Gyan Panda, an ed-tech startup from Assam earns ₹2 Lakhs in 3 months since launch

23JulJuly 23, 2020 By startupassam

Call it a fluke or a meticulous plan, the ed-tech startup, Gyan Panda, has launched the online learning app at a time when the world has realized the need for remote learning platforms more than ever.

In 2019, founders Manash Boruah, Dibakar Dutta, Bhaskar Jyoti Dutta, and Pravakar Dutta explored the need for a bi-lingual digital learning platform that would help students from Assamese medium schools to undergo a smooth transition to the predominantly English mode of learning at the higher secondary and degree levels. The high-priced packages at coaching centres and uneven availability of these centres in the remote districts of Assam were the other problems that they wished to address.

Manash, an engineering student in Jorhat, chanced upon a conversation on social media with Dibakar Dutta, an engineer by profession. While they discussed the idea, Dibakar got Bhaskar and Pravakar on board as well. Together they brainstormed for months to design high school and higher secondary level tutorials for SEBA courses that would help the students clear their concepts.

Gyan Panda was incorporated in October 2019 and sooner works got kick-started to develop the online tutorial app. Gyan Panda started offering online video tutorials for Mathematics Advanced Mathematics, Science, English, and Physics for students from ninth, tenth, and twelfth standards. While the mode of instructions remained predominantly Assamese, they soon launched Mathematics classes in English while obliging to the user demands. Works are underway to introduce Assamese and Social Science as well, which, the founders intend to offer for free.

Apart from these regular subjects, Gyan Panda has a special section catering to the basic concepts of Mathematics for those who need special care to grasp the basic concepts. Besides, there’s a Basic English Grammar course and an Extra Curriculum section focussed on career guidance, etc. Interestingly, these sections are offered for free. The Live Test section enables students to write class tests for gauging their performance.

Currently, there are 8 faculty members on board, giving out meticulously designed video tutorials. The number is expected to go up to 10 with the introduction of the two new subjects – Assamese and Social Science.

Gyan Panda is offering the school level courses for an annual subscription fee of Rs. 600 per subject, while the higher secondary level classes are on offer for Rs. 1200 per subject. A quarterly instalment option is also available, especially to make it more affordable for the people from the lower economic strata.

Acknowledging the inadequate knowledge of online payment among many, Gyan Panda has introduced a Help section especially to guide users on the process of making online payments. Furthermore, they have reserved the bank deposit option for those who aren’t comfortable with the digital payment method.

The startup has smartly leveraged the current demand for remote learning to rev up the revenue right after the start. Since its launch in April 2020, the Gyan Panda app has witnessed over 37, 000 downloads, with the daily active users tallying to around 2200. As Manash informs, the users are increasing by 500 every day. Till last month, the startup had made a total revenue of Rs. 2 lakhs, recording a phenomenal revenue growth of 117% in June.

While the founders are ideating new features almost every day, they are undertaking research and analysis of the existing digital learning platforms in the market to identify loopholes and cull out key learnings that could be applied to Gyan Panda to make it more effective and user-friendly. For instance, Manash points out about the relative ineffectiveness of animated educational videos for slow learners, who need special handholding by the teachers. “We feel that we cannot completely do away with a classroom environment, especially for students who need more time to absorb learnings. We are planning to introduce live classes in the future while making a conscious effort to create a classroom environment,” Manash informs.

As big names in the startup investment world are quietly keeping an eye on promising ed-tech startups in the wake of the pandemic, the one like Gyan Panda is expected to hold a strong ground in the race for impact-driven innovations in the education sector.

By: Satarupa Mishra

Is your marketing plan ready for the “new normal”?

21Jul By startupassam

While COVID-19 was crashing down the traditional ways of marketing one by one, Digital Marketing said “Checkmate.”

COVID-19 has brought about drastic transformations not only in one’s personal life but also on the professional front. From scurrying out of bed in the morning to reach office on time after duping the traffic to taking a few paces to the work desk at home; from highly expensive events to low-cost webinars; from warm hugs to simple oral gestures; from handshakes to Namaste; the new normal is all about getting your work done while keeping distance.

It’s a difficult time for businesses as the traditional ways of working are kept on hold for uncertain periods. Many business houses have resorted to lay-offs and pay cuts to stay afloat in the sail for survival. As a more drastic measure, many organizations have been shut down, either temporarily or permanently.

While the traditional ways of working are doomed, the world of digital marketing has seen an unprecedented boom. Most business houses have already flung their wings to the digital world because the need for an online marketing strategy is now a necessity for survival.

The new normal has compelled marketing gurus to strategize new tactics to adapt to the changes ahead. We list down a few of those tactics to cope with this new normal.

