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Announcing the 3rd batch of 10 companies @InTech50 2015

InTech50 2015 (a flagship event of iSPIRT & Terenne Global) is happy to announce the third batch of 10 finalists.

Congratulations to all the following finalists…listed alphabetically. The first and second batch of 10 companies has been announced before.

InTech50

  • 42Gears – 42Gears Mobility Systems Pvt. Ltd is software company based in Bangalore, India.More than 5000 companies in 50 countries around the world use 42Gears products to increase their mobile workforce productivity, reduce costs and increase profits. Businesses in retail, manufacturing, healthcare, government, logistics, education and other industries form our customer base.
  • Aujas – Aujas helps organizations manage information security risks by protecting data, software, people and identities in alignment with best practices and compliance requirements. We also help strengthen security governance and intelligence frameworks.
  • Customer XPS – CustomerXPs is revolutionizing Sales, Marketing and Fraud Management in fortune 500 banks by harnessing the power of extreme real-time BIG DATA
  • Ideal Analytics – Helps you in free data analysis in cloud; connect to your data and explore;
  • I-exceed Technology – i-exceed is a technology products and services company. We currently operate across two major business lines, viz. products (Appzillon) and services (BFSI consulting services, Mobile Consulting Services Performance Management and Oil & Gas Technology Services). Appzillon, our flagship product, is a feature rich, agile and flexible cross-platform suite to build apps for smartphones, tablets and browsers
  • Indusface – Indusface provides organisations with a complete suite of comprehensive application security solutions to protect their web and mobile applications from online attacks and assist them in meeting the standards set by compliance regulators.
  • KPoint Technologies – kPoint Technologies offers kPoint – a cloud-based enterprise video platform – that makes your video content discoverable, mobile and social. kPoint enables organizations with a complete range of do-it-yourself tools, packaged as an integrated platform, for use of videos in the enterprise.
  • Olivo – Fully Integrated Patient Centric Care Solution
  • Uniken – Uniken provides a digital access platform REL-ID which provisions mutual trust in the digital relationships and protects digital interactions and data.
  • Zenatix – Zenatix’ mission is to empower energy consumers with data, insights and recommendations that will drive energy savings. Our solutions enable the energy consumers monitor their energy consumption pattern at various system/appliances levels, and take actions based on the recommendations driven by our energy analytics.

Watch this space, as we will announce the fourth batch shortly. Check the first batch of 10 companies and the second batch of 10 companies here. 

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Announcing the 2nd batch of 10 companies @InTech50

InTech50 2015 (a flagship event of iSPIRT & Terenne Global) is happy to announce the second batch of 10 finalists. The Jury had a wonderful time in going through this process of selection – of curating the best product startups in India. They deep-dived into their business models, teams, future plans, etc. and were completely overwhelmed with the quality of their ‘products.’

Congratulations to all the following finalists…listed alphabetically. The first batch of 10 companies can be seen here

  • Analyttica – is a global analytical solutions and services provider. With our innovative TreasureHunt™ platform, we create a sustainable business impact across industries and functions. Analyttica TreasureHunt™ is an experience based knowledge immersion and collaborative workflow platform for advanced analytics, on the cloud. The platform is powered by a proprietary analytics engine, which integrates with multiple statistical packages, such as R and SAS, allowing point and click user operations instead of coding.
  • Anunta Technologies – Anunta Technology Management Services is an IT service company with a specialized focus on Application Delivery as a Service.Anunta has developed a unique offering called ‘Application Delivery as a Service’ (ADaaS) on its own proprietary platform. This solution has proven business and IT benefits that are working for a number of companies around the world.
  • Fix Stream – we make sense out of massive and disparate data through automated correlation to solve complex Datacenter and Cloud problems using a fraction of time and resources. We enable simplistic and elegant visualization of the vast and varied infrastructure with an application centric view – putting the applications and business services at the center! All this in a single pane of glass and in near real time!
  • Julia Computing -Julia is a high-level, high-performance dynamic programming language for technical computing, with syntax that is familiar to users of other technical computing environments. It provides a sophisticated compiler,distributed parallel execution, numerical accuracy, and an extensive mathematical function library.
  • Xploree is a unique Search & Discovery platform created by KeyPoint Technologies. It is the industry’s first user-initiated, hyper-contextual, platform with language intelligence that conveniently connects mobile device users with brands offers and services in the exact moment of need. Xploree predicts a user’s needs and delights them through their journey across applications as they discover most relevant content, apps, deals and services.
  • Reverie Inc – Reverie builds a language as a service platform that enables search and discovery of local language content, interaction in any language, and creation and publication of local language content and apps.Reverie’s  Language Platform is used in the consumer Internet space (online retail, E-Commerce marketplaces, travel, vehicles for hire and more), banks and financial services, e-governance, across millions of devices, and more. Swalekh, Reverie’s free multilingual keypad app, enables typing in 3 modes in 11 Indian languages.
  • Sirion Labs – Sirion helps businesses simplify the management of key suppliers and lower the cost of governance by delivering critical intelligence on demand and automating the full spectrum of contracts, performance, financial, risk and relationship management on a single, integrated platform. Organizations deploy our product to create a single system of record for strategic suppliers, standardize processes, consolidate legacy systems and drive meaningful comparisons in performance between diverse suppliers, functions, and regions
  • Teamchat is an enterprise-messaging app that enables clutter-free messaging for teams of unlimited size. It is an innovative product with patent-pending smart-forms that summarize responses enabling important message content to stand out. Teamchat is available on all mobile and web platforms and is used by 1000+ orgs worldwide, including some of the largest enterprises in the world.
  • What Fix – provides instructions right inside websites; no more verbose howtos and screencasts. It create flows (guides) in just a few clicks; you can see ‘see live’ help directly inside websites; embed flows as articles, slides, buttons.
  • Xurmo  – Xurmo is a Big Data analytics platform that determines the natural structure of raw data and stores it in a patented format. The platform then allows instant Search-guided Query so that complex analysis can be performed without any schema design and use-case specific data models.

