The 10 Most Emerging Tech Startup In India

2019 / Vol. 10 / Issue 01 Company of the Month

Ashish Jain, CEO & Founder AnkTech Software Pvt. Ltd.

10

The

Most

EMERGING

TECH STARTUP IN INDIA

Snehal Desle Umbarkar Director

KANISHKA SOFTWARE TRANSFORMING PRESENT AND FUTURE TOGETHER

Editor’s Desk

Building Long Lasting Successful Startup with Strong Foundation Base

“A startup messed up at its foundation cannot be fixed,” Thiel’s Law, author of Zero to One.

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eginnings are always special and creating a foundation can be rewarding. How important are the foundations? We all are well-aware that a poor foundation could possibly fall, but a strong foundation always stands for many generations; whether its of a building or that of a business. A strong foundation enables a business to grow and flourish. If it’s not strong enough to cope with the work load, the businesses can collapse. It is often said that more than half of new businesses fail in the first few years. And, according to one of the independent survey reports, near about 80% of businesses fail in their early days.

In construction, a lot of work goes into getting the foundation set up correctly. Not to mention just the sweat and energy that goes on just to prepare the foundation, even before the building gets started.

Because anything we start, we cannot succeed if there is no clarity ahead. It is important to have a foundation that

is well-planned and it must continuously be measured.

As it is wisely said that “What gets measured, gets managed —Peter Drucker, American-Austrian educator.”

Experts suggest some Key Performance Areas(KPAs) and that it is important for a startup to perform well on those measures to grow further. These are: Leadership, Marketing, sales, Financial Management, Operations Administration, product Development, and Customer Service.

This October Issue of Insights Success features “The 10 Most Emerging Tech Startup In India”. These startups, built on strong foundation, are soaring towards new heights.

On the Cover of the magazine, we have featured a s p e c i a l sto r y of Ka n i s h ka S of t wa re P r i v ate Limited—an organization that leverages disruptive

Shruti P. Jambhale

technologies such as OIT, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning to provide BPM consulting services and platforms.

We have exhibited some distinctive companies who have come up with the most unique solutions. Thus, we have featured AnkTech Softwares—a pioneer company developing enterprise software, web, and mobile applications in various domains since 2008. It strongly believe in long-term bonds rather than shortterm gains; as a Special Profile.

Apart from this, we have listed a few other companies too who are performing extraordinarily. Those are, DIPITR—an up-and-coming technology company is dedicated to developing innovative and delightful tech products that benefit the health, wellness, and lives of its customers; i-LEND—Revolutionizing the Indian money market, i-LEND has made access to credit at affordable rates of interest a reality by building a platform for people to strike an ideal deal; TechGenYZ Software Private Limited— the company behind the popular media-tech brand TechGenyz, cloud solutions provider brand Quavzent that people love and trust; TechNEXA Technologies—one of the fastest-growing information technology consulting organization that implements

and maintains high-performance IT systems for organizations of all sizes and a wide range of industries.

Along with this, we have an exclusive ‘Interview with Insights Success’. Here, Gaurav Chopra, the CEO & Co-founder of IndiaLends have shared some insightful views and highlighted the influences made by their company to be the most Emerging Tech Start-ups in India. A market leader in the unsecured consumer loan market, IndiaLends is enabling the common man so he can live a better life and most importantly a life that he hopes for.

This magazine includes a leader’s thoughts section as well, where Sarun Iyer, an Executive Vice-President at HEXANIKA discusses the topic “Indian Startup Ecosystem: Fintech Is The Dark Horse”.

Also, we have included the article “An Ultimate Guide to Startup Funding” scripted by our in-house editors in the delightful pages of this magazine.

So, flip the pages of our magazine and explore interesting insights from the world of business!

Contents 08

KANISHKA SOFTWARE

Transforming Present and Future Together

COVER STORY

32

ARTICLE STARTUP FUNDING An Ultimate Guide to Startup Funding

INTERVIEW INDIALENDS One Stop Solution to Financial Requirements

26

CXO STANDPOINT INDIAN STARTUP ECOSYSTEM FinTech Is The Dark Horse

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14

COMPANY OF THE MONTH ANKTECH SOFTWARES Initiating a Platform for Global Software Services

24 DIPITR Channelling the Strength of Indigenous Innovation

30 i-LEND Redening the Conventional Lending – Borrowing Model

36 TECHGENYZ The Next Generation Tech Brand

38 TECHNEXA TECHNOLOGIES Your trusted IT Consulting Partner

Editor-in-Chief Pooja M. Bansal Managing Editor Shruti Jambhale Contributing Editors Rahul, Rajkunwar, Sneha, Abhishaj Art & Design Head Amol Kamble Associate Designer Poonam Mahajan Art & Picture Editor Mayur Koli Co-designer Shweta Ambilwade Business Development Manager Megha Mishra Business Development Lead Tejaswini Whaval Business Development Executive Sarika Kawade Technical Specialists Amar, Pratiksha Digital Marketing Manager Prashant Chevale SME-SMO Executives Manoj, Ketki Circulation Manager Tanaji sales@insightssuccess.com

OCTOBER, 2019 Corporate Ofces: Insights Success Media and Technology Pvt. Ltd. Ofce No. 22 & 510, Rainbow Plaza, Shivar Chowk, Pimple Saudagar, Pune, Maharashtra 411017 Phone - India: +91 7410079881/ 82/ 83/ 84/ 85 Email: info@insightssuccess.in For Subscription: www.insightssuccess.in

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Cover Story

“

We automate and continuously improve business processes

”

KANISHKA

SOFTWARE

TRANSFORMING PRESENT AND FUTURE TOGETHER

Snehal Desle Umbarkar Director

“There is no one solution for all business problems"

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he Indian market today has lots of opportunities for tech-based services. There is a good future for technologies like IoT, AI, Machine Learning, AR/VR, and new coding techniques. The companies have started comprehending the power of digitization which is definitely going to flourish in the coming days. The government of India has set an aim to become a five trillion-dollar economy by deploying and developing through key initiatives like Digital India and Make in India etc. Indian market is flourishing at a rapid rate and proving to be an oasis for the new start-ups.

The country has been blessed with a unique talent in tech-industry. Hence, it has become natural for tech-enabled start-ups to sustain and grow in India.

The rise in tech-based start-ups is revolutionizing the industry on a whole different level resulting in people

moving more and more towards the techno-based processes and businesses as a whole.

in nurturing talent by providing a healthy working environment with inclusivity.

Kanishka Software Pvt. Ltd. focuses on providing opportunities to the young minds and giving solutions to the organisations, and thus facilitating exponential growth and sustainable gains.