Social media as a marketing tool

Social media platforms and apps have seen a tremendous spur in usage during the lockdown. People are turning to these apps to combat the isolation and keep them entertained, connected, and informed while they’re spending more time at home. It’s high time for businesses to make the best of this opportunity and turn it to their advantage. Provide engaging photo/video/text content and engage audiences across all the social networks. Conduct polls, chats, and live updates to engage the followers. Gone are the days when social media was just for fun. Socializing is a skill now and you need people for it. Take social media as seriously as you would take any other marketing channel.

Amp up the digital presence

Have you ever wondered about the chronology of weblink appearances whenever you type some keyword? Why a particular web link appears at the top and why another appear at the bottom? Naturally, people end up clicking on the top two or three links, and hence, it is important to have a website with good search engine optimization (SEO) principles so that your online presence is not lost among the competition. Remember, more than ever, this is the time when people would visit your organization virtually than physically. Make the best use of this opportunity and build an outstanding SEO that can help you stand out in the crowd.

Pay per click advertising (PPC)

As the name indicates, PPC is an online advertising model in which advertisers pay each time a user clicks on one of their online advertisements. The phenomenal increase in internet usage during this period of social isolation has opened wider possibilities for online ad conversions. This is the perfect time to launch online ads and grab mass attention at a minimum cost.

Conduct virtual events

In the past few months, events and field marketing have faced severe lashings. Issues of and safety have forced physical events and field marketing to take a backseat. But as they say, “where there is a will, there is a way”. It’s a smart move to shift the in-person events to digital platforms in the form of webinars and virtual events.

Add website chatbots

Give your customers a conversational experience by adding chatbots to the website. Adding a chatbot will help connect with the visitors instantly, create a pipeline, retain customers, and ensure an improved customer experience. Instead of asking your customers to send a mail and doing manual follow-ups, a chatbot can help deliver an in-person experience digitally. Chatbots can be used to give information about the products/services, answer queries from the visitors, and subsequently connect with the sales executives. The feature further accelerates the digital transformation by providing a 24*7 customer experience.

Customer survey and behavior analysis

Customer behavior has turned more unpredictable and experimental in the current situation. It’s time to adapt to the changes and tailor the marketing strategies accordingly. Marketing’s new normal has brought one more addition to the B2B, B2G, and B2C scene – B2Me. The B2Me concept aspires for mass customization towards delivering Living Services that adjust, modify, and revolve around the individual consumers. This is the right time to target customers as individuals and focus on delivering personalized experiences to help build valuable relationships with the consumers for securing customer loyalty. One of the best ways to achieve the B2Me target is customization. Customers are ready to share personal data in exchange for customized attention. Create a profile of your customer’s unique choices, interests, and needs based on an analysis of past interactions and product genes. This will allow you to penetrate beyond just knowing what customers purchase and understand why they made those choices.

Video marketing

Visual contents are always attractive and can convey the message effortlessly. Engage your customers/potential customers through video marketing. A video is engaging and easy to understand. It can also be shared across multiple platforms. Also, you can record your webinars and use that content, later on, to grow your audience and build the brand.

Content marketing and customer stories

With the marketing game going virtual now, there will be more people looking for online content. Share positive stories of your customers and innovations around the globe. Use case studies and customer reviews. Analyze which of your webinars, resources need more social proof and give a shout out. Also, you can conduct content analysis and use this period to improve the overall content performance.

Compile different segment of employees

Your organization must compile different segments of employees to meet customer expectations and achieve business goals. This will include an assemblage of your marketing/sales team with other key partners like the IT department and third-party agencies towards ensuring smooth sales and marketing and seamless customer experience. Thanks to the new normal, your best marketing personnel must now get upskilled to balance both human proficiency and AI knowledge for delivering smooth customer experience.

Guwahati baker rustles up innovative ways of serving Black Rice

09Jul By startupassam

Innovation can take place anywhere – in a lab, a hostel room, or even in the kitchen. While the popular buzz for innovation revolves around technological breakthroughs, one cannot dismiss its existence even in things as basic as food. If the general definition of innovation includes a new product or a new method of utilizing an existing product towards serving the market needs better, a home baker’s craft to rustle up innovative ways of serving black rice can, arguably, fit in the definition as well.

Keyaa Das Choudhury’s experiment with black rice makes an inspirational pocketbook for those who remain smitten with a thing of wonder, but could not think of creative ways to put it to the right use.

When Keyaa Das Choudhury, a homemaker based in Guwahati, came across black rice at a fair in Guwahati, she was bowled over by its tremendous health benefits. After asking around for a recipe, she finally prepared a regular black rice pudding. Although happy with the outcome, she couldn’t contend herself with making just a single recipe of this wonderful ingredient.

“My husband didn’t like the pudding much. Or let’s just say that it was more of a regular item tried and tested down the generations. It was disappointing to see such a wholesome ingredient getting wasted in a single recipe. There had to be other ways to cook it. There must be more people like my husband who look for better serving variations to it,” Keyaa says.