We have had a good run so far, and we hope to continue to contribute towards showcasing the  best of Indian software products to an eminent group of global CIO’s. We are proud to have been able to build on our track record of 2014 and aspire to  make it bigger and better every year. Our commitment towards making India a ‘Product Nation’ feels revalidated.

Watch this space. We shall soon announce our next ten finalists.

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Announcing the first batch of 10 companies shortlisted for @InTech50

InTech50 is a flagship event of iSPIRT & Terenne Global. It is a showcase of some of the most promising software products created by entrepreneurs from India.

The top 50 companies that will make it to InTech50 are selected by an eminent panel comprising of Chief Information Officers (CIOs) of marquee companies, VCs, and senior executives from Product companies.

These chosen 50 companies will receive advice, on-going mentoring, product marketing support, and funding to scale their offering to the global markets.

We received over 228 applications (As expected, we had a slew of applications that came in on the last day). Thanks to the efforts of our core team and jury members we have now closed the first leg of InTech50 2015 selection process.

Our eminent jury had a wonderful, but tough time in shortlisting from among the applicants the top 100 that will make it to the next round. According to a jury member – “We were thrilled with the quality of applications we saw. It was an exhilarating experience to see so many good ideas that are tryignt o shape the world for a smarter future.”

The criteria for the first phase of shortlisting were as follows:

  • Products that were already operating in the market were preferred to those at a concept / POC stage
  • Products that addressed horizontal opportunities were preferred over those that focused very deep on a vertical
  • Products that were easy to implement & use were preferred over products that needed deeper integration with enterprise systems (like ERP)
  • Solutions that could be an “add-on”/”bolt-on” to the existing eco-system

Here are the ten shortlist of our first batch(in alphabetical order)

  • Germin8′ Social Intelligence stakeholder insights and engagement platform that collects and analyses conversations in real time from public sources and private sources, and converts them into industry-specific actionable insights and leads.
  • Framebench is the easiest way to view, annotate, discuss and collaborate over any file online. Be it an presentation, a high res image or even a video.
  • Freshdesk is a full-fledged cloud based support software that lets businesses support their customers across email, phone, chat and social media.
  • Indix App and Indix API – They collect, organize, structure and analyze a huge amount of product and product related info so that businesses can use their apps and APIs to improve product search, optimize offers, better target product ads, enrich their catalog and do ad hoc analysis.
  • Qubole Data Service is a self-service platform for big data analytics that runs on the three major public clouds: Amazon AWS, Google Compute Engine and Microsoft Azure. QDS provides platorms like Hadoop, Hive. Spark and Presto as a service along with programming interfaces like SQL, Pig, Cascading, Scala and Python – all through an intuitive user interface that encourages collaboration.
  • Sapience is a patent pending software product that catalyzes a Mindful Enterprise. By combining self-quantification at work for individuals and enterprise effort analytics, Sapience enables data driven decision-making in empowering employees and management towards productivity and wellness.
  • Seclore FileSecure helps enterprise define, control and audit the use of information as it flows within and outside of the enterprise. It allows enterprises to embed security, privacy and compliance policies within information itself.
  • Talview Video Interview platform is reinventing the way screening and selection happens in the industry. They are the second largest player globally in video-mobile recruitment tools augmented with talent engagement and state of the art Hiring Analytic Technology.
  • ToneTag is a patent pending proximity tech that allows easy, frictionless and secure proximity payments using sound (Tone) or NFC (Tag). Depending upon user device and retail pos hardware, mobile application can toggle to initiate in-store purchases using sound or NFC. It works on any mobile device and no internet is required on user device at time of initiating payment.
  • Tydy – The documents we use today were built for the desktop world. Microsoft Office was launched in 1990 and not much has changed since then! PDF, PPT, XLS and others were not built for mobile consumption. Tydy is a new mobile document format. The Tydy doc harnesses the interactivity & sensors of mobile devices to create a completely new document consumption experience.”