The Industry Enablers An Electronics & Telecommunication Engineering graduate; Snehal Desle Umbarkar - Director, KSOFTPL has established herself as an entrepreneur for which she was working hard, from past 5 years. With additional 7 years of job experience in the core Info-sec industry, she has associated herself with a myriad of entities such as Ernst & Young, Mahindra & Mahindra, NII Consultancy and D-Link. Her expertise in handling respectable clientele for more than 11 years in all types of industries & working under pressure for deliverables proven to be a strong base for her start-up at KSOFTPL. Snehal was already playing an indispensable role of a wife and a mother to a toddler in personal life when she decided to step out of the comfort zone of a 9 to 5 job and expand her wings in a challenging role as an Entrepreneur to fulfil the dream of establishing her own business.

“With KSOFTPL, we are set to revolutionize the traditional approach

“Empowered with talented team members, our vision is to enable continuous development of unique process-oriented solutions,” stands the motto and vision of KSOFTPL. “It’s always a pleasure to work with the young brilliant minds of startups and serve them as our clients. The company definitely gets benefited directly working with them!” the team adds.

The company aims at providing personalised solution to every client of theirs. and hence satisfying their customers is their primary objective.

Its progressive tailored solution offering has been able to retain customers as well as generate new ones with more than fifty reputable organizational clientele, in a very short period of time. The company believes

followed in the process of designing & bringing forth a digitized platform, where management & employees can come together and quantify the need against various options,” opines Snehal. “KSOFTPL is truly set to be ‘everybody wins’ platform which a lot of companies will appreciate as well as benefit out of it,” Snehal adds.

contributed to the emergence of Kanishka Software Pvt. Ltd. Apart from his other ventures, he has been very instrumental in building KSOFTPL to a level where it is right now. With his business acumen, the firm has been able to define new solutions and frameworks for optimizing customer processes.

Vinay Singh – Director KSOFTPL; started his career working as a pre-sales consultant in Network & Security around 8 years ago. He was tasked with handling major accounts given his quick go to the market attitude. He has an engineering degree in Electronics and Telecommunication which served as a base, along with natural sales knack which assisted him in establishing his roots in the organization. However, it was just not enough to complete the vision this navy brat had envisaged. He wanted more from himself. After a while, Vinay moved on to his own venture and became one of the think tanks who

“KSOFTPL products serve as a framework that prospective corporates and their employees can utilize to get the best of what the market has to offer.

But it also serves as a hidden tool to grow oneself in terms of becoming a good business strategist,” explains Vinay.

Serving the Purpose “Ours is a client-oriented company,” says Vinay. The firm develops products that are tailor-made as per the client’s requirements. We believe in designing and customizing frameworks according to the customers’ vision and their internal flow of the business process.

“We automate and continuously improve business processes”

10Most

The

MERGING

TECH STARTUP IN INDIA

“We help in generalizing a process so that it can handle multiple departmental and designated conventions without the need for re-design”

For us, our client's needs are of paramount importance

“Our framework products like QUALUS, REALUS, PERFECTO, MEDOC, VASCO VMS, ACTIF, FODDISOFT, AND SMART RABBITThermostat have been specifically designed to fulfill the client’s necessities,” he adds.

ACTIF is used for tracking all the company assets of both admin and IT department. This yields optimum results and a better management system. On the other hand, QUALUS is a facility management suite with a ticketing mechanism, scoring board, performance analysis, escalation matrix and IoT based devices to save facility-related manpower and costs for customers. Also, the product MEDOC is a doctor-patient application that keeps records of patients’ prescriptions added by the doctors. It acts as an e-prescription and provides timely notifications to the patients for their medicine consumption. “We are the budding yet promising service providers of Software Development, Business Process Management and Business Consulting to few of our prestigious customers,” describes Snehal. “We believe in tailoring our products as per the needs of the customer by making sure that our data analysis gives them better transparency in their processes,” she further elaborates. She sheds some

light on a few of the notable factors to keep in mind while catering to clients, explaining: Optimizing the processes which are highly error-prone. Ÿ Reduce scope for human errors. Ÿ Ensure SLA for the workflow attached to the timelines which are needed to be followed properly. Ÿ Ensure maximum visibility and devise a plan of action for shortfalls.

Ÿ

The culmination of all the above steps helps customers reduce their Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and improve their internal deliveries. For example, even if there are two clients who are competitors to each other but their processes would be entirely different.

Hence, different solutions to each of them would be realized. There is no “one shoe fits all” theory for us.

Overcoming The Challenges “Actually there were not just one, but many challenges in the beginning,” claims Snehal. During the initial days of the business when it was still a consultancy firm, it was difficult to envision a hassle-free option since the company was going to build a thorough process. However, without the actual software framework to follow through, it was difficult to win

complete trust of the (potential) customers and make them understand how automation could replace the manual process. However with the wave of digitization already hitting the Indian market, it had become relatively easy for customers to see their business flourish with Mobile Tech, AI, IoT, etc.

Nowadays, things have changed for the better.

With KSOFTPL growing and expanding the branches of its tree, is converting its framework app to work with IoT-based devices. With allaround development in the world and smart cities budding up, the firm is also enabling smart cafeterias in some of the spaces. “We have developed prototype IoT device for Food Temperature monitoring for which, we are preparing to apply for a patent,” proclaims Vinay proudly.

Imparting some inspiration, Snehal shares insights to budding entrepreneurs and states, “Solutions to your clients does not only mean coding. Instead, it’s more about understanding your client’s requirements and then building a solution that is more apt for them, which helps them in solving the real problem.”

Ashish Jain CEO & Founder

ANKTECH SOFTWARES Initiating a Platform for Global Software Services 14 | INSIGHTS SUCCESS

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COMPANY OF THE MONTH

“We strongly believe in long-term bonds rather than short-term gains”

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nktech Softwares Pvt. Ltd. was formed in 2008 to deliver reliable, scalable technical solutions to meet the diverse needs of enterprise clients and big brands spread across the globe leveraging on our commitment, domain knowledge and technical expertise. AnkTech was established with few members from a very small office in Noida.

Later company shifted to a new base in Jaipur along with its ten employees prevailing at that time. In the last eleven years, it has grown from ten to more than eighty-five people dedicated to provide excellent services. Being a quality service provider in the software sector, the company ensures that the clients receive nothing but the best.

What makes AnkTech different from others:

development space comprising of all the facilities like a three-level power back-up system, and high-speed fibre cable internet, etc.

Company provides services in sectors like Enterprise Applications, E-Commerce, Mobile Application, Content Management System and 24/7 support. The company utilizes the following technologies: l l l

More than a decade of experience with top global brands like: Vodafone, KFC, BT, Marks & Spencer, HSBC, Mc Donalds, JP Morgan Chase etc l Clients’ trust is most important for us l Company works as a partner with clients and not just a vendor. Their problem is our problem and their success is ours l Company has the best team, which follows best industry process to deliver best quality l

The early days of 2013 marked a great period for AnkTech as for AnkTech as it moved into its very own its very own state-of-theart advanced premises. Now, the firm owned a 15,000 sq ft. of VOLUME - 10, ISSUE - 01, 2019

l l l l l l

ASP.Net, MVC 5, C# Umbraco, KenticoCMS, Sitecore NodeJS, AngularJS, React JS, MongoDB iOS, Android, Xamarin, React Native Drupal 8.x, Wordpress, Expression Engine Magento 2.x, Shopify, Woo-commerce PHP, Laravel 24x7 Support QA Salesforce & Dynamics

A Profound Leader Ashish Jain, M.D. of AnkTech, founded the company in 2008 after being in industry for a decade with a vision to provide professional services to clients across the globe. Mr. Jain INSIGHTS SUCCESS | 15

“Our goal with every new solution coming out from AnkTech is to bring new values, new benefits, for users worldwide” holds an Engineering Degree in the field of Computer Science and has vast experience ranging from Consultancy to Project Management.