Two years later, someone from her family had gifted her another packet of black rice bought from Manipur. This time, she decided to try and spin her wand (a spatula in this case) to try out something new with this Midas ingredient. She pulled out her grandmother’s recipe of a regular cake baked in an ethnic coal stove. But instead of the regular flour, she experimented with black rice. To her surprise and relief, the black rice cake came out better than she had expected. Her next experiment was to make the cake more palatable for her kids and tried baking layered cakes with delectable icing. Her experiment worked this time as well.

Ecstatic and encouraged by the success, she baked a cake for her two acquaintances from the Assamese film fraternity, Surjya Hazarika and Malaya Goswami. She disclosed to them, for the first time, her clandestine urge to start her own venture – an all-black rice bakery. The movie stalwarts enthusiastically validated her idea. In fact, Malaya Goswami was the first customer of Keyaa’s Black Rice Creative Baker’s Industry launched in 2019, ordering for an eggless black rice cake.

From that day to date, Keyaa’s focus has relentlessly been on innovating wide varieties of black rice desserts and savories. Though designer cakes and cupcakes are her specialties, she makes equally scrumptious chocolates, biscuits, dosas, idlis, cutlets, and laddus – all made from black rice. Her special salted black rice tekeli pitha (an Assamese recipe traditionally made with sticky rice, jaggery, and grated coconut) and savory black rice cakes with chicken and cottage cheese are must-tries for those who love experimental cuisines. Perhaps, it won’t be entirely wrong to call her culinary twists with black rice as a remote form of incremental innovation that increases the value of an existing product for consumers.

Of course, Keyaa’s quirky black rice fares weren’t perfected overnight. It required time, effort, and perseverance to get the proportions, temperature, and the ingredient combinations right. The appetizing outcome is all set to make the difference for people who swear by the nutritious benefits of black rice.

Keyaa’s out-of-the-box black rice dishes have rewarded her with around 50 regular customers from Guwahati and Kokrajhar, receiving 4-5 orders for designer cakes each day, on an average. As a baker, Keyaa dreams of the day when she could represent India in the global market for the indigenous confectionery and chocolate items.

A self-taught chef and a mother of two sons, Keyaa is taking baby steps every day to hone her entrepreneurial acumen. Keyaa’s creative mind conceived the idea of popularizing black rice through a variety of scrumptious delicacies. Next, through her trial and error experiments, she has succeeded in innovatively dishing out enjoyable black rice eatables. Perhaps, with a bit more focus on strategic business practices, a new chapter awaits to unleash and reward her efforts with a profitable enterprise. Especially given the current tide skewing towards indigenous products and local innovations, the right kind of branding and promotion can give Keyaa’s Black Rice Creative Baker’s Industry deserving access to the global market.

By: Satarupa Mishra

5 take-home notes from stories of startup failure

07JulJuly 7, 2020 By startupassam

Swearing by the stories of successful entrepreneurs is a good practice. But digging into the cases of startup failure is equally smart. If a success story tells what to do, a startup failure teaches what not to do. Here are 5 such stories of startup failure to learn from in order to unlearn the bloopers.

Shyp
Shyp stormed into the scene with a promise to make cargo shipping as easy as the “two taps on a smartphone.” The company founded in 2013 in San Francisco by Kevin Gibbon, Joshua Scott, and Jack Smith, grew at a rapid pace and managed to raise $62.1 million in quick time. The startup was under the media spotlight and comparisons began to be drawn with Uber, so much so that the stories got into the founders’ head. While Shyp focused excessively on the vanity metrics, the founders were caught offhand when the need arose for re-strategizing and reorienting the company in the wake of decelerating consumer growth.

Note in a Nutshell

A Startup that witnessed a sprawling growth in the initial days, eventually had to die a slow death in 2018 due to a fixation with growth and the inability to flex a strategy to keep up with that growth.

Jawbone
The consumer electronics company was launched in 1999, offering wearable technology, like portable audio devices, Bluetooth speakers, and fitness trackers, etc. The company attracted the interest of big VC companies like Sequoia, Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and Andreessen Horowitz and had raised over $930 million in due course. Overfeeding with VC funding had artificially shot up the valuation of the company.
Meanwhile, however, news of product failures began to grow more prominent and the company’s wearable technology struggled to stay up in the race against the industry giants like Apple, Samsung, and Fitbit. It had also got into a legal spat with Fitbit on claims of patent infringement and trade secret misappropriation. Finally, weighing under an insurmountable financial pressure, Jawbone announced the liquidation of its assets in July 2017.

Note in a Nutshell

The Company messed up due to overfunding, especially with the failure of an ambitious product in the face of stiff competition, affording too little margin for mistakes.