According to Piyush Singh, co-host, InTech50, “The shortlisting process was an intellectually stimulating exercise. Am happy to see the escalation in not just the number of applications from last year, but also the quality. Jury members unanimously concurred that the software product eco-system seems to be evolving very well”

We are delighted that InTech50 has emerged as a platform that connects high-potential products to CIOs, investors, Executives from product companies and other stakeholders of the co-system from across the globe. That individuals and organizations from across the world consider InTech50 as the annual event that showcases a well curated and end-user driven platform for “Innovation for a Smarter Future” is encouraging. iSPIRT is committed to work with each of the selected companies to make a difference in their entrepreneurial journey, with support/advise/mentoring/guidance and giving their ventures a thrust as they scale up.

Do follow this space, as we will soon announce the next batch of 10 InTech50 companies. 

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Where the best meet the brightest – Announcing #SaaSx Chennai – 26th March

In India’s SaaS startup context, Bangalore and Delhi are the cities spoken of repeatedly as beacons and dens of great innovation and entrepreneurial activity, and deservedly so. But still, there is another city, a rather quiet, unassuming metro that characteristically keeps churning out great companies but remains stubbornly under the radar. The sea blown streets in the old British trading capital of Chennai are buzzing with a different kind of business these days and iSPIRT is proud to play a part in it.

SaaSx_headerOver the course of several weeks of conducting the SaaS roundtable in Chennai, the quality of the ecosystem in city has become evident. And with the idea of leveraging the knowledge for the city’s younger entrepreneurs as a whole, we conceived an event called SaaSx which is now live and will be held on the 26th in Chenna(Venue to be confirmed soon).

SaaSx Chennai will be a one of a kind event organized by SaaS entrepreneurs for SaaS entrepreneurs. Reason being that the knowledge needed to grow SaaS business from zero to $10k to $100k to $1m in MRR is rare, and the only people who can tell you something about it are the people who have done so already.

Which is why we have assembled an all-star team that you can speak to and get advice from, including Avlesh(WebEngage), Girish Mathrubootham(Freshdesk), Niraj(GrexIt), Paras Chopra(Wingify), & Suresh Sambandam(KissFlow). The iciing of the cake will be a talk by Aaron Ross, celebrated author of Predictable Revenue and renowned SaaS guru. Register here, there are few seats and the event is only open for SaaS Founders.

We will also be launching A Jump Start Guide to Desk Marketing and Selling for Mid-Market SaaS. The goal of the guide is: Let the truth be told – SaaS businesses are amazing. Predictable recurring revenue, great margins and inbound marketing. Best of all, the ability to operate from India and sell to the world. Stay tuned. 

SaaSx Chennai will be another milestone event in India’s SaaS community, a batch of entrepreneurs who are making the world sit up and take notice. iSPIRT is delighted to play an integral part in this movement.

See you in Chennai!

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In conversation with the Founder of RippleHire – Sudarsan Ravi, participant – @Intech50 2014.

RippleHire is a SaaS-based employee referral product.

Tell us about RippleHire – your journey so far…

We help companies automate their talent sourcing by leveraging their employee pool.

We spent our first year working with the ecosystem getting feedback and crowdsourcing problems on hiring. Only then did we begin our sales process and that too with the top global brands, so that we get the right folks to get the product experience and results right.

The journey has been challenging and exhilarating – full of the regular highs and lows that every entrepreneurial journey has, along with the crazy experiences and insights that come with building a global company.

RippleHireWhat challenges did you face during the course? Any learnings from that? 

It was initially tough for us to go after brands like Adobe, McAfee, Capgemini. Convincing them to be among your initial customers was not easy. People love social proof and we will be eternally grateful to our first set of customers who have co-created this innovation with us and helped provide the social proof.

If I were to do one thing differently, I would focus directly on global customers.

Do you think that getting access to/finding investors is difficult in India? 

I don’t think getting access to investors in India is difficult at all. We have always believed that investment is a by-product of building a good scalable business. Our focus as a team has been about building a product that adds value to our customers (the real proof came through when they paid).

I always recommend startups to not focus on building a business for investors but for customers. Do take the inputs that the investors give you on the space and the approach. Factor that in. However, build the business to add value to customers.

Our approach has meant that we have always received inbound interest from investors. So, I think getting access to investors is definitely easy if you focus on building a good business.

Why did you consider participating in InTech50? 

We wanted to get validation from Indian and Global CIO’s on our concept. It was wonderful to have multiple CIO’s stop by our booth post our presentation and share their hiring challenges.

It was a great way for us to get feedback on RippleHire. Not only that, it helped us bag customers too.

How has getting shortlisted for InTech50 helped you? 

Being recognized as one of the top 50 innovative software companies coming out of India helped us a lot from our sales standpoint. People in India, and globally, take you seriously especially when the validation for the software comes from CIO’s.

