Showing posts with label Awesomeness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Awesomeness. Show all posts
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Giving back to alma mater makes you Awesome

26 May 2012 View Comments »


Lessons Learned
My Learnings
Last one year has been the most exciting phase of my life (or a quarter life. It's only 25 years since I am born). I did many things and got some very good recognition. I met few awesome people and made some good friends. My personal clout increased and I learnt some important lessons in life and career during this period. There were some nice opportunities that came along. And, before you ask, yes all these happened in the last one year or so.
The central point of this phase lies around my role as VP at BITS Spark Mentors. For the uninitiated, BITS Spark is an initiative by BITSian alumni that is setup with a very ambitious vision of making my alma mater BITS Pilani a top 3 Institute for entrepreneurship in Asia. Shivaraaj and I serve as VPs to one of the three pillars of the program - BITS Spark Mentors. More about BITS Spark in an another post.
When I came on board, BITS Spark was in a very nascent stage. Abhinav Khushraj and Vijay Sharma (The God Fathers behind the initiative) gave me a brief about the program and trusted me for Spark Mentors. This was the first time I had taken up a leadership role (if you exclude the entrepreneurial experience). I had no expectations on the role. I just love BITS Pilani and Startups :D When I get such an awesome opportunity to work for something that is a great mix of both, I just couldn't resist. I thought I am going to help a few awesome BITSian startups during their growth phases. But moving forward, I could see that not only that I was able to involve in the growth of young BITSian startups, but I was also able to benefit myself in the process.
During this short period, I was able to meet and work with amazing people like Raju Reddy, Chandra Bhople, Satish Gupta etc. My network has grown to a great level. One of the most important lessons I learned was that everyone wants to help. We only need to ask for it. We hear the maxim "Ask and it will be given to you;" very often. I thought that is just a cliche until I experienced it first hand at BITS Spark. When we were looking for building the initial pool of mentors for the Spark Mentors, all we needed to do was ask. We got hold of email Ids of few of the vast BITSian alumni base and sent them a mail asking for help. Most of them immediately came forward for help. Few even helped us in connecting to few more alumni.
I was able to connect with many BITSians through my position. Surprisingly, I observed that senior BITSians are much more easily approachable than young guns. I never expected them to be such a sport. My communication skills were/are very bad. This was a perfect platform for me to hone my skills.
The most important benefit I got out of working with my alumni was my selection into the prestigious IIM (Indian Institute of Management), Calcutta. I used the experience I gained at my leadership position at BITSAA to get through the GD&PI process. More than half of my interview process involved me speaking and relating my experience at BITSAA. I am sure that I wouldn't have got through the process if not for my position at BITSAA and previous entrepreneurial experience.
Why Volunteer
What you Get :)
Since everyone loves lists, here is a list of 10 reasons to contribute to your alma mater :
  • Lots of fun
  • Meet awesome people
  • Make some very good friends
  • Grow your network
  • Enhance your CV
  • Work on stuff that you love. Do things that you love to do but not allowed at work
  • Give back to your alma mater
  • Learn some great lessons in life and career
  • Hone your leadership qualities
  • Be involved
Note to BITSians:
BITSAA is recruiting new batch of BITSAA Leaders.
Apply to be a BITSAA Leader over here – BITSAA Leadership Program 2012
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An analysis of Facebook Instagram Acquisition

10 April 2012 View Comments »


The news that is buzzing all around now is of Facebook's $1Bn acquisition of Instagram. While few are terming it as a bold strategic move by Facebook, many are talking of the bubble. Inspired by Dan Frommer's numerous posts at SplatF, I decided to my own version of what I think of this move by Facebook.

First things first - as Zuckerberg of Facebook and Kevin of Instagram already said, Instagram will be remain an independent entity and hence it is more of like Google's acquisition of Youtube than Google's acquisition of Doubleclick.

Should Facebook buy Instagram ?  

I would say downright that Facebook should have bought Instagram. Reasons are here:
  • Instagram has 30Million+ users . Not to forget that that number is only on iOS platform. The number is only going to explode after its recent launch on Android platform.  ( Android holds >50% of Smartphone market share and Instagram's Android app was downloaded more than a million times in 24 hours of launch  ). It is the fastest growing Mobile social network.
  • Facebook gained its popularity on web due to Photos. Though it is both photos and apps that draw more crowds to Facebook these days, the start is through photos. Instagram is a photo based mobile social network and could become a potential competitor to Facebook on mobile.
  • Every smart phone has a camera and hence photos play a much bigger role than they played on web during Facebook's initial days. You can't just ignore the most popular mobile photo social network.
  • While instagram's growth rates are astonishing, they are a super lean organization with just 13 employees. It will be super easy for Facebook to integrate Instagram's small team into Facebook.
  • Facebook is one of the most popular mobile apps but its app really is shitty. Attempts to bring out a better Facebook mobile app did not work till now. They could probably use someone from Mike and Kevin's team in planning  a better mobile app in future. ( I know it is not a talent acquisition but I think the effect of having a great mobile developer team around can always teach a lesson or two for others )
  • Mobile is going to be the future of social networking. Mobiles are more intuitive, well-equipped and accessible for social networking and hence they are going to rule the future of social networking space. Apps like Instagram and Path are going to play a major role in this change and Facebook cannot deny the reality.

