Jan
20

Viral Hit – Rajnikanth’s Website Works Without Internet

247 views

When I first read it in a Times Of India article I thought that someone from TOI had got it wrong and in a hurry copy pasted a story from the Faking News website. So, I decided to check it out for myself. And lo behold – it is true – Rajnikanth’s website does run without Internet or so to say it runs without Internet only. You need to disable your Internet connection to enter the website and if you turn up your Internet connection while surfing the website it will give the error message - “Aiyyo! That was unexpected. To keep browsing, switch off your Internet“. Without much ado check out the website - www.allaboutrajni.com and check the miracle for yourself. Rajni Website works without internet

While I am not sure how the team at WebChutney has managed to do this, its indeed a fantastic way to  virally market the movie site – DesiMartini.com. Must say, WebChutney does keep coming up with innovative  viral marketing ideas  for their clients. Some more of there popular work can be checked here. Read the rest of this entry »

Jan
18

Part 1 – Entrepreneurship Lessons From Harishchandrachi Factory

86 views

Happened to watch a beautiful film today, the Oscar nominated Marathi film – Harishchandrachi Factory. The movie is the story behind the making of the first Indian feature film – Raja Harishchandra. The movie in a light hearted way portrays the struggles Dadasaheb Phalke, had to face to make his dream of producing a motion picture a reality. While the movie is a must watch for cinema lovers it also can be a source of inspiration for budding entrepreneurs. So if you do not have time to take up a course on Entrepreneurship, spend around 100 minutes in watching this film and you shall have learned enough.

Lesson # 1 – Follow Your Passion Irrespective Of Failures
Although his first venture in the camera business failed miserably, Dadasaheb Phalke realised that it was due to people spreading false rumours that taking photos sucks the life out of you and not because of any lack of opportunity in the business. Seeing an English feature film for the first time, he was bewildered by seeing pictures in motion and instantaneously decided that this is what he wants to do. While he did not have the resources or the knowledge to make a film, he had the passion to make motion pictures. Being passionate about what you intend to do is most crucial to setting up your venture. Knowledge and resources can be acquired, but passion has to be ignited from within.


Lesson # 2 – Have Confidence In Your Dreams
While the movie portrays the struggles of a first time film maker, ironically Paresh Mokashi (the director of the film) had to face his share of struggles in making Harishchandrachi Factory. But his confidence in his dream made him overcome all problems. When no producer was ready to produce the film in Marathi, Paresh mortgaged his home and decided to make the film on his own money. This bears resemblance to Dadasaheb mortgaging his wife’s jewels to make his first film. When you have confidence in your dreams, problems are nothing but milestones in your journey.


Lesson # 3 – A Desire For Continuous Learning
Dadasaheb sat for hours watching English cinema on screens in his town to try and learn the art of making films. However he realised that watching films alone is not enough and if he had to learn the art of making films, he would have to go and learn it at London. Without having any contacts or acquaintances in London, but with the burning desire to learn, he left for London to study cinema. It was this quest for knowledge which gave him the confidence to walk into a Motion Pictures office in London and say, “I am Dadasaheb Phalke and I want to make a motion picture. Will you help me?”. As entrepreneurs you need to have this constant quest for learning everything related to your business. As long as this desire is present within you, success would not be very far. When you think you have learnt everything, then it is time to move on to something new.

Harischandrachi factory lessonsEntrepreneurship lessons from Harishchandrachi Factory 

Read the rest of this entry »

Jan
06

Mexico – Will The Desert Bloom?

61 views

The article was originally published on IIM Shillong’s Consulting blog. A special thanks to Prof. IC (Indranil Chakravarthy), whose course on Firms, Markets and Global Dynamics, instilled in me the desire to read up on emerging economies and equipped me with the skills to interpret facts correctly and read between the lines of articles from business magazines.