Juicero
Juicero shot to limelight with its $699 Wi-Fi connected premium juicer that came with proprietary cold-pressed juice packs. Company founder, Doug Evans even compared his pursuit of juicing perfection to another perfectionist, Steve Jobs. He claimed that his juicer had the power to lift two Teslas. Having succeeded in creating a sensation around the product, the company raised $118.5 million right in the initial days. However, once the product had hit the market, a few of the investors expressed dissatisfaction over the bulkier size of the juicer than what was originally pitched. The biggest blow came when Bloomberg released a video that showed how their juicer packs could be squeezed with hands to yield almost the same amount of juice and just as fast as by using the juicer. This largely dissuaded consumers from buying a luxury juicer. Subsequently, they reduced the product price to $399 but decided to shut down just 16 months after the initial launch.

Note in a Nutshell

The Company that had everyone in confidence about their claims to take juicing to the next level, had to draw curtains because they did not care to test the product and pricing with the users before launching.

Beepi
Beepi introduced an online peer-to-peer marketplace for buying and selling used cars in 2014. The startup venture came at a time when demand for such a marketplace was rather high. Being able to address the pain point, Beepi soon managed to raise $60 million Series B funding round. Unfortunately, the startup could not take care of the money. It went through a high burn rate that reached $7 million monthly at one point while paying exorbitant salaries and furnishing the office space with extravagant items. Further, if reports are to be believed, the leadership failed to get rid of micromanaging decisions that restricted the employees from learning fast and acting on it.

Note in a Nutshell

The Company that speedily rose to prominence and managed to bag funds even faster fell prey to reckless spending.

Yik Yak
Back in 2013, when Yik Yak, an anonymous chatting app, was launched, it attracted a large number of young takers, mostly the college-goers. For a time when smartphones had started witnessing a boom, many innovative apps were launched, much to the users’ delight. Yik Yak smartly tapped on the opportunity but failed to capitalize on it further. The app was plagued with cyberbullies and crass content that led to some colleges and universities even banning it. Entries of more popular chat apps like Snapchat and Tinder proved to be the final nail in the coffin for Yik Yak. It had decided to call it a quit in 2017 without anyone remembering or missing it anymore.

Note in a Nutshell

A Company that rose in popularity by tapping on the current trends failed to create a roadmap to stay afloat against competitors and beyond the current trends.

By: Satarupa Mishra

Naga woman, Akitoli Suu, creates buzzword for sustainable living with her organic toiletries

02JulJuly 2, 2020 By startupassam

Women in North East India have been known for their courage and industriousness. It is their impeccable grit and knack for business that has pushed Ima Keithal in Manipur as the largest all women’s market in the map of Asia. So, when we chanced upon the story of Akitoli Suu coming back home in Dimapur, Nagaland to start her business venture, it didn’t surprise us.

Following her 8-year stint in the US and the UK as an expert nutritionist, Akitoli decided to make a homecoming in 2012 and engage in her father’s rubber plantation. It was during this time that she developed an attachment with Nature and began unearthing its blessings. The 38-year old also started maintaining a vegetable garden towards pursuing an organic and sustainable lifestyle.

Akitoli’s choice of adopting a natural way of life also drove her to explore natural alternatives to the chemical-laden toiletries and healing ointments. She did thorough research on the harmful effects of chemicals on skin and decided to experiment with making soaps at home using natural ingredients.

The first time she made soaps, Akitoli Suu decided to get the quality validated by her friends and family. The positive feedbacks from them encouraged her to carry on with her experiments to create her line of organic soaps. The trial and feedback cycle continued for another 6 months.

Learning and unlearning through her experiments in the kitchen, Akitoli Suu finally founded Angry Mother Soap Co. in 2014. Her soaps are abundantly infused with the natural goodness of coconut oil, olive oil, lemongrass, almond, garden fresh tomatoes, papayas, oats, French red clay, calendula, Shea butter, fresh cow milk, hemp, flowers, and aromatic essential oils.

Having carved a niche for herself in organic soap making, Akitoli slowly expanded her range to other toiletries like shampoo bars, perfume sticks, lip balms, body butter, foot creams, elbow grease, pain relief balms, massage oils, and pet soaps, among others.

Akitoli makes sure to add the wow element in her soap designs. From cupcake shaped soaps to the neon-colored varieties that glow in the dark – she incorporates flabbergasting designs to masterful outcomes.

All her products are organic certified by USDA and India Organic.

With over 35,000 units of soaps being sold so far that includes serving orders from the local hotels in the state, Angry Mother Soap Co. churns out an annual turnover of around Rs. 6 lakhs.

They say that what looks good also sells well. Akitoli’s product packaging is as interesting as the name of her company. The recycled paper packs are handcrafted and come with cool labels, depicting the 16 official tribes of Nagaland in their traditional attires.

She has a store at Thilixu in Dimapur that has been wonderfully done to create a natural ambience for customers to get sold on to her product offerings. Though she doesn’t have a website yet, Akitoli’s brand has been able to garner decent exposure through Facebook and Instagram accounts. The buzz created around the products has also helped her bag B2B collaborations with establishments such as The Farm Chennai.

We can’t wait to see her company website, which, she says, will be launched in the coming days. Akitoli is about to make her way onto the online retail platforms that are expected to push the sales further.