He encourages practice of commendable standards for competency and professional conduct throughout the organisation to consistently add value to every customer association. In past, he has worked for fortune 500 clients in US and UK including Engelhard Inc, Bank of America, Merrill Lynch etc.

He has a lot of experience when it comes to software management and facilitating services. It was not an easy decision to leave a high paying corporate job in 2008. However, his persistence is what made AnkTech today a globally leading brand. One thing that inspires him the most is a saying from Thomas A. Edison - “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize

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“We create enterprise, digital products, and experiences that help brands grow their digital businesses” how close they were to success when they gave up.”

When Ashish is not busy with work, he likes to spend time with his kids and enjoys various types of sports activity like Cricket, Badminton, Swimming, Running, and Cycling. He also participates in Marathons regularly.

Ashish is a person with a life, which drives him to achieve greatness over and over.

Leaping Towards Success Even with the determination and persistence of Ashish, there were a lot of challenges that AnkTech Software faced. The industry is ever dynamic; therefore, the nature of challenges has changed over time. Initially, there used to be time when we had to deliver a lot with very limited work-force. Pressure used to be very high to maintain quality and deliver on time. Most of the time Ashish himself had to work over-time, sometimes alone even in order to deliver projects on time. Then, there used to be

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time when we had no work, which used to create a lot of issues and the most prominent being the survival of the company. Still, in these adversities, the firm always believed in the team and never fired anyone which resulted in employee retention on a larger level. 25% of the staff AnkTech currently has are people that are working from 5 to 11 years in the company.

What people do not understand about start-ups is that it can never be a part-time gig. “You really need to spend all of your brain, time and energy in your start-up to succeed,” says Ashish. Many people want quick success and they give up midway. If anyone is solving a problem, it is advised to stay in the business patiently. Lots of people come to Ashish for guidance and discuss their ideas. People don’t want to take risk. They want to continue their job and try their ideas part-time by getting an app or a site. However, “99.9% of the time, it doesn’t work unless you are really fortunate,” he explains.

Stepping Forward Many of the people see the success of others and they start desiring to be an Entrepreneur. However, they don’t see the challenges and hard work behind the scene.

According to Ashish, “People that are serious in their own game, are destined to succeed.” Addressing the upcoming batch of entrepreneurs, he tells, “If you can differentiate between; Desire, Hobby, Dream and Passion then no one can stop you from being successful.” The three qualities that are must for an aspiring entrepreneur is passion, dedication, and optimism or rather having patience.

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A

market leader in the unsecured consumer loan market, IndiaLends is enabling the common man so he can live a better life and most importantly a life that he hopes for for.

In an interview with Insights Success, Gaurav Chopra, the CEO & Co-founder of IndiaLends have shared some insightful views and highlighted the influences made by their company to be Emer the most Emerging Tech Start-ups in India.

Brief us about your company. Tell us about the inception story of the firm.

IndiaLends is a digital platform that provides a marketplace for financial products such as personal loans and lines of credit ranging from Rs. 10,000 to Rs. 50 Lacs, Credit Cards & Free Credit Reports. IndiaLends connects borrowers with financial institutional lenders such as banks and NBFCs. The platform simplifies the entire borrowing experience for the consumer right from helping with loan applications to disbursing loans within 48 hours of applying.

Gaurav Chopra CEO & Co-founder

lar number of The platform processes a large data points for each borrower to help them get the right credit product at an affordable interest rate, while also helping financial institutions improve their risk scoring capabilities. IndiaLends uses proprietary algorithms to connect borrowers with right financial institutions.

It also provides data analytics and risk scoring services along with a loan management platform to financial institutions. It has also helped automate workflows and risk assessments thereby

IndiaLends One Stop Solution to Financial Requirements 20 | INSIGHTS SUCCESS

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INTERVIEW WITH INSIGHTS SUCCESS making the loan disbursal process much more efficient.

India is an undeserved market with approval rates for consumer credit below 10%. In India organized lending is available only to a lucky few mainly those with high credit scores. The remaining borrowers are at the mercy of unorganized lenders and loan sharks and end up paying high interest rates. What also makes approaching traditional Banks or NBFCs for taking credit unappealing is the long-drawn process of reaching out to multiple lenders, the long application process, researching for the right information such as the right credit product, interest rates, documentations needed, etc. Additionally, unsecured loan categories remain significantly under-tapped due to the dependence of Lenders on robust credit risk assessment capabilities.

This leads to financial institutes missing out on a large chunk of potential customer segment.

Through our products and services, we are trying to solve these issues by ensuring that borrowers have easy access to right credit options with best interest rates and in minimum time possible. For our lending partners we are sourcing accurate information about the applicants and helping them reduce the time and cost involved in acquiring right borrowers.

Brief us about the Founder/CEO and what inspired him/her to start a tech based business.

Gaurav Chopra and Mayank Kachhawaha worked together in Capital One in London for about 10 years, this is when the idea of enabling borrowers to secure cheaper and quicker loans and helping lenders make better credit risk decisions was conceived. There was no looking back after that. Apart from the strong business acumen and knowledge garnered over the years, their strong academic pedigree of the London School of Business and IIT Madras is what helped our Founders sail through all the challenges that came their way in establishing the brand IndiaLends in the digital lending consumer space.

The core idea behind IndiaLends, was to enable the common man so he can live a better life and most

importantly a life that he hopes for. Our prime focus is to help our customers get the best interest rate offers possible and aid our partners to source accurate information about the applicants. We aim to innovate the online lending space by providing borrowers with the right credit product in a matter of few clicks and almost instantly. Additionally, we are equally committed towards making the lending process as seamless and hassle-free experience as possible for our lending partners.

Kindly make us aware about the various tech-enabled products or services your company is going to provide.

The primary parameter considered for lending is a person’s credit score. We are changing this by using data points such as past bank transactions, utility payments, etc. to build credit risk models that enables an instantaneous underwriting decision. We strongly believe that through the use of data, deep analytics and machine learning algorithms, we will be able to enable more borrowers to secure cheaper loans at a faster rate and also help the lenders make better credit risk decisions.

What differentiates us from any bank or NBFC is that we scientifically match the right borrower profile with the most relevant lender and thereby reduce inefficiencies that lead to lower loan approvals, higher interest rates and sub-optimal loan amounts.

State the challenges faced by the founder or the company as a whole while in the process of formation.