Mexico has shown great resilience despite being badly hit by the financial crisis of 2008 (its economy shrank by 6.1% during this period), last year its economy grew by 5.4%. While Brazil has overtaken Mexico in terms of GDP in Latin America, Mexico is soon catching up. Mexico is currently the third highest exporter ($400 billion in 2010) to America, the World Bank also ranks Mexico as the easiest place in Latin America to do business. Mexico also has the highest per capita income amongst the BRIC nations (excluding Russia). Also the low cost advantage of China is rapidly dwindling and industries which once shifted to China from Mexico are moving back to Mexico. One major advantage that Mexico has is its proximity to America, which gives it a transportation cost benefit compared to other emerging economies like China and India. Also a recent NAFTA ruling in favour of Mexico, which America had been violating since 1994, will cut Mexican exporters’ shipping costs by 15%, further helping the Mexican economy.  The rise of first generation Mexican entrepreneurs like Carlos Slim, who is now the richest person in the World, makes one look optimistically towards the future.

However on the gloomier side – the unemployment rate is unlikely to reach the pre-recession mark of 4.1% before 2018 and as of now 46.2% of Mexico’s population lies below the poverty line. The continuous news stories of drug mafia and reports of violence and crime are also responsible for a lower than expected growth of Mexico. Also with 1/3rd of its GDP coming from exports – mainly to America, Mexico is highly dependent on a single country and is looking to increase its exports to other emerging economies, in order to diversify its export risk. Also the highly monopolistic nature of its industries (like telecommunications) has caused higher prices, leading to poorer people in the economy not having access to these services. Banking, medicine, transport are the other necessary service industries that have high costs due to the highly uncompetitive nature of these industries. Economic and policy reforms are needed in these industries, if a brighter future for Mexico is to be envisaged.

Mexico Will The desert bloom

Here we need to observe that, countries which continue to compete on their low cost advantage – do not have a sustainable growth strategy. This can be seen with countries like China, which once attracted industries with their low cost advantage are now seeing departure of these industries. This is because with passage of time, increase in the wage and operational cost in China, is no longer making it an attractive destination for investment. Mexico has been criticised for not opening its doors to foreign players, but I believe that this is actually one of Mexico’s strength. The country is trying to build its internal industries, so that when it becomes a totally open economy, its local industries will have the potential and financial strength to compete with global players. This is something that other emerging economies have failed to do – they have opened up their markets without first strengthening the foundations of their own markets. However there are some problems in Mexico’s economy too –

  • Mexico has not fostered and created enough number of domestic players within every industry. Thus this has led to monopolistic nature of the markets. The lack of sufficient players means growing cartelisation and lesser competition for existing players – which has resulted in these players not innovating to a large extent.
  • The limited choice, due to lack of players also means exploitation of the masses by the monopolist companies.

With a presidential election in 2012, political parties are looking at creating competitive policies and economic reforms which are necessary to deliver any real improvement in the quality of life for the average Mexican: job creation, middle class expansion, expanded social services, poverty reduction and reduced inequality. This if done, will help drive internal competition in the market and benefit Mexico as a whole. Read the rest of this entry »

May
20

The Indian IT Sector In A Transformation Phase

781 views

From just being cost effective cheap labor offshore destinations, the Indian IT sector has come a long way to giving competition to global players like IBM, Accenture in their home grounds, not just on cost but also on quality. However with growth figures not meeting market expectations, analysts are predicting the IT services market to have reached a plateau. However I believe, the next few years will see rapid transformations in the Indian sector – As can be seen in top IT companies from TCS to Wipro to Infosys, the leadership baton is being passed to energetic, young leaders- an indication of the agility and the aggressive strategies this industry is likely to see. Below are five trends and strategies I believe Indian IT companies are likely to concentrate on and it will finally boil down to who does a better job at executing that strategy.

1. Focus on Activities Higher In The Value Chain

IT players are looking at strategic partnerships with clients rather than small off shoring contracts. Also concentration is on doing more consulting work, creating IT strategy roadmaps for organisations and full integrated solutions. Amongst major Indian IT vendors, Cognizant Technology Solutions is one up in this area, as it has made early inroads into Management Consulting by recruiting a high talent pool in this area for the past few years.