Her mother being a businesswoman working on traditional handlooms, one might say that entrepreneurship runs in Akitoli’s blood. Yet, to manage two full-time employees and ransack her brains to come up with standalone branding and sales strategies demand a world of determination, persistence, homework, and knowledge. As much as innovation, entrepreneurship is the cumulative result of innate acumen, core intent, and acquired skills. And Akitoli Suu is surely shifting gears meticulously to achieve her entrepreneurial goals.

By: Satarupa Mishra

Health-tech startup in Assam is making healthcare facilities accessible to all

25Jun By startupassam

If COVID-19 has severely disrupted businesses, it has also accelerated technological innovations to cope with the lockdown norms. Health-tech startup from the Silchar town in Assam, QWKPRO Consultancy has leveraged the opportunity to up the game on digitising healthcare services, integrated on a single platform.

Biswajit Paul gave up a lucrative job to design a healthcare platform in 2016 – QuickOBook – in order to steamroll the hassles faced by patients in getting doctor’s appointments and waiting in long queues at the clinic. The platform enables patients to not just book an appointment, but also live-track it to be able to cut down on the waiting time at the clinic.

While its patient management software connects hospitals, laboratories, doctors, and clinics with patients, the startup’s cloud server, called QOB Connect, stores the medical history, prescription, and test results of the patients for future reference. The startup is also integrating data analytics into the software to offer possible diagnostic indications to the doctors based on the accumulated data about the patients.

Biswajit’s drive to create QuickOBook stemmed from his personal experience of having to trek over two hours to reach the government hospital in Silchar. There was no respite even after reaching the hospital as he had to wait throughout the night to get the appointment tokens to see a doctor. While this struggle for accessing medical facilities might seem alien to the urban dwellers, it is a hard reality for people residing in the far-flung rural areas of the North-Eastern region. That’s when Biswajit realized the need for a solution to ensure timely medical intervention in rural areas in the Barak Valley of Assam.

Interestingly, QWKPRO is outsourcing the QOB Connect software to hospitals, labs, clinics, and doctors for free. Revenue is sourced from the patients, charging them an amount for every doctor’s appointment. They also charge from the doctors for website listing. Besides, the startup earns a commission for lab appointments and medicine orders.

What sets QWKPRO apart from the big players like Practo, DocsApp, and Lybrate is its focus on rural patients. As Biswajit says, the medical sector in the North-Eastern region is largely fragmented and most inaccessible to the rural population. The startup’s objective isn’t just to organise the healthcare sector, but also to facilitate even access to the healthcare facilities, including for those residing in the remotest villages of the region. Acknowledging issues of poor internet connectivity and digital illiteracy in the rural areas, QWKPRO has also designed an offline version that allows patients to schedule appointments through SMS.

Today, the startup has over 1000 doctors enlisted on their website and over 12 hospitals and diagnostic laboratories onboard across the Barak Valley in Assam. They have also penetrated into Tripura and Mizoram, making an annual revenue of Rs. 38 lakhs in 2019-20. The health-tech startup has already connected 2.5 lakh patients in Assam’s Barak Valley and Tripura with medical practitioners.

As it happens with most startup entrepreneurs, Biswajit’s journey has been dotted with challenges. He was wanting in support from his family who aspired to see him chair a coveted position in a government department. Yet, going against the tide, he quit his job at Tata and started working on developing the website in 2016.

“It was difficult convincing the medical practitioners about the QuickOBook. They found no viability in the idea especially given the digital illiteracy among a lion’s share of the population in the region,” Biswajit says.

For a year, the startup went without getting a single appointment request. Subsequently came a phase when the startup founder was faced with a severe cash crunch, which compelled him to take up the job of a Medical Representative in Silchar. The job turned out to be a blessing in disguise in terms of building a network and generating leads.

Meanwhile, Biswajit met Jewel Sen who readily bought his startup idea and agreed to wear the co-founder’s hat. Together they invested around a lakh to build the infrastructure and hire a team.

Tables began to turn after the first year as revenue started to toddle into their kit. In 2018, the startup managed to raise a seed fund of Rs. 10 lakh from a local distributor in Silchar. Since then there has been no looking back.

Today, QWKPRO has an independent office set up in Silchar with 19 employees working under them. They have also roped in an IT team based out of New Delhi to develop the QuickOBook app as well as revamp the website.

With the incubation and nurturing received under Assam Startup – The Nest, NASSCOM, Bengal Chamber of Commerce, and NIT Silchar, QWKPRO is surely barking up the right tree in scripting red-letter success in the coming days.

By: Satarupa Mishra

7 Life Lessons from the Seven Summiteer

21May By startupassam

Ask about life from a mountaineer and he will give you every reason, with examples, to treasure it and live it to the fullest against every great hurdle. And when the mountaineer is one who has lived through asthmatic history, you know that no weakness can be big enough in front of a passion that reinstates one’s purpose for existence. Meet Satyarup Siddhanta, world’s youngest mountaineer to climb the Seven Summits and the first Indian to climb the Seven Volcanic Summits.