One of primary challenges we faced when we decided to enter the retail lending space in India was that majority of the loans were still being applied for and disbursed offline. Digital Lending was still a fairly new concept.

One of the key tasks at hand was to create awareness amongst people about the ease and convenience of using a digital platform for their credit needs.

Another challenge was that we were not the first to enter the digital lending space in the country and compared to the existing companies in the space, we were fairly small. While these challenges existed, we also

“Enable borrowers to secure cheaper and quicker credit products and help lenders make better credit-risk decisions” VOLUME - 10, ISSUE - 01, 2019

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“IndiaLends is India's leading provider of personal loans and credit cards.

Our products include personal loans and lines of credit ranging from Rs. 10,000 to Rs. 50 Lacs, Credit Cards and Free Credit Reports. To our Lending partners we also provide technology, data and credit analytics solutions along with a loan management platform" understand the potential growth of the retail lending space in India and how the adaptation of digitisation will impact the sector. We worked on the fundamental areas where we wanted to add value as a digital credit products marketplace and how would we provide a better and seamless experience to the customers. Time to time we reassess ourselves and constantly work towards improving our services and making our process more efficient.

According to you, what are the notable factors to keep in mind while catering to the clients and dealing with techno-based products or services?

The points to be kept in mind when catering to a customer coming on your digital platform to avail credit products are that he wants to access instant funds through a seamless experience.

He wants to avail a credit product with minimum paperwork and with minimum time needed for the entire process of submission of the application to the final disbursement.

So, focus on technological innovation and commitment towards data security, and efforts to make the entire process of taking a loan a simplified journey is imperative. From providing free and credible credit reports, to verifying the details about the applicant’s income sources, bank statements, ID proofs etc should be done through an automated process online. For a better customer experience curate and recommend best

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and relevant credit options that they are eligible for.

Educate us about your vision to the future in terms of growth and expansion.

We see IndiaLends becoming a market leader in the unsecured consumer loan market. We are uniquely positioned to tap the huge opportunity available by using technological advancements, specifically by reducing loan origination cost, better risk assessment capabilities by using alternate data captured during the customer’s digital journey, low customer acquisition cost, and faster loan processing because of a completely digital process.

Additionally, our differentiated solution gives us a competitive advantage and we will continue to develop and focus on technological innovations to further this. Currently present and prevalent in 55 markets, we plan to expand to nearly 120 new cities by 2020. Additionally, we intend to launch new products and services that will make our offering even more wholesome. Some of the products that we are looking to launch in the near future are Line of credit, E-commerce Loan, etc.

What would be your advice to the budding entrepreneurs hoping to get into this tech-enabled field?

My advice to all the budding entrepreneurs starting out their own venture will be:

Ask yourself a question- what problem are you trying to solve through your product/service and how will you solve it a different and better manner than others in the market.

Hire the right people for the right job and empower them to make independent decisions, this will go a long way in making your company successful.

Be patient and persistent. Starting your company maybe easy but to keep the show running will need a lot of hard work, patience and resilience. fight your way through setbacks and challenges. Starting something of your own isn’t just about the passion for the idea, it’s also about enduring the pain of setbacks and failures, and getting up each time.

What are the technological innovations you wish to see happening in India at the earliest?

For the Indian Fintech space to evolve further, it’s important that emerging technologies are adopted by companies in the Fintech space. To remain relevant and to ensure smooth and secure transactions of large volumes, to mitigate risk, companies need to build and integrate newer technologies on a real-time basis to serve customers better.

Emerging technologies such as blockchain and smart contracts help companies enhance the security of consumer data and make the digital

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lending process more transparent.

Cognitive Science and behaviour analysis are important tech innovation as they will help companies enhance customer’s experience on their platforms and also make it easier to showcase them products that are best suited to their needs and lifestyle.

Robotic Process Automation technology is changing the lending space as it provides an efficient and fast way of analysing the effectiveness and efficiency of any process. Another disruptive technology is Artificial Intelligence (AI), this tech will completely remove the need for manual intervention form the lending industry. Comparison of data, verification process, credit assessment, approval of loan and disbursal process will be done is lesser time and with reduced chances of errors.

As a tech-startup, what is the current situation in the company’s workplace environment and are there any developments taking place?

Our focus for the coming few years will be: · Tapping into lesser chartered territory such as tier 2, tier 3 cities in the country: The penetration of unsecured credit offerings to the Tier 2 Tier 3 cities of India has been abysmally low. Majority of the credit products offered by Banks and NBFCs are catered to the metros and semi-metros. Since unsecured credit products are not backed by any assets or collaterals, there is a greater risk associated with providing loans or other credit

products to such a segment.

IndiaLends is catering to this underserved market by exploring unconventional credit risk assessments models that uses unique data points such as past bank transactions, utility payments, monthly rent payments, mobile phone payment patterns, subscriptions such gym memberships etc. for instantaneous underwriting decisions. · Making credit lending more inclusive: by expanding the customer base to include not just urban salaried individuals with good credit scores but also the low salaried customers, poor credit profile customers, blue-collared customers, etc. residing in smaller cities and towns. Currently, these customer categories remain significantly under-tapped due to the dependence of Lenders on robust credit risk assessment capabilities.

This leads to financial institutes (Banks and NBFCs) missing out on a large chunk of customer segments.

In order to help them tap into this customer segment, we have integrated unconventional credit risk assessment models that use unique data points such as past bank transactions, utility payments, monthly rent payments, mobile phone payment patterns, subscriptions such gym memberships, etc. for instantaneous underwriting decisions. This allows Lenders to widen their customer segments without incurring the high cost of technology up-gradation, infrastructure cost, marketing costs, etc.

“Currently present and prevalent in 55 markets, we plan to expand to nearly 120 new cities by 2020” VOLUME - 10, ISSUE - 01, 2019

· Providing credit to the self-employed segment of the country: The self-employed segment in the country still lacks access to ample formal credit, making financial inclusion a key issue for this segment. The overall disbursal rate for self-employed individuals in India stands at 30%.

The main barriers preventing smallscale entrepreneurs in the country from accessing bank credit are lack of steady income source, no credit history, and informal nature of business. Through our innovative lending models leveraging alternate data points for credit risk assessment and underwriting, we are addressing this issue. We have enabled small entrepreneurs in the country, be it budding start-up entrepreneurs or the Kirana shop owners to get easy access to credit options with best interest rates with the ease of a click in minimum time. In Q1 2019 alone IndiaLends disbursed over 2000 personal loans to self-employed individuals, a number which is expected to grow further in the coming years.

Entrepreneurial Mindset After the first Big Success ‘Startup’, What’s Next??

“My focus remains on further scaling up the business and expanding our reach in terms of our presence in Tier 2 and Tier 3 markets and introducing newer products to better cater to our customers” - Team IndiaLends

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Amir Valani

CEO

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he future is now, it seems – wearable ‘smart’ devices, straight out of science fiction, have finally hit the market in a very big way. The wellness potential of wearable devices is beginning to be discovered.