We have also grown by 10X in the past year.

Who were the people you connected with as a result of InTech50, and can you give us a few specific examples of what those introductions translated into? 

We were able to get feedback from multiple CIO’s and introductions to prospects like Happiest minds and Ascendum through this platform. Ascendum signed up RippleHire as a customer as well.

What advice would you give to other emerging companies as they plan their scaling up?

Every startup is different and has different challenges when it comes to scaling up. I think it is important to get the following right when it comes to scaling up –

  • Your customer support and product experience should be consistent. Think of a Pizza Hut. As they scale customers, it is important that the Pizza quality stays the same.
  • Scaling well is about putting the processes in place that the experience stays the same. Getting this in place requires thinking of your engineering, sales and support teams in the form of units. Once you get one unit right in your support engine, scaling is about replicating that unit.

One recommendation I would give out to the InTech50 participants this year is that – research the sectors that are of interest for you. Hiring in our case is sector agnostic. It would have helped us if we had picked three sectors and focused on attendees from that space.

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InTech50 – helping software product companies connect with influential CIOs from across the world

In a recent article in ET, Mohandas Pai and I suggested that if India does not produce enough product companies, our economy will not be sustainable in the future. The data is compelling. To quote from that article, “Boeing and Airbus alone generate almost as much profit as all global airlines put together. Pfizer’s profits are more than those of the top 100 hospitals in the US. Cisco’s profits are more than those of all European mobile operators. Microsoft generates more profit than those of top 20 pureplay global IT services firms.While Indigo is a very well run airline, being a Boeing creates far larger value.”

Indian entrepreneurs and businesses can be world-scale and world-class. We have demonstrated that convincingly in services. Airtel, Jet, Indigo, Apollo Hospitals, Fortis Healthcare, TCS & Infosys, etc. are fine examples of companies that are respected across the globe. There is no reason why we cannot create world-scale and world-class product companies in India. The environment is conducive for entrepreneurs to now think ‘products.’

We created iSPIRT as a non-profit think tank with the aim of accelerating the software product eco-system in India. Since our inception in 2013, iSPIRT has focused on solving tough problems that will foster software product companies in India. Making M&A happen is one such problem. iSPIRT’s M&A Connect Program has made a big difference there. The last one-year has changed that perception of India as just a software services destination, and we have now generated early but enthusiastic interest in the international markets for our software products.

Some of that change in outlook started becoming apparent when, in January 2014, Facebook acquired Little Eye Labs, a Bangalore based startup that develops performance analysis and monitoring tools for mobile app. This was followed by Yahoo’s acquisition of Bookpad, whose document-viewing product is similar to Google Docs. The latest in the series of acquisitions is that of ZipDial (a mobile and analytics company) by Twitter. Some of these acquisitions, which got significant media attention in the startup eco-system, will hopefully encourage more entrepreneurs to think products.

Another hard problem

Another problem, which is equally hard, is to do with getting quality access to big-name CIOs in US. InTech50 address this issue. It is a one-of-a-kind forum where shortlisted software product companies get an opportunity to showcase and interact with some of the most influential CIOs from India and other parts of the world. This unique platform is a springboard that provides software product companies a connect with potential customers, investors, partners and influencers – that they would otherwise find it difficult to access, and certainly impossible to access over a 2-day period. InTech50 – a collaboration between iSPIRT and Terrene Global Leadership Network – serves as a platform for recognizing the most promising software products by entrepreneurs in India. After a thorough screening of applications, 50 innovative technology startups from the software product space are shortlisted to interact face-to-face with a panel of renowned CIOs and investors from across the globe. Through their close interaction with them, these startups gain valuable insights, which can facilitate them in scaling up globally.

The event, scheduled for April 15-16th 2015, is our 2nd edition. In our inaugural InTech50 event last year, we curated some high-potential companies. The audience of CIOs and other stakeholders took note. They now recognize that India is on the cusp of becoming a product nation.

InTech50 is the only forum of its kind where startups can get unparalled access to top global CIOs and investors, closely interact with them and showcase their products extensively with the end goal of closing deals. The best part is that CIOs from across the globe will assemble right here in India with the sole objective of finding interesting software product companies that they can engage with.

Though the applications for InTech50 are closed, if you are convinced about your product and feel that it deserves every chance to be showcased at the event, you have ONE LAST CHANCE TO APPLY by getting one of the Fellows, Founder or Product Circle Donor at iSPIRT to recommend you. (You can view the list of iSPIRT Fellows).

13897639212_c86c8c02ed_cIf you are shortlisted, do work with Mentor Panels and Business Catalysts, to prepare your pitch, and interact with our team and past participants to understand how to best leverage this unique opportunity. Take a look at our illustrious panel of Business Catalysts here.

NRK Raman, Co-Founder of iFlex (instrumental in its acquisition by Oracle for a whopping USD 909 million in 2005), is driving our effrots to help product companies sharpen their pitch and presentation.

