his publication won that case and their name in the
market was rightfully restored in the market.

He later recruited more teacher and faculty to author books on subjects other than Chemistry.

He published 5 books in year 2006 for Intermediary Schools (CBSE and U.P Board), IIT Entrances
and Mains UPSC (Maths) which was a success and sold very well.

He then expanded and marketed his books to India’s biggest coaching institute market in the city of
Kota, Rajasthan. His books on various subjects in entrance exams, especially chemistry were adopted
by these institutes and were recommended to students. His books were highly appraised and his
publication house got an awareness in Kota, creating more business opportunity.

He regularly supported his customers and keenly took feedbacks to further improve his books.
(“Teaching faculty questions and student needs”)

He later realised that he has a limited time and writing books limited his usage for marketing and
production of books. So, he recruited other faculty for IIT, JEE, NEET exams. New Teaching
faculties were inducted on a Royalty basis. Number of books increased and went Pan India as a
supplier of books for his publication.

He gradually expanded the business and now his publications house has a turnover of RS 220 Crores
per annum. Publishing various Competition and entrance exam books, CBSE, U.P and ICSE Board
books. He now has a team of 19 authors on various subjects.

In 2018 after implementation on GST 11 Services by way of printing of all goods falling under
Chapter 48 or 49 which attract GST @18% or above.
Mr. Prabhat realised that he has to pay 18% Gst just to get his books printed. So, as to not to lose his
profit on expense of paying for printing, he opted to expand in this business. He wanted to complete
the process of his penmanship to its printing under his publication house. As stated, “20 lakh books
were to be printed in a year” “that is a lot of money going into just printing” he brought 4 Heidelberg
Spymaster Printer, 2 wrapping and packaging machines and other necessary equipment.

“now we have all solutions”

In 2019, Mr. Prabhat’s printing operation can have produced approx. 50 lakh books per year. He
has 9printers, 4 Routing machines, 3 packaging machines for this purpose. He utilities this facility for
his Sri Balaji Publications as well providing its services to tether houses for a fee per consignment
size.

He now has recently purchased addional 5 machines to upscale his printing business. Muzzafarnagar
is a sugarcane producing area of Uttar Pradesh. Printing is very cheap over their as the main
ingredient to produce a paper is “Pulp”. It is easily purchase cheaply from market as sugarcane
industries in the vicinities of Muzzafarnagar produce sugarcane pulp as a waste, which is utilised to
make paper.

This makes his printing business a success as resource to setup the aforementioned business is readily
available there. Turnover from his Printing business is Approx. 100 crores. He is planning to open 3
more printing plants in Muzzafarnagr and a non-woven fabric factory.

He is also interested in opening a factory for agricultural produce and equipment as stated “there is a
reaching potential in agricultural sector”

Conclusion
My ending questions in the interview was: what was your encouragement, your drive to start up your
own business? it could have failed, what was the key component that kept you going?

Mr Prabhat Kumar answered:

“I always looked myself as different. I always wanted to do something different from the herd”

Maybe that is what is needed to be an entrepreneur. To “be” different. “Think” different. An

Entrepreneur doesn’t always have to be a Tata or Steve Jobs, opening a billion-dollar company or
Elon Musk, stretching the frontiers of an innovation. He can be a simple person, from a small town
opening up his own business, his own venture.

“I wanted to give employment to others” that’s what Mr. Prabhat said in his conclusion for the
interview and being that is it and maybe that’s why we need entrepreneurs big or small, in our
country.

Business creates business. And every business creates job opportunity, prosperity wealth. It drives us
forward

The motivations for becoming an entrepreneur are diverse and can include the potential for financial
reward, the pursuit of personal values and interests, and the interest in social change. ... Successful
entrepreneurship often requires creativity and innovation in addressing a new opportunity or concern
in a new way.