Numerous health apps that were complicated in design and difficult to implement are now being seen in the play-store with improved customer ratings and accessibility.

This innovation initiated by the wearable tech is launching a new gold rush, with improved quality of life as a prize in return. Nowadays with the surge in desk-bound lifestyle, health concerns are immensely increasing. Undoubtedly a healthy employee is more likely to be productive than an unhealthy one.

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DIPITR Channelling the Strength of Indigenous Innovation

This is where wearable technology plays its role. The advantages of wearable devices extend beyond ROI as they create a healthy workplace culture. Better health choices, reduced risks of diseases, in turn, lower the rates of absenteeism, increases presenteeism, and improves performance at work.

Hence this positively impacts productivity and engagement.

Watching the Posture While the mad dash to find new uses for wearables is still ongoing, DIPITR, a tech-enabled health care provider has emerged as the early leaders, and for a good reason.

Based out of Bengaluru, it is providing an invaluable aid to users

and positively impacting their health and wellness. To solve the problem of rising back ailments, it has launched India’s first smart wearable posture trainer and corrector device called Strack. The product’s manufacturing, designing, and development is indigenous which have become a pride to India as well as DIPITR. It takes care of Posture correction, Posture training, Posture tracking, and Posture management functions to make back happy and healthy. It is the first comprehensive solution for improving posture in as little as two weeks. Customized back health surveys, wellness drives, awareness sessions, and ergonomics are some of the tools clients are assisted with. One of the most noticeable undertakings is, the

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physio partner program for physiotherapists to upgrade them about the latest posture-related developments and help their patients with the same. Providing the customer testimonial of reference customers and reassuring that they are making the best decision possible is immensely important for both B2B and B2C markets. The customers are provided a 14 days moneyback guarantee with a 1-year warranty for every Strack device.

especially electronics products”. For him, distance is not a barrier anymore due to the high usage of technologies. He thinks this is a better time to have a startup in India. This is possible because India has one of the largest educated youth population in the world, which means there is a huge market for tech products and services. Amir says that hardware start-up is not easy but patience, persistence, and determination can get the things done.

Executing the responsibilities

Targeting a Healthier Future

Amir Valani takes pride in being the Founder and CEO of DIPITR. Amir combines a brilliant educational background from IIM, Indore, and SMU (Texas) with an experience of 20+ years in entrepreneurship, product management and marketing. His valuable contribution has made DIPITR flourish 30-40% every month on the way to become a leading tech company. He has also worked in positions of high responsibility at several prestigious companies, including Paras Marketing and Aga Khan Education Service. Technically sound, Amir ensures that his company never lags in terms of technological know-how. Under the leadership of Amir, Asia’s first 360° posture care solution, Strack was recently launched. His constant determination to make people aware of causes of back pain and eliminate it by proactively focusing on prevention made him launch Strack – India’s first smart wearable 360° posture care device.

Envisaging the bright future of DIPITR, its target is to become a $100 million company by Dec 2022. It wants to scale up in India by covering all major cities and also reach international markets such as Europe and North America. With flawless metrics and appropriate privacy standards, health can undoubtedly be in the hands of every individual. This will aid them to keep tabs on where they are and what they need to do to improve.

Thus, wearable technology in the workplace is indeed a step in the right direction for corporate wellness programs.

Hardware start-up is not easy and requires patience and determination to get things done. Amir had lots of hardships starting from procuring parts to design, assembly and manufacturing. But he focused on the mission readily facing the challenges and accepting them as a part of his journey.

Recommending Notable Factors Amir suggests that “Demoing product or service is a very powerful tool when catering corporate clients VOLUME - 10, ISSUE - 01, 2019

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Indian Startup Ecosystem FinTech Is The Dark Horse 2018 has proved to be a rewarding time to be a startup and 2019 promises to make that ride a lot better. Indian startups are adding value not just to local industries looking for technology adoption but also the global space. The startup ecosystem is helped by change in industry’s outlook to innovation and new technology, support from government initiatives and regulations as well as opportunities in diverse fields to scale up and grow!

About the Author Arun Iyer, Executive Vice President at HEXANIKA Arun is a Business and IT leader with 22+ years of experience in the Banking and Financial Services industry in areas such as product management, operating model design, business architecture, process optimization and information management. Arun has a keen interest in building innovative solutions and at HEXANIKA he is responsible for Product Strategy and Roadmap while also enabling the Business and Sales functions.

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According to Inc42’s ‘State of the Indian Startup Ecosystem 2018 Report’, the Indian startup ecosystem has grown exponentially, from ~7000 startups in 2008 to 49,000 in 2018. Startups have impacted the lives of 1.3 Bn Indians and raised investments of $38,500,000,000 ($38.5 Bn) in the last 4 years alone.

Of these, FinTech startup ecosystem is proving to be the most prominent. Here is a look at why FinTech will prove to be the dark horse this year.

Rising FinTech Adoption & Awareness According to EY’s ‘Global FinTech Adoption Index 2019’ the global FinTech Adoption rate is 64% in 2019, with high awareness even among non-adopters. In this, emerging markets like India and China are leading the way, with an adoption rate of 87%.

This is also showcased by the major uptick in number of new FinTech Startups being founded in India between 2015-18. 1300+ FinTech startups were established in this timeframe, the number outpacing the US in terms of homegrown startups in 2016. According to MEDICI’s India FinTech Report 2019 “In 2015–16, India had a greater number of new FinTech startups being founded than any other country (except China). Globally, the US and India have been at par over the last four years in terms of new FinTech startups founded in a particular year.”

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CXO STANDPOINT

FinTech’s Reach Is Expanding Digital payments has been the flag-bearer of FinTech revolution in India, propelled by demonetization, consequent active adoption of the Unified Payment Interface and growth of eCommerce ecosystem. Almost every white space, be it Digital Wallets, Point of Sale solutions, Payment Gateways and adjacent areas have been covered by a large number of players.

Digital lending is another sector that has picked up, fueled by the credit demand in the Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises. Aided by a maturing IndiaStack and an intelligent usage of data and technology has enabled several startups to come up with innovative business models.

FinTech is further expanding into specialized sub-domains in the form of: l WealthTech - providing solutions for wealth management and investing via Robo advisory, micro investments, portfolio management and insights l InsurTech - claims processing, online policy handling and administration of insurance online l RegTech - enabling institutions to manage risk and regulatory processes such as Regulatory Reporting, Risk Analytics, Fraud Detection Additionally, FinTech in India has emerged as a unique provider of financial services to the largely unbanked sector, mainly due to government initiatives and the lower data costs by network providers as compared to the rest of the world. Today, 90% of India’s 1.3 billion population have a unique Aadhar identity, which is vital for meeting “know your customer” (KYC) requirements. This provides a unique opportunity for FinTechs to capitalize and provide financial services to the unbanked audiences.

Technology advancements are a key enabler allowing FinTechs to explore and automate complex processes.