If Satyarup’s story from being an asthmatic child to a fearless mountaineer is inspiring, his journeys to the pinnacles have been replete with life lessons and precious realizations that show what great blessing life is! Here are seven life lessons from the Seven Summiteer that every common man, especially the entrepreneurs, must take a leaf from for scripting stories of victory and leading a life that makes man die without regretting the unfulfilled dreams.

Make a start; do not worry about the obstacles in the journey

“Had I known what it takes to climb the Mount Everest, I might have never gone for it.” – Satyarup Siddhanta

Fretting about the possible hurdles will not let you make a start. Be so much in love with your dream that the thought of the challenges on the way will not matter. Being positive isn’t just a hackneyed quote of motivation. It is a skill for tasting success.

Do not be afraid of Fear

“Take fear as a foe and it will overpower you. Take it as a friend and it will help you.” – Satyarup Siddhanta

Fear isn’t as dreaded a villain as projected. Fear of a fall can help you prepare harder not to fall. It could be a brilliant harness against overconfidence and slackened homework. Use it to your advantage to prepare better for the challenges ahead. The journey graph of an entrepreneur will depend a lot on whether one uses fear as a stumbling block or as fuel.

In every bad phase hides a good reason

“Try to find the good in all the bad happenings.” – Satyarup Siddhanta

To make a lemonade when life throws lemons demands bearing in mind the sweeter possibilities of sourness. If things do not go as per the plan, know that the Universe must have a better plan. When Satyarup practiced crossing the crevasse on a ladder in broad daylight, he didn’t imagine that he would also have to cross a crevasse in the darkness of a night. But when he finally did, he realized that the darkness was a blessing in disguise for it kept him from gauging the depth of the crevasse, the fear on his leader’s face, and the enormous distance from the summit. The darkness helped him focus more on his steps to cross the crevasse than getting distracted by the depth, the distance, or his teammates’ fears.

Failure gives an opportunity to win

“Every time I get knocked down, I take it as an opportunity to come back stronger.” – Satyarup Siddhanta

To err and to fail is human. Entrepreneurs will fail too. But getting bogged down with failure doesn’t make winners. Embrace failure when you meet it on the way, but with a promise that you will come back stronger the next time in order to defeat it. Make your failure the metrics to gauge where you are lacking and start working on filling up the gaps.

As Satyarup says, “The fact that I am still alive even after meeting so many setbacks means I am stronger than earlier.”

Learn to value your resources

“Mountaineering has taught me to lead a minimalistic life.” – Satyarup Siddhanta

While most of us crib and cry about the resource constraint due to the lockdown, imagine the mountaineers going without proper food and shower in adverse weather conditions! Satyarup relates about a situation where he was even ready to fight a wild rodent over a piece of leftover picked up from the trash.

You never know when your life or your business takes a U-turn and you are left with just the bits and pieces of resources. Better value your resources while the sun shines on you and learn to spend meticulously.

Your biggest weakness may become your greatest savior

“My asthmatic trouble that I have cursed all my life had saved me that day.” – Satyarup Siddhanta

Never get disheartened by your weakness. You never know when and how the weakness turns into strength and saves you from a catastrophe. During the final leg of his expedition to the Mount Everest, Satyarup had to trek without his oxygen mask for half an hour due to a blockage in the oxygen pipe. He was surprised at the ease with which he managed the suffocation without growing nervous or anxious about it. While mulling over the episode during a regular day, Satyarup realized that it was his childhood experience of handling breathing troubles due to asthma that had helped him manage with scarce oxygen on the mountain.

Hold your nerves and you will discover beauty in danger

“The near-death experiences that I have encountered were near-life experiences in reality.” Satyarup Siddhanta

Our reaction to a stimulus determines the quality of our experience. Hold your nerves in a situation of danger and you will discover beauty around it. This will create brighter reminiscence of a threatening event and dismiss the piling up of negative memories that can adversely affect one’s mental health.

Satyarup met with a near-death experience when he fell into a deep crevasse, dangling from a rope for not less than half an hour until he was rescued. Although initially taken aback by the fall, he soon regained his composure and looked around. To his joy and surprise, the mountaineer discovered the untrodden beauty of the snaking long stretch of the white crevasse, reflecting the clear blue of the sky. He felt lucky to be the chosen one for experiencing the hidden brilliance of Nature which not many get to experience. That which could have been 30-minutes of dread and exhausting fight for life, turned into moments of overwhelming ecstasy. Satyarup’s preoccupation with the surreal splendor of that crevasse freed him from the fearful thought of falling dead into that seemingly bottomless abyss. Today, when he recounts that experience, there are glitters in his eyes and not trepidation as one might expect.