With InTech50, you have everything you need to GO BIG, right here, on a platter – the right connections, the requisite support and everything else that you’ll need in the process.

Watch this space. India is on its way to becoming a Product Nation.

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‘Finding’ Innovation

In a highly competitive market, and one where market dynamics are changing faster than ever, innovation is the key to long-term sustainability and success. History has proven that companies that have a culture that encourages innovation stand a far better chance at sustaining their leadership position or emerging as market leaders.

1Harvey Firestone, an American businessman, and the founder of the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company once said, “Capital isn’t so important in business. Experience isn’t so important. You can get both these things. What is important is ideas. If you have ideas, you have the main asset you need, and there isn’t any limit to what you can do with your business and your life.”

Businesses recognize that. Most progressive businesses have put in place people, processes, resources, and investments and encourage a culture that fosters innovation.

Considering the fact that companies need to innovate faster than ever before, many companies now are also looking for absorbing innovation that is independently created outside their company. Smart companies recognize that they cannot hire all the smart people, and that smart and relevant innovation is also happening outside of their organization. Their efforts are therefore directed not just in innovating within the organization, but on engaging with innovations from outside as well.

By ‘outsourcing’ innovation, many leading companies have managed to minimize innovation costs and associated risks by as much as 60% to 90% while simultaneously reducing cycle times. In addition, they leverage tens to hundreds of times by internally investing the resultant savings. By engaging with innovators outside the organization, larger companies are able to look at a significantly larger pool of concepts and products, and thus are able to significantly reduce the cost of deploying innovative solutions and products for their businesses.

To enjoy the benefits of outsourcing innovation, the executives and the front-line should be on the lookout for the latest and most innovative technologies emerging across the globe and then figure out which ones they can leverage to derive the maximum synergy.

What is important is that you catch innovative companies’ young, i.e., when they are still in the startup or early-growth stage. Identifying and engaging with companies at an early stage has significant benefits for a large company, not just in monetary benefits, but also in being able to guide the product / concept design to best suit their own use case.

Larger companies who may not have the ability and bandwidth to scout for innovation independently can easily collaborate or partner with enablers in the entrepreneurial eco-system like accelerators, incubators, early-stage funds, and also the emerging online platforms that showcase startups and early-stage companies. Domain specific ‘hackathons’, mentoring clinics, and boot camps are some other ways in which larger companies can connect with relevant innovators.

Once the organization has identified which of these innovations fits into their scheme of things, there are 3 options before them:

  1. Acquire the company – in some situations for competitive reasons and to get a longer lead-time compared to competition it might make sense to acquire the company.
  2. Use the product – – sometimes it is worthwhile to simply use the product as an add-on or bolt on to the existing eco-system to provide a unique offering or enrichment to the existing solution.
  3. Partner with the company – This option involves jointly developing the product or innovation further, keeping in mind your specific requirement. This way, the innovation can be customized to suit your needs.

These are interesting times, particularly for software products. The pace and quality of innovation in India has gone up significantly. At iSPIRT, we have seen the quality of entrepreneurial talent, ideas and products, improve rapidly. We have quite a few global standard companies as witnessed by the global scale acquisitions, and the pace at which newer ideas are being introduced is very encouraging. It is also encouraging to note that a number of larger companies have already connected with us to get an early glimpse into innovations. The InTech50 event is a great initiative to showcase innovation to CIOs, product leaders and VC’s that provide the platform for the innovators to springboard.

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Announcing Validation Tank @InTech50

The second edition of InTech50 is round the corner.  InTech50 (flagship event of iSpirt) brings together 50 promising enterprise software start-ups, 50 CIO’s from some of the biggest companies (read Citibank, Kroger, Procter & Gamble, Great American Insurance Company,  AllStage, Accretive Health, Nationwide Mutual Insurance, Crate & Barrel and the likes) and who’s who from the venture capital community. To be held at the The Leela, Bangalore on April 15th & 16th, iSPIRT is bringing Validation Tank to this this year’s InTech50.

What is Validation Tank?

Validation Tank is a platform designed to help companies in idea stage validate their product ideas. When you are building a product, there are a lot of unknowns like the market, market size and competition etc. As entrepreneurs, we make some intelligent guesses and believe in our gut and set out to build the product. We often ignore the buyer in the product development process and reach the buyer only when the product is ready. The whole concept of validating the idea before building the product is missing from the picture. At InTech50 this year, we are going to change this.

Through Validation Tank, we are going to give companies in the ideation stage an opportunity to pitch their ideas to CIO’s. The CIO’s will listen to your product idea and help you validate it by providing actionable insights in to the opportunity size, technical viability, business model and importantly the buyer’s perspective. All this even before you start developing the prototype. It is a great opportunity to get an honest feedback about your product idea. It is a platform to engage with IT leaders, product champions, mentors and early adopters for your product.

Who can apply for Validation Tank?