Almost all startups have some flavor of Big Data analytics, Artificial Intelligence/ Machine Learning, Blockchain, or IOT enabling the business processes or the entire business model. Adoption of these technologies have enabled these start-ups and their clients to bring down cost of technology and operations while providing additional insights and simplicity.

Indian FinTech’s Are A Favorite With Investors As per MEDICI database, Indian FinTech’s raised $1.83 billion in funds in 2018, with payments and leading segments leading the way. In fact, the fate of Indian

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FinTechs is already more promising in 2019, with Indian startups beating China in Q1 2019 by attracting a larger volume of investments.

According to CB Insights, FinTechs in India raised $286 million in Q1,2019 with Chinese FinTechs receiving $192.1million in the same period. Although China is still the dominant player in this space, India is catching up thanks to VC investments and tightening of regulatory environment in China around online lending. Not just B2C but even B2B FinTech’s are gaining attention from investors as they cater to niche problem statements, need relatively lower upfront investment and usually provide a global appeal.

Simple, Smart & Efficient Largely, the rise in FinTech adoption and growth of this sector has a lot to do with accessibility and ease of usage.

According to EY survey, 27% respondents chose FinTech for its pricing while 20% thought it was simpler in comparison with a traditional financial process.

There are a number of macro-level drivers that will enable ongoing growth of FinTech: l Government impetus in the form of commitment and broad initiatives from the Central Government and policy framework from State Governments.

Government initiatives undertaken by Mumbai Fintech Hub ‘&’ Fintech Valley Vizag. l RBI’s recent paper on Framework for a Regulatory Sandbox is the first step in the right direction in emulating the success of similar initiatives by regulators like Singapore’s MAS and England’s FCA l Greater collaboration in the form of Open Innovation, between startups and corporates.

Programs launched by financial institutions such as Yes FinTech, Barclays Rise showcase the popularity of FinTech solutions amongst established companies With the changing mindset towards FinTech, the BFSI sector is already seeing a lot of changes and emergence of new solutions and services bringing together the trustworthiness of a financial institutions with the innovative spirit of a FinTech startup.

The fusion of new technology to traditional financial processes will only make FinTech a more popular choice to be a frontrunner in the Indian startup scene over next few years.

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Uday Sudhir Pilani , Director

Shimoni Sahay, Business Head

Redefining the Conventional Lending – Borrowing Model

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he talent and resources pool in India has been on a significant rise in the recent years. The most important aspect when starting up a venture is to have clarity of the business path the business needs to take and to follow it assiduously. One also needs to keep an eye on cash flow for growing successfully. This can be achieved at its best by having a broad range of capital sources – and cash substitutes – to draw on. And, it is important to remember that a thoughtful and flexible financial plan focused on scale-up will make one’s business to grow fast, be responsive, and thrive.

The flip side of supplier financing is Peer-toPeer (P2P) lending. And, for the benefit of this industry and the

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individual bowers and lenders, one such first P2P lending business, i-LEND has pioneered the online lending services in India.

The Commencement of the Trail The company, i-LEND has been founded by the seasoned professionals Uday Sudhir Pilani, the Director and Shimoni Sahay, the Business Head.

A lead investor in different projects across the globe, Uday Pilani is also the director of i-LEND. Invested in different hospitality industries across United Kingdom. Some names are The Makeney Hall Hotel, Derby, the United Kingdom, The Lace Market Hotel, Nottingham, United Kingdom, Silverstar Properties LLP, Croydon,

United Kingdom, etc. He has built up multiple companies across India and also associated with Krish Motor Services Ltd, Mablethorpe, United Kingdom – UK’s Largest Independent Filling Station.

Whereas, Shimoni Sahay is a qualified MBA graduate specializing in finance and marketing, presently serving as a Business Head leader in i-LEND. She has developed and implemented multiple ranges of value-added services that have redefined the bench marking standards known in the industry.

The original idea of the core team, behind the starting up the company, was to develop a credit behavior prediction algorithm. An algorithm that

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can lead to better decision making for lending money to thin files and can also change the way the scoring model works. Also, one of the key objectives was to assist individuals to manage risk which is the cornerstone of all lending models in the world. Finally, the last mile contact was automated so that businesses can harness technology to deliver on the last mile connectivity.

Founders’ Experience Tale As the saying goes, ‘Experience greatly improves chances of success’; the company has experienced a huge success while working with the profound founding unit – Shankar Vaddadi.

Shankar plays a successful role in leadership with verifiable year on year success in delivering on Strategy Planning, Operations, International Business, Startups, Strategic Alliances, and fundraising. He is deeply involved with social entrepreneurship through path-breaking leadership of Pochampally Handloom park which was the first initiative of its kind in the world. His second venture is i-LEND and he has also held ‘C’ level positions across diverse industries.

Niti carries diverse experience over different sectors, primarily in product management. She has successfully launched a range of Retail POS systems for TVS Electronics. She is establishing the entire ecosystem from sourcing, manufacturing, and building marketing strategies to customer satisfaction. She has also handled Strategic Alliances, Social sector challenges in PHPL, Retail Finance, Business Strategy, and Planning over the years.

She also has experience in building a complex software platform in i-LEND. Both the founders faced multiple challenges during the initial phase since lending in India is tightly regulated grounding the business model. Adhering to multiple state and central laws, legislation, creating awareness of the business model, recruiting talent, and raising funds were all challenges encountered by the founding team.

opened new avenues for lenders to effectively manage their financial portfolio.

At i-LEND, they believe the availability of credit should not be limited by narrow workflow walls. Thus, as an endto-end P2P lending tech-enabled marketplace, i-LEND connects individual borrowers with lenders. It verifies KYC, assigns a credit score based on both qualitative and quantitative parameters, and match makes between lenders and borrowers. It also monitors the loan performance, as well as helps, and manages the collections process as and when required. All this is done through the website and various API’s.

One notable factor that needs to keep in mind is that UI & UX are the key aspects while catering to customers across the length and breadth of India. And, from an operational perspective, the privacy of the data collected is of utmost importance in tech-based products, and services.

An Admonish “Get the value proposition right, identify the pain point with clarity. Identify a team with a shared vision and don’t be in a hurry to raise money.” advises Shankar to the young entrepreneurs.

Stepping Forward i-LEND is scaling up its presence across the country, improving the tech interface, and building various API’s to enhance the user experience. Recently the company has moved into a new premise which is an upgrade from the previous one.

Also, the company believes and is working hard to grow continuously at the same pace in the coming years as well.

Tech-Enabled Solutions Revolutionizing the Indian money market, i-LEND has made access to credit at affordable rates of interest a reality by building a platform for people to strike an ideal deal.

The various viable lending options provided by i-LEND has

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STARTUP FUNDING

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tartups are capturing the Indian market with their curated knacks and innovative solutions. They are playing a pivotal role in contributing to the nation’s economy alongside unlocking opportunities for the youngsters of today and tomorrow. They are emerging as one of the fastest-growing businesses aiming to develop viable business models, products, services, processes, platforms, etc. However, a major aspect that complements these out-of-the-box solutions and is necessary for a thriving outcome is ‘Finance’.