By: Satarupa Mishra

Young woman from a small town in Assam turns culinary skills into a cloud kitchen venture during lockdown

14MayMay 14, 2020 By startupassam

Many of us have utilized the lockdown to revive lost hobbies and hone skills. But, only a few must have thought of leveraging the situation to turn skills into business ventures.

Tusharika Gogoi, a resident of Demow in the Sivasagar district of Assam, was hit by an idea when her friends complimented the culinary pictures she published on Whatsapp stories.

“Why not commercialize it?”

Especially in the current context, when outside foods are either scarce or looked at with apprehension, the idea of delivering restaurant-style, hygienic homemade food holds a lot of promise. Tusharika obtained the necessary permission and started her cloud kitchen called Home Restaurant on 3 May 2020 with help from her mother and younger sister.

In fact, her sister, Arshi Gogoi, who aspires to study Hotel Management, had been contemplating about starting a similar venture along with their mother, Popy Gogoi for a long time. The lockdown offered the trio with the luxury of time to give shape to the thought and execute it.

It’s been just 10 days since its launch, and her cloud kitchen has already made some good business, serving 15 orders a day on average. From varieties of momos, chowmein, and fried rice to dahi vada and panipuri – the enterprising women are catering to a range of orders and getting them home delivered. They strictly follow the hygiene guidelines and lockdown rules and do not take any order after 5.30 pm.

Tusharika is also adding new twists to these recipes. However, she promptly adds that the Home Restaurant would have failed to see daylight without her mother and sister. While her mother’s magic touch gives her recipes the extra edge, Arshi has largely taken the responsibility of getting the orders home delivered.

A student of Psychology in the Dibrugarh University, Tusharika started discovering her unexplored culinary skills during the lockdown. Her decision to open a home-based restaurant was purely experimental, inspired from her sister’s dream of having a restaurant of their own.

“I have no trained background in either cooking or business. I just thought of giving it a try. But I never expected it to click so well,” she says.

The story of these ladies is an ideal example of how one doesn’t need a specialized degree in business to think of a promising idea and execute it. In fact, their cloud kitchen idea has inspired a few women from her locality to start working in similar lines as well.

Asked if she would like to carry on with the business once she goes back to college after the University reopens, Tusharika says she would make sure that their cloud kitchen doesn’t get stalled at any cost.

By: Satarupa Mishra

Startup Webinar Series conducted by IIMCIP to brainstorm business solutions to the COVID challenges

11May By startupassam

COVID-19 has wreaked a nightmare in the startup world. It has been a one-off situation for startups where supply chain has been disrupted while the demand has remained comparatively unaffected barring a few sectors. While experts have been vouching for business pivoting to sail through the crisis, there are a number of unique challenges that the startups have been looking up for redressal. Towards addressing the challenges and reassuring the startups of every possible support in these unprecedented times, IIM Calcutta Innovation Park organised a 5-episode Webinar series for the incubated startups from IIMCIP, Prime Startup Hub Meghalaya, and Assam Startup.

Each session was dedicated to an exclusive startup sector, viz., Healthcare, Education & Skill Development, Food & Agriculture, Manufacturing & Logistics, and E-Commerce, Livelihood, Tourism.

For every session, a panel of experts were roped in from the respective domains. The esteemed panels included seasoned professionals like Ajay Muttreja (Strategy Advisor & Mentor for MSMEs and Startups), Rohit Chopra (Vice President, Mitsubishi Corp India), Dr. Sachin Gupta (Member, ICMR -Centre for Innovation & Bio Design, PGIMER Chandigarh), Sanjay Prasad ((CEO- IQ City Foundation, Ex CEO-Medica Superspeciality Hospital), Suman Mukhopadhyay (Director, Banglanatak.com), Dr. Satyahari Dey (Professor IIT Kharagpur, MD of STEP IIT Kharagpur), Sumit Dutta (Chief Advisor to Offbeat Ventures & Senior Consultant and Advisor to Kerala Startup Mission), Dr. Sriparna Baruah (Head, Centre for Industrial Extension, Indian Institute of Entrepreneurship), Vinay Sharma (Business Head, Digital, S. Chand & Co), Gowrishankar Chella (Executive Director & Chief Risk Officer of Take Solutions), Kaustav Majumdar (Head – Startups, Incubation, Acceleration, SPJIMR), Subhankar Sarker (Consultant, Strategy and Execution), and Girish Naik (Chief Regional Officer, Kolkata, Mitsubishi Corp India), among others.

The sessions were facilitated by the CEO of IIM Calcutta Innovation Park, Dr. Subhrangshu Sanyal.

The main objective of the webinar series was to navigate the challenges faced by the startups in a spirit of problem-solving. The series intended to create a platform for all the startups to meet, brainstorm, and formulate solutions that wouldn’t just help float through the COVID crisis, but also thrive in the long run. And throughout, IIMCIP has been committed to act as the enabler to help the startups with useful insights to help come up with solutions.