If you are company founded/incorporated after 2014 and working on a product idea for businesses or in the process of building a prototype, you are the ideal company for Validation Tank. You need not have a working prototype or early adopters but a presentation on your product, technology target market, competition (if any) is good to get your idea validated. If you are already building your product you can still apply for Validation Tank and get your idea validated.

How do I apply?

APPLY NOW ! 27th Feb is the last day for rushing in your entries… Your timely response could open up a whole new world for you to explore (literally!) and put you in the BIG LEAGUE much sooner than you expected it!

Validation Tank is curated by Praveen Hari(Thinkflow) & Ranga Raj(Thinxtream)

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Announcing the Business Catalyst program at InTech50

We are pleased to announce that this year Intech50 will connect Indian startups with experienced business catalysts and consultants visiting specially from USA.

Why Are We Launching Business Catalyst

In his famous blog, Ben Horowitz discusses why we need sales people in the cloud world.

Last year we saw many of our startups getting the POC from large US customers, but some of them struggled to close the deal. We felt the companies need for experienced local sales presence to help maneuver the enterprise sales process.

Partly quoting from Ben’s article, the purpose of the enterprise sales team is not just about relationship and introductions. They also have to talk about value for the specific customer, dethrone alternative options, and navigate through the complex enterprise procurement process. In addition, when selling a startup product, they have to mitigate the risk of buying from a startup.

Our goal for the Business Catalyst program is to help startups understand this process of selling in USA with their interactions with senior sales leaders and consultants.

And Yes, the business catalysts can also provide introductions to their customers and manage the sales process for you.  

Some of the confirmed list of business catalysts are:

Is there a cost to participate in the Business Catalyst Program at the conference?

There is no additional financial cost that InTech50 will charge to participate in the program. The business catalysts will be choosy about who they take to their customers. They will be looking for companies that are ready for launch in USA market. The criteria generally include product readiness, some references; understanding of US based customers to target, competition and ability to fund sales expenses in USA. To this end, there will be a small questionnaire we will ask you to fill.

Most business catalysts will expect to enter into some financial arrangement if they decide to work with you after the conference. Our goal is to educate you on what they are looking for, and ensure a warm handshake.  

Which Industries, verticals domains and geographies are the Sales Consultants from? Typical Profile?

While this is an evolving list, our focus is sales consultants from North America. We expect 4-6 sales consultants. Each consultant typically has 15+ years of sales experience in large MNC and now helping other companies on full time basis. 

Do I have to work with sales consultants that Intech50 recommends?

No, there is no obligation to work with sales consultants after the conference.

 

 

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Product Leaders Forum brings PLF 2015 to create and celebrate product leaders!

There are two things that ring loud in my head whenever I think about PLF. The first is the teaching by renowned Chinese philosopher Lao-Tzu that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. And the second is the quote “Celebrate what you have accomplished but raise the bar a little higher each time you succeed” by Mia Hamm a leading soccer player who has many firsts to her name.

At iSPIRT we dream of making India a product nation. In it’s 2-year journey so far (yes #iSpirtturns2!), the dream has taken shape in different ways! It is great that there are others who share the dream and the passion! Product Leaders Forum (PLF)—a not-for-profit is one such catalyst working in the eco-system in the same direction. PLF’s mission is to build an active forum of product leaders helping build stronger product mindsets and skillsets in India. This journey is going to be made of many steps and as a part of its early steps it brings an upcoming event PLF 2015!

As a product citizen I am very excited about “Product Leaders Forum – 2015” a 4-day event coming up in Bangalore between 17-20th February 2015! True to it’s core, PLF’s promise for the event is to bring together product heroes and sheroes—visionary practitioners who have successfully run product centers for global companies or transitioned to start-up on their own; gurus—product management, leadership and design gurus; and practising and aspiring product citizens.

A key goal of PLF 2015 is to help create product leaders and to celebrate product leadership! As we know a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step and the Indian eco-system has made a bold start in the last few years. As the country was fast thriving in the Indian services industry making a global impact, the product journey slowly but surely began! With the vibrant eco-system of MNC companies and local start-ups, it is only going to grow further. Start-ups have an appetite greater than ever to get bigger and the R&D centers want to go beyond being R&D centers to become product and business centers! This shift in appetite and need to move up the value chain calls for a greater role of product management, product leadership and product leaders in the play.

The product leadership evolution has become a revolution and it stands on two key pillars—product mindsets and skillsets to make the shift! At PLF 2015 all sessions and speakers have been hand-picked to exclusively focus on that. Here are just a few of the many exclusive things that can be expected at PLF 2015:

  • 11 CEOs, 1 stage, 1 topic — Panel discussion on Product Leadership’s journey from evolution to revolution!
  • Series of career tracks, workshop tracks and best practice series carefully hand-picked for product leaders to build the mindset and turbo-charge career paths
  • Candid conversations on a spectrum of topics ranging from intraprenuership; product management; design and experience; leveraging emerging; transformative technologies; and organizational championship to build great product teams!
  • First hand success stories from accomplished stalwarts on their journey from product leadership to intrapreneurship to enterprenership
  • Actionable takeaways
  • An exposure to a bagful of unexplored possibilities to become a product leader and a great one at that!
  • Form lifelong, meaningful connections in the eco-system not just at the event but ones that open up dialogues beyond it as well

This is a not-to-be-missed event by every product leader, and anyone who’s in the business of building products needs product leaders!