A detailed analysis of suitability and understanding of the avenues available for picking startup funding calls prove to be the precursors for success. Let’s have a look into the opportunities for funding startups and be ahead of all.

Bootstrapping can Help Tapping into the world of the self-funding avenue and writing a self-cheque is not an easy task. The growing competition across the country can push a budding entrepreneur towards cutting corners in personal life. As such, it is necessary to analyse the requirement of quantum and the ability to take risks related to bootstrapping.

Having a few discussions with the family members, like-minded people, known circle of winners, etc. can surely prove a big help in bootstrapping and creating own benchmark. It’s all about effective planning and being sure that the savings are enough to take the venture to the next level. Also, it can be one of the best options for first-time business owners and startups which are passionate about what they do.

A Simple Friend Request Reaching out with a passion to all the friends and acquaintances is the key to the startup venture and can prove to be a safety net. Friends know your capabilities; they are accessible to your requests and communicating with them can surely help in raising funds.

One can also ask for a low interestbearing loan that can create a win-win situation for both. Unlike any other unknown agency, this can be a great supportive source to avail seamless legal formalities and finance.

Go for Incubators This is one of the best options for tech startups – not just for funding, incubators back the venture from its nascent stage and provide it with all the necessary assistance. They act as the early-stage

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growth enablers that provide all the much-needed multi-dimensional support and access to finance. It effectively helps startups in honing up and learning the steps to find funding.

Several institutions have set up incubators with a vision to enhance the startup ecosystem decently.

stockbrokers that are engaged with the clients who are regular investors in public shares.

It focuses on rolling out an assured ROI, thereby promising a sense of security to the investors. One just needs a legal advisor for carrying out the legal formalities and paperwork.

and disruptive tech initiatives.

As such, higher visibility can prove to be a great accelerator for the startup funding efforts thereby, creating a sense of stability.

Financial Institutions The most traditional plan of action for funding is Banks. It is considered as one of the most secured and swift routes for providing funds to the startups. The Banking Financial Service and Insurance (BFSI) segment is creating various opportunities through innovative schemes and policies aimed at propelling the startup ecology.

‘Accelerators’ of Growth Functioning similarly as Incubators, Accelerators are bound with welldefined planning and call to action with respect to funding. It’s a dedicated short-term support service equipped with hands-on guidance from experts and mentors from diversified industry fields.

Tap Crowd Funding It is one of the best options for individuals and startups who are passionate about addressing social causes. There are a plethora of crowd funding platforms as well as facilitators that have the potential to raise funds and hit the right target audience with utmost prominence.

Also known as Seed Accelerators, these are cohort-enabled programs that showcase seed investment, sales, etc. and play a significant role in accelerating growth in the longer run.

It focuses on attracting the investors by pitching them with the product/ service/solution without making any personal rapport with the startup founder.

Backed by a wide-ranging network and HR capabilities, Banks can efficaciously provide economical funding solutions. Also, the funding cost that the borrower has to deal with is much lower when aligning with banks.

Play Private Embracing this opportunity involves a degree of ingenuity and reaching out to the unknown. Known as ‘Private Placement’, it involves creating a robust business plan. It is a cognitive process of targetting high-net-worth individuals, elite clubs, prestigious trade and business house associates,

Government-led Initiatives When it comes to funding, enrolling and participating in governmentsponsored interfaces can be of huge help. Interfaces like the Investor Hubs, Startup Hubs etc. can aid in reaching new heights. It can successfully boost and offer good exposure to budding

Non-banking Financial Companies (NBFC) They have emerged as one of the major contributors to uplifting the startup ecosystem. They boost the startup with faster processing time and are wellendowed with funds to cater to their needs. They work with a more holistic

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view of the startup ecology when it comes to paperwork and carrying out the legal formalities. NBFC provides seed funds to the startups which is an important differentiating factor.

Micro Finance Similar to NBFCs, these are the type of micro-financial institutions offering micro-credits on some reasonable terms. However, if the funding requirement for a startup is relatively low, these institutions can stand amongst the best options to opt for.

Contest Registrations This can be tricky, but it surely has the potential to work best for the startups to quench their funding needs to a certain limit. Various offline and online competitions are held that offer exclusive prize money. It certainly seems like a good idea to enrol, participate, and give your best shot.

Angel Investors These are high net worth individuals and/or groups in charge to offer funds with a high risk-high return approach.

They are extremely objective and wellaware of the budding technologies and markets, which help them in providing equitable funding. In some cases, the angel investor would preferably take equity off the startup and associate with the founders at the grass-root level.

Startups funded by them have to cede the luxury of self-directed functioning.

However, the startups would possibly never starve for funds in the longer run.

Venture Capitalists (VCs) Before going public, this can be an ultimate to-the-mark source for the startups. It’s a cornucopia of talent – well-equipped with capital, hands-on expertise, subject-matter experts and experience across diversified domains.

VCs offers comprehensive guidelines and necessary funding for the overall growth of the startups. Funds are released by acknowledging the abilities of the founders and the core team alongside traction for products/services/solutions.

Initial Public Offer (IPO) IPO can be a good resource for startups to attain funds for their ventures.

However, it’s beneficial for the startups that have an impressive track record of net profit and reputation. Attaining funds from IPOs for a startup showcasing a high-velocity growth band can be much feasible. Founders can also take guidance from seasoned IPO professionals such as Brokerage Houses, Consultants, Merchant Bankers, etc.

The bottom line is to take on an incisive study and objective analysis before entering into the business world and taking the final leap. Funding is never a trial and error practice, it’s a complex segment of challenges to tackle and climb the success ladder.

- Rahul Niraj Editor

A good presentation before the VCs can lead to productive results. Some facts & stats, USP, traction so far can help get funds from VCs.

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The Next Generation Tech Brand

Swapan Kumar Manna Founder/CEO

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loud computing is the most flamboyant technological innovation of the 21st century. This is because it has seen the fastest adoption into the mainstream than any other technology in the domain. This adoption has been fueled by the ever-propelling number of smartphones and mobile devices that can access the internet. Combined computing resources available through cloud computing has offered tremendous benefits to business organizations. Unraveling benefits include efficiency, flexibility, and strategic value. The service providers play a major role in delivering their best solutions. TechGenyz is one of the topmost solution providers

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delivering ideal solutions to its users.

TechGenyz has two verticals – one is in the media tech domain, which is represented by the brand name TechGenyz and the other one, Quavzent is a cloud-based solutions provider. TechGenyz is a leading source of news and information on the latest technology, startups, AR/VR. Quavzent builds next-generation technology solutions to power companies from multiple sectors.

TechGenyz connects readers from 75+ countries across the world and tells the story about digital transformation and how it is affecting our day-to-day life. It was founded in June 2017 in an

ambition to feed millions of readers with relevant information which matters to them. They believe information is power and aim to empower the generation leading on the forefronts and build a digitally empowered community.