At the outset of every session, the moderator from IIM Calcutta Innovation Park introduced the startups from the respective sectors, who laid before the experts the peculiar challenges that they have been facing due to the Covid-19 crisis. The experts then took it over, breaking down the challenges to find pertinent solutions.

Some crucial points that came out from the discussions were the importance of smart business pivoting, skills repurposing, collaborations, and out-of-the-box partnerships. Startups expecting to work in isolation is an adventurous idea at the present times. Forging collaborations and complementary partnerships would be decisive towards abating the supply chain disruptions and sealing corporate and government deals. Furthermore, in this times when social distancing has become the tested norm to stay alive, the enormous importance of technology has been reinstated. And startups must make the most of this situation to help corporates and government with technological innovations. This is also a perfect time to talk to the customers, understand their needs and what’s crucial to them. The customers will listen and respond only when the startup understands their needs. Brainstorming to devise customer retention strategy is the need of the hour.

The sessions received overwhelming response from the startups with average attendants of 60 for each webinar. The sessions also provided a productive platform for startups to strike discussions for collaboration among each other.

“For all the startups going through tough times, these sessions blow in a fresh leash of life to hold on to our nerves and move on,” said the co-founder of Dream Decals, an incubatee from Assam Startup.

“The Zoom session was quite useful as I got a chance to know and interact with many Startups pivoting to technology-based solutions. It was kind of refreshing to hear from people working towards a common goal. Though our Startup is not fully healthcare and we are more dependent on logistic services, we have to wait for the lockdown to relax,” said the founder of a Guwahati-based fintech startup, HookoluPay.

Based on the challenges and opportunities identified during the webinar, IIMCIP will be coming up with subsequent domain-specific brainstorming series very soon.

By: Satarupa Mishra

COVID-19: Startup from Assam develops an App for smooth execution of Relief Drives

11May By startupassam

While the startup world goes through testing times due to the COVID-19 outbreak, they haven’t compromised on their spirit to innovate solutions and make a difference. One such startup from a remote area of Assam has chosen to detangle a problem that especially makes more sense at this hour of crisis.

Aranyak Valley, a startup based out of Cachar district in Assam, has recently launched an app to organise all the donations and distributions of the COVID-19 relief materials by a number of volunteers & volunteering organisations in the district.

Taratari – Cachar Covid-19 relief resource module app lets the volunteering local teams to generate, crowdfund, source, monitor, and manage thousands of relief packets every day in different parts of the district, while keeping the district administration in loop for the daily passes.

“Typically, the local volunteering groups first have to get the names of the people in need and send the names to their leader. The leader, in turn, goes to the donors for fund. He then buys the relief materials, packages them, applies for passes from district administration, waits for approval, and finally sends his team to deliver. All these he does manually and in an unorganized fashion. With the help of Taratari app, he can easily control, monitor, and record all the activities. Through this app, the volunteers, donors, and administration can efficiently monitor the progress,” explains Gaurav Chakraborty, the founder of Aranyak Valley.

The app helps avoid duplication of delivery, instruments greater reach to the needy and efficient interaction with administration.

What’s remarkable is the fact that the app has been developed by the students and faculty of Aranyak Valley in just 7 days without any physical interaction between the developing members. The COVID-19 situation forced them to interact virtually from their respective villages with unsteady power and no broadband availability, and yet, come out as winners in just a week.

“It was a live validation opportunity for the students and faculty of Aranyak Valley, to test their knowledge and provide instant solution to a regional problem,” the founder adds.

Aranyak Valley was founded in 2017 in Silchar, offering skills training that are quintessentially ‘local’ in nature. The skill-based education model of the startup focuses on developing the local skills and finding them an opportunity to validate their skills.

The startup’s objective is to create self-sustainable “Pride Habitats” in Tier 3 and Tier 4 regions of Assam that would offer classes on skilling (IT & Non-IT) and farm appreciation and drive cultural agro-tourism in those regions. The model lets such regional ecosystem sustain on its own while maintaining the rich local cultural life. This will eventually inspire bright brains to focus on developing their own region rather than draining out in search of better opportunities.

Aranyak Valley has established 2 operational Pride Habitats in the Barak Valley, training 700 students and directly employing over 20 people in the region. Over 10, 000 native plants and trees have been planted. The startup has established over 50 diaspora connects for culture, script, skill, flora, and fauna.

Although comfortably placed in Dubai as the Regional Commercial Director (Asia & Middle East) of a reputed French company, Gaurav’s love for his state and his strong urge to give back to its people inspired him to set up Aranyak Valley in his hometown. His core intention has been to instill a sense of pride as well as empower the local people from the grassroots with essential skills, knowledge, and confidence to develop world-class solutions to the local problems.

When the skilled pool of teachers and students of the Aranyak Valley, together with local volunteering leaders, pulled off a smart app in just a week with zero physical interaction, it, indeed, arrived as a ‘Ta-da’ moment for the Founder.

By: Satarupa Mishra