  • If you’re a product company making global products, you need product leaders
  • If you’re a service company with thriving services business, but are looking to build great platforms that not only allow you to take the best to all your customers, but also monetize it better; you need product leaders
  • If you’re an entrepreneur running a start-up for local or global customers, while you are focussed on managing funding and selling of the product as you build it, you need to also play the role of a product leader! And as you grow, you need a team of product leaders!

Being part of both families, I can see and feel the passion; and visualize a product nation for all us product citizens; and inspired and upskilled product leaders; and it is this visualized dream that keeps me marching one step at a time every day in that direction! Before we continue on the journey ahead, I do plan to stop by at PLF 2015 to celebrate product leadership and become a champion product leader! Given the way the iSpirt family is a fan of building great products, definitely hope to see many of you there J!! To find out more about the schedule, speakers and registrations check out the PLF website before the bus is full!

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If you have a B2B Product, here are 5 reasons why you should apply for #InTech50

If you have built an B2B Product and have aspirations to take it to a global scale, here are the 5 reasons why you should apply for #InTech50.

InTech50

  1. An opportunity to showcase, get validation of the concept and product direction, better understanding of business value in the enterprise from Global CIOs.
  2. High probability of being selected by Global CIO’s for pilot or early adoption.
  3. Possibility of being selected by large product companies for add-on/bolt-on value add/partnerships to their large scale product solution sets.
  4. Potential possibility of getting investors attention due to interest/validation from Global CIO’s/large product companies.
  5. Getting selected in the elite #InTech50 list and subsequently getting a high degree of visibility from different stakeholders especially media coverage.

The possibility of all this happening without the need to travel out of country is real! This is the 1st and only platform for Enterprise products to showcase their products to Global CIOs.

Only the 50 shortlisted companies will get to attend the event. So what are you waiting for, go ahead and apply, the last date is 18th Feb 2014.

Read more details here – Announcing InTech50 for 2015

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Announcing InTech50 for 2015

Welcome to the second edition of InTech50. We’re happy to report that we achieved some spectacular results from our first edition last year and are all geared up to announce the dates for the next version of the program.

What did we achieve?

    • 39 companies had active deals in progress
    • In September alone, a 100 days after the last edition, 5 companies had closed deals
    • 19 had active deals in the pipeline

Spurred on by this success, we believe we are ready for edition two.

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So, what is InTech50?

For the uninitiated, InTech50 is a forum where 50 carefully chosen software product companies have an opportunity to interact face to face with a panel of CIOs, product leadership and venture capitalists. On conclusion of the event, these companies will receive ongoing mentoring, product marketing support and even funding to scale their operations to global markets.

Is InTech50 for me?

Yes it is, if you are a software product company that has aspirations to go global. Most importantly, you don’t need to travel abroad to seek your fortunes but rather the panel of experts comes to you in Bangalore, in India.

We want you to succeed and to that end, this program is designed to offer you all the encouragement and support possible from product strategy, UI assistance, product marketing help and so on that will enable your product to become the best in class.

The program combines prospective buyers (CIOs) who will constructively critique your offering, funders(VCs and other investors) who will tell you why they will fund your product and mentors who will offer you that timely bit of advice that will give you the extra edge.

When and where will it be held?

Intech50 will be held on April 15 and 16 @ Bangalore, India.

How much does it cost?

There is no application fee. 50 companies will be shortlisted by the Advisory Board comprising global and Indian CIO’s, product company heads, venture capitalists, and analysts. The selected companies will need to pay a fee of Rs. 25,000 to cover the expenses for two attendees. Only the 50 shortlisted companies will get to attend the event.

So what are you waiting for, go ahead and apply, the last date is 18th Feb 2015.

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WIEF Startup Competition 2015 powered by LetsVenture

LetsVenture partners with Wharton on one of the most prestigious India-focused conferences in the US – the Wharton India Economic Forum (WIEF). WIEF provides a unique platform for thought leaders to discuss the opportunities present to India and the challenges that need to be addressed.

This year, WIEF will be hosting its second India-focused Startup Competition as part of the WIEF conference in Philadelphia on Feb 21st, 2015. 

LetsVenture invites startups to apply for this competition to stand a chance to win up to USD 10,000 in prize money, as well as the unique opportunity to showcase your product / service in front of a global audience comprising of angel investors, VCs, corporate leaders and serial entrepreneurs at Wharton. Apply Now

Who can apply?

The Startup Competition is open to any individual(s) (subject to the eligibility requirements) with a business idea or model incorporating products or services targeting the Indian market OR Indian products or services targeting the US market.