Was 1Bn$ justifiable?  

While almost everyone agrees that there are all reasons why Facebook could buy Instagram, many people can't understand why Facebook paid such a huge amount of money for a startup that is earning zero revenues. Like every time, people started talking about bubble. But, there are sufficient reasons as to why Facebook, rightly, decided to pay so much of money on Instagram.

When Yahoo previously had a chance to buy Facebook for the same 1Bn$, they backed off thinking that it was too pricey. It surely was pricey at that moment, but Facebook has soon outgrown Yahoo and there was an opportunity missed for them. Now, Facebook is in a similar position now. Infact, it is even more forced to buy Instagram because it has potential to become a competitor to Facebook. Though Instagram may or may not worth a billion, they are going to lose much more if they are going to ignore it.

Secondly, Instagram has shown the ability to maintain stickiness. One of the factors that helped Facebook was the stickiness and they know the importance. In addition, Instagram is a content generator. It has 5 Million photos uploaded everyday and hence will surely be worth a lot for Facebook.

The Instagram team can help Facebook in future, in its mobile strategy and help them grow there. Mobile is the place where Facebook can gain a lot in future.

Finally, my conclusion is that the 1Bn$ might be high on the scale of valuation but Facebook is playing a safe game here and doesn't want to take risk of ignoring competition. Taking that into consideration, the valuation is justifiable.  
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65 Lessons I learned about Entrepreneurship

02 August 2011 View Comments »


For starters, I started a personalized merchandise company with couple of my friends while in my final year of graduation. When we jumped into this business , we knew nothing about Entrepreneurship. Not just that, we even did not know anything about merchandising, the core of our business. All we had was the zeal for making money and the knowledge that the top market players in this business are not yet indomitable. We thought that is all that is needed, as we had high esteem about our skills. But as every first time entrepreneur experiences, the ground realities are different. Once you are into it, you will learn a lot of lessons.

Though I parted with my first company within an year and a half, my interest in entrepreneurship has never left me. During the course of the year that followed, I learnt many more lessons. Here goes the compilation of lessons I learnt and probably you are not told when jumping into Entrepreneurship.

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In Pursuit of Awesomeness - Things I did

14 June 2011 View Comments »


Yesterday, I wrote my 30 Under 30 which is a list of the 30 things I plan to do before I am 30. The list was a collection of things which I haven't yet done. But there are already a lot of things I have done in the pursuit of Awesomeness. Here are some of them jotted down. I hope some of you will get inspiration for their 30 Under 30 from this list.

Initially, I am only putting 30 things in things I did. But, I will be adding more to this list as and when I do something worth mentioning.

In pursuit of Awesomeness by Lucky

1)  Steal Something
2)  Start a Web venture ( BITSexam )
3)  Start a Company ( Colon K )
4)  Do rafting ( At Rishikesh )
5)  Go on a Roadtrip to an unknown destination ( on 26th Jan 2011 )
6)  Travel around the country on a train ( TATA Jagriti Yatra )
7)  Write to a Magazine ( wrote to Bhelpuri magazine )
8)  Work as a freelancer, social media guy, programmer and a writer
9)  Write Poems in two languages (Telugu and English)
10) Cry out loud ( Most difficult phase of my life till now )
11) Jump from 2nd floor of a building ( in 7th or 8th class )
12) Pay a bribe and Refuse to bribe ( Traffic Constable and LLR )
13) Eat in more than 10 Star Hotels ( Thanks to Startup conferences :P )
14) Help organize a national level event (Event Management)
15) Watch movies continuously for 20+ hours
16) Hack a website ( Secret shhhhh! )
17) Make a software Crack ( Desktop Icon Toy )
18) Quadboot from a single Hard Disk ( Ubuntu, Suse, OSx86 and Windows Vista )
19) Earn 1 Lakh+ in a month ( via Eureka Tips )
20) Take bath on the railway tracks ( During TATA Jagriti Yatra )
21) Study in a premier institute ( BITS Pilani )
22) Deeply Hated, Loved and Respected by at least one person each
23) Travel more than 50,000 Kms on Trains ( cumulative - during my different trips )
24) Stay awake for 48+ hours ( OASIS rocks! )
25) Lie under water for more than 2 minutes.
26) Donate Blood ( 5 times till now )
27) Watch a match (actually a live telecast) in stadium ( World Cup 2011 Finals at Gachibowli Stadium, Hyd )
28) Sleep on a highway ( Also on stairs,grass, portico etc)
29) Travel 200+Kms on top of a bus with a girl ( From Pilani to Delhi )
30) Receive award/prize infront of an audience of more than 1000full post 
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