2. Telecommunications and Education Sector Will Be The Next Big Thing

With focus of many developing economies in increasing their communications infrastructure and developing a strong telecommunications backbone for the growth of their economy, Telecommunications seems to be the next big thing after the Banking and Financial services sector. Telecommunication services with the advent of LTE technology many nations will expand to providing financial, social services and not just be restricted to simple communications. The IT sector will have to focus on partnering with major telecommunication companies in helping them achieve their vision. Mobile communications will be embedded with social computing and the internet and mobile services would be integrated on one platform. Also education services and the use of Information and Communication technology in fostering its growth and proliferation will be vital. Read the rest of this entry »

May
14

Resolutions For The New Year

318 views

Setting short term goals for yourself and seeing if you can stick up to them or exceed them, surely does help one inch closer to their long term goals. I have had this habit of making resolutions at any important stage in the year and I believe that’s where a New Year starts for me. So here are my 10 resolutions for the New Year. Read the rest of this entry »

Apr
28

Why I Strongly Disagree With Dorie Clark

618 views

Recently came across this post by Dorie Clark on HBR, “Don’t Do What You Love” (do check it out).  While the article certainly makes for an interesting read,  I strongly disagree with the points put across and here’s why:

  1. You Love It But You Are Not Great At It: I strongly believe that, If You Love Something, You Will Be Great At It and vice versa. But what is important to note here is that you need to love the skills associated with your job and not just the perks and benefits associated with it.  If you suck at Finance and love the perks associated with Investment Banking, then surely you are surely not going to be great at the job. But if you love the skills associated with the job, then in a matter of your time you will surely master those skills and will stand out from the crowd. This is where Dorie goes wrong when she takes the example of Scott who likes the glamor associated with the media job but did not have writing skills which were the core skills needed for doing the job.
  2. You Are Skilled At Your Passion But Hate The Work That Surrounds It – I believe that if you are good at your core tasks then doing the secondary and tertiary tasks will not bother you much and with times as you grow up the organization chain, you can very well delegate the secondary and tertiary tasks that you do not enjoy, to your team members. The core emphasis hence should be loving the core skill of a job. As a HR you will have to do a lot of documentation, follow up with managers, etc. You may very well not like these secondary tasks. But dealing with people, working on organizational structures, balance scorecards, compensation and talent development – these would form your core tasks. If you love these core tasks of your job, then you would surely have found the perfect dream job for yourself. i love my job Read the rest of this entry »

Apr
27

Now Read Books At The Best Price

539 views

Rashmi Bansal is all set to come out with her third edition of entrepreneurial books : I Have A Dream. A fan of Rashmi’s books that I am, I decided to instantaneously pre-order the book from Flipkart, past experience has shown it to have the best deals. And yes, I do get it for a price of Rs. 101 compared to the market price of Rs. 150. Pretty impressed with myself for having saved 49 bucks I give myself a pat on the back.  Hardly had I finished my self-adulation act, that a friend of mine informs me that he has just ordered the same book from Infibeam for Rs. 75. Damn it ! When will I ever be able to boast of my money saving skills to my Mom :( .

save money reading books

With 10′s of online book stores, can one seriously start comparing books across all book stores just to save a few bucks. I believe after spending 30 minutes in selecting a book, you will end up losing all the interest in buying a book. But when you buy a book and then realise you were getting the same book at a lower price someplace else, your post buyer cognitive dissonance is going to be pretty much high. So how do you save time and also get the best book deals online, that would help you save enough to buy a sea facing Marine Drive apartment. Here’s the solution : India Book Store . This website helps you compare prices across all major online book stores in India and helps you choose the best deal. So happy reading and happy saving to all my readers :)

Thanks to Aseem for the information.

Older posts «