What is the selection process like?

Competition entries will be pre-screened by a panel of experts from the Venture Capital industry. This panel will select semi-finalists (post review of 1st round applications). Shortlisted semi-finalists will be provided with 20-minute time slots to present their ideas to the judges (via teleconference) Finalists will present their business plans to renowned Indian entrepreneurs and Venture Capital investors at the Startup Competition to be held on the day of the WIEF conference. The presentation format will consist of a 5-minute presentation and a 3-minute Q&A session.

What prizes are on offer?

Cash prizes worth up to US$10,000. One member from each team of finalists will receive a subsidized return ticket to attend the WIEF conference (where the Finals of the Startup Competition will be held) in Philadelphia, USA. Apply Now

Guest Blogpost by Kasturi Shrivastava, Let’sVenture.

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UxNow ~ Nickel o Wonder : The Design Conference

 “It was a rainy day. Everyone in the family was relaxing and I, in my cuddling days, was sketching scenery with mountains, birds and rivers. I filled my clipart with all the colors I wished for and stroked in every direction with the freedom unrestricted.  Upon finishing my drawing, I jumped and jacked straight to my granny and she, with all the worldly affection, patted my shoulder and gifted me a cent as a token of appreciation. Back then, the twinkle in my eyes was shining bright and it was just the onset of the creativity in me.”

~Anonymous

Is that a walk past the memory lane?  Off course! The semblance of this sweet memory is locked safe in everyone’s account.  Isn’t it? So, what if we invite you to unlock and unhide the very childlike streak in you?  Are the twinkles in the eyes coming back with a smile?

And now that we know you are smiling, here we go!

mailchimpMark your calendar for 28th November 2014 as MakeMyTrip, celebrating the sprit of World Usability Day, brings you UxNow, a conference focused on this year theme of “User Engagement”. World Usability Day is conducted each year in November with an aim to bring professionals, researchers and academicians to work towards simplifying products and services

UxNow aims to provide a multidisciplinary platform for designers, academicians, entrepreneurs & developers to discuss the challenges and potential solutions for effective interaction with and through web and mobile devices, applications, and services.

A one-day conference with exciting talks, chatter, networking lunch and a roundtable panel discussion provides participants plenty of real-world examples along with actionable takeaways.

Checkout the event site & agenda at: http://uxnow.org

To set the ball rolling, we have also started a design challenge where both students and professionals are invited to create products and services that can revolutionize the travel industry. To know more about the challenge please visit the website

UXNOWAs it was once said, “A creative adult is a child who has survived”. So what are you waiting for? See you on 28th Nov ’14 under the umbrella of UXnow. Let us together revisit the creative child in us in our very own NCR and we promise that you would ‘Rediscover’ the shining Nickel for the wonder inside.

Come ready, devices charged. We’ve got a packed day!

Yes!! Your very, Nickel o Wonder!

Guest Post by Dushyant Arora, Head – User Experience & Design at MakeMytrip

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Get to Learn from @Zoho – Zoholics: India, Nov 20-21, Bengaluru

We have been around for the last 18 years, making software for businesses around the world. At Zoho, software is our craft and our passion. Our people spend years mastering the craft, and their handiwork are the 30+ products that we now offer. With more than 10 million users across the world, we are one of the largest IT product companies based out of India. This journey has taught us many things, and we are ready to share our experience with you.

We are holding our first-ever event in India on Nov 20 and 21 at The Ritz Carlton in Bengaluru. At Zoholics: India, we will share our story and talk about creating world-class products, and selling them to a global audience, from India.

Other sessions include, product vs services mindset, engineering products, running a business on a budget, whether to take VC money or not, and much more. To view the full agenda, click here.

zoholicsJoin us at Zoholics:India, to learn, share and explore the Indian innovation in IT, through the lens of Zoho.

Who should attend and why

Entrepreneurs and Startups: It does not matter what business you do. Business apps can greatly increase your productivity and help you streamline various processes. This will leave you free to do what you love. At Zoholics:India, you can learn about which tech-tools are best suited for your business, how to position your product in the international market, and whether taking venture capital is good for your business or not.

Aspiring Entrepreneurs: Learn about various opportunities in the local market and how to create world-class products and sell them to a global audience, from India. Also find out how to capture the attention of an increasingly mobile-centric world.

CXOs and Managers: Discover some of the best practices in online marketing for selling to a global audience out of India. Know about the market trends and opportunities.

Technology Geeks: Learn about cloud-based technology and how it is affecting the local market. Find out more about business apps and latest trends.

Business and Technology Analysts: At Zoholics, we will discuss product vs services mindset, how college credentials are of little value as the real learning happens at the workplace, market trends and much more. Also, use this opportunity to learn more about the cloud market in India.

To register, log on to ZOHOICS India website. Use the discount code: ISP to avail a 15% discount.

Guest post by Raju Vegesna, ZOHO