Founder & CEO Realizing the need for change is crucial for the development of any business and initiating the change from oneself is an endeavor only a few achieve. Swapan Kumar Manna, the Founder & CEO of TechGenyz adorns this virtue. He was witnessing the changing status quo of the country in terms of internet

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accessibility. People no longer find information in traditional media, rather they are curious to get news on tech, gaming, digital innovation over the internet. Keeping the same in mind Swapan grabbed the opportunity to initiate his career in the media tech domain and led her to establish TechGenyz. He was aware of the drastic change in the number of internet users which is doubled since the last decade. This influenced him with an opportunity to empower today’s generation with information that matters to them.

Tech-enabled Services TechGenyz is into the media tech domain and focuses on how it can connect readers with the most relevant information promptly. It has Content Studio Solution, where the expert content creators create content that makes their brand stand out. Beforehand, the company struggled to manage the whole work process and analyze how a modern-day tech media company runs. Latterly, it thought to build a media intelligence solution where it can seamlessly connect with all the writers, marketing people, editors, and can manage news feed sources from a single dashboard. It predicts what would be interesting to the readers across social networks, and which news stories will be popular on social or on the search engine. This helped to ride the wave of organic and social traffic to TechGenyz website. On the contrary, the development team, at Quavzent is building marketing intelligence solutions backed by artificial intelligence, which can help clients understand their market insight, competitor analysis, predictive analysis and help business grow.

Tech start-ups in India today

the process of how clients buy technology solutions or services. Clients prefer business relationship not just a solution efficiently, and cost-effectively be it via social media, email, text messages, live chats, or more. Swapan advises everyone to understand what they are looking for and give the solution to the challenges they are facing. He has created a strictly open working environment giving employees the liberty to think, learn, and build something amazing. This has helped his team to build a strong foundation and work culture which tells people what to do when the CEO isn’t in the room. He aims to make the company one of the top players in the media tech domain with robust tech solutions in the coming two years.

Advice to the Budding Entrepreneurs Entrepreneurship is an exciting journey. There are great ideas taking birth every day, but most of them get buried and never face the light. But, what Swapan says, “If you have hesitation in starting a business, he suggests not to start unless you are confident about your ideas that can bring a change. You will face challenges at every corner of the road, but take those challenges as an opportunity. Find people who have a similar thought process and build a great team and who are aligned with your vision. In the journey, there may be a time, when you will feel like leaving in the half-way but don’t let bad days bring you down rather stay positive. Believe in yourself and take calculative risks.”

Further, he said, “Getting into the social media bandwagon is no longer a matter of choice if you want to succeed. Your business and every business need it. The importance of social media in business is now more prominent than ever.”

Swapan describes the start-up ecosystem in India with a positive approach. He recollects, initially there were a handful of companies in the competition but since last decade there are a lot of unicorns emerging as new brands of the country. Swapan feels, just entering the ground is not enough but sustaining the market is crucial.

Imparting Challenges and Sharing its Experience Apart from hiring good talent, increasing and running the business, financial challenge is one of the most common challenges faced by every startup and TechGenyz was not an exception. The internet and social media have changed

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K.K.Kaushik

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he business world today is witnessing a transition as new technologies emerge to disrupt their existing systems. The newness does offer more enhanced services but comes with a hitch of how-to transform and adapt to the new technologies without hampering the current flow and revenues. To ensure smooth transitions, experts such as TechNEXA Technologies, who are more than just Service Providers. TechNEXA is one of the fastest-growing information technology consulting organization that implements and maintains high-performance IT systems for organizations of all sizes and a wide range of industries. It is focused on providing expert IT consulting, cloud computing solutions, cybersecurity services, managed services and business technology consulting to its customers.

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TechNEXA Technologies

Your trusted IT Consulting Partner

The Driving Force – The Management TechNEXA was formed with a vision to provide cost-effective & innovative solutions satisfying the expectations of our customers & improving their operational efficiency using the latest technologies.

Currently, the business is driven by industry veteran Mr K.K.Kaushik having invested 30+ years in the Industry. The management believes that the IT ecosystem is going through a transformation and there are many challenges like rapidly changing technologies, budget limitations, lack of expertise and inflexible vendor contracts etc. Keeping all these challenges in mind, TechNEXA Technologies was created to bridge the gap between the technology and the

organizations. We act more than just a service provider and help organizations to achieve their IT objectives while keeping the cost in control.

Tech-enabled Products TechNEXA’s specialities include cloud services & support, network & infrastructure design, managed services, project management, email services, network management, storage solutions, network security and various other emerging technology solutions.

Based on the industry requirements, it has also built 4 in-house products to help organizations optimise their operations. This includes VMS, Enterprise File Sharing platform, NOC Management Solution and IT Service Management Solution.

Developing and designing these

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products goes through a lot of brainstorming before being finalized. There are many criteria that TechNEXA considers while developing them. The challenge of service-business management begins with design. As with product companies, a service business can’t last long if the offering itself is fatally flawed. It must effectively meet the needs and desires of the customers. Some factors that the company considers are: · Trust and customer relationship are the major factors for any IT services company growth. · Many organizations have budget limitations and providing cost-effective solutions keeping their budget in mind plays a critical role. · Companies often live or die on the quality of their workforces, but because service businesses are typically people-intensive, a relative advantage in employee management has all the more impact there.

Top management must give careful attention to recruiting and selection processes, training, job design, performance management, and other components that make up the employee management system. More to the point, the decisions made in these areas should reflect the service attributes the company aims to be known for.

also need to keep the pace with the emerging technologies both in terms of knowledge and competencies.

Going by their own experience, the founder’s advice for the budding entrepreneurs is: ·

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Don’t view challenges as hurdles – Embrace each challenge as a learning opportunity. When you take small steps, you’ll reach your goals faster as compared to when you take big leaps.

Step in with a clear-cut vision – When entering into this industry, one should have a clear vision of what services is he going to offer and to what type of customer. Customer segmentation plays a critical role as this helps to sell the right product to the right audience.

Customer satisfaction should be the top priority – As now the IT industry is customer-oriented, the primary focus should be on the customer experience.

As for its growth, going forward, TechNEXA wishes to be a trusted IT consulting Organization and is planning to have national and global footprints.

Challenges that Shaped the Present TechNEXA is graduating with a steady pace and gunning for inorganic growth. The company started with a small team of 10. Taking one step at a time, it optimized various processes across the organization so that it can provide timely and cost-effective solutions to its clients. The Team kept growing with time and started building industry relationships with leading OEMs. The HR team plays a key role in ensuring that the employees are highly motivated and keep updated with the current IT trends. This has helped TechNEXA to achieve industry recognition as one of the fastest growing IT Consulting Organizations.

A Bubbling Industry Numerous start-ups are popping up in different industries in India. Team TechNEXA believes that only the players with a clear vision and the attitude to serve the customers (SEVA) will succeed. In modern times, customer satisfaction is one of the major factors which lead to growth or downfall of any organization. Emotional connect clubbed with AI is what is going to work. The upcoming solution providers

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