India conducive for building billion dollar company
What is really proving to be the clincher in today’s India is that entrepreneurs here can attract global talent.
By Team ET, TNN |
BANGALORE: These are great times to set shop in India. The India growth story complete with a huge marketplace for goods and services is as good an ecosystem as it gets.
| (Left to Right): Kanwaljit singh, K Ganesh, Sanjay Nayak and Srini Rajam at the ET Entrepreneurship Roundtable in Bangalore | |
ET’s expert panel on startups, TutorVista founder K Ganesh, Tejas Networks CEO Sanjay Nayak, Ittiam founder Srini Rajam and Helion Ventures managing director Kanwaljit Singh, are completely convinced that the atmosphere in India today is far more conducive to build a billion dollar company.
While the entrepreneur’s sweat, pain and passion will be required in the same doses, what has changed is that the pill is sugar-coated. So, funds are chasing million-dollar ideas and the market is right on the doorstep. These were precisely the reasons that markets like Silicon Valley became a great spawning place for entrepreneurial activity, funds were available, in a mature market.
Says Nayak of Tejas, “Two areas where India can gain a leadership role in incubation are the telecom and consumer spaces. The opportunities are phenomenal, the good news is that basic scale in India is serious scale in the world.”
From the funding side too, the landscape is fast changing. Earlier a preserve of the technology space, venture capital is now chasing non-tech and emerging areas. “Even VCs are changing. We were following the conventional model that was followed globally. Today, there is great interest in the Indian consumer space. People are setting up sector-agnostic funds,” says Kanwaljit Singh.
While the entrepreneur’s sweat, pain and passion will be required in the same doses, what has changed is that the pill is sugar-coated. So, funds are chasing million-dollar ideas and the market is right on the doorstep. These were precisely the reasons that markets like Silicon Valley became a great spawning place for entrepreneurial activity, funds were available, in a mature market.
Says Nayak of Tejas, “Two areas where India can gain a leadership role in incubation are the telecom and consumer spaces. The opportunities are phenomenal, the good news is that basic scale in India is serious scale in the world.”
From the funding side too, the landscape is fast changing. Earlier a preserve of the technology space, venture capital is now chasing non-tech and emerging areas. “Even VCs are changing. We were following the conventional model that was followed globally. Today, there is great interest in the Indian consumer space. People are setting up sector-agnostic funds,” says Kanwaljit Singh.
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The year 2006 saw a record 92 deals worth $508 million in VC funding with about $278 million coming in the sub-$10 million category. The latter figure could cross the $500-million mark this year, according to sector trackers. The intangibles of business models, funding and addressable market are perhaps easier to comprehend.
What is really proving to be the clincher in today’s India is that entrepreneurs here can attract global talent. This is because the India growth story and potential is for real. And, more and more people, both expats and returning Indians, are willing to bet their sweat equity on local promising startups.
Some of the late 90 vintage ventures could well hit the billion dollar bracket given adequate gestation time. So valuations are already hitting the billion dollar mark in several cases.
“Ventures have benefited from PE investments. For instance, valuation of Customer Asset which is today’s Firstsource, has touched $1 billion,” says Tutorvista founder K Ganesh, who founded CustomerAsset and exited from it in 2002. So, clearly, it is the best time to deep dive.
Entrepreneurs, are you on the same page?
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