For all those students who attended my speech at the Technopreneurship event in Pune, my offer for helping start-ups with funding, connections, guidance is still open. Contact me on anandvc [at] hotmail.com with your idea.

International consultant David Batstone presents his experience dealing with India in his article titled "Not so fast to India":
http://www.rightreality.com/articles/not_so_fast_to_india.html

What are some ways in which India can solve the huge problem of the lack of customer service and of zero customer respect?
http://www.brainreactions.net/brainstorming/showall/846

The folks at 37signals.com have released a book that encompasses their business philosophy that is very innovative and agile. The book is called Getting Real and is available at http://gettingreal.37signals.com It is a fairly quick read and is easy-to-read even for the non-technical readers.

This current month's issue of BusinessWeek also has a feature on 37signals and their approach to go from concept to released product in 3 and a half-months or less. I am a big advocate of their philosophy because it can be a great mantra for Indian IT start-ups. The book professes a low-cost and lean approach to starting up that enables you to move quickly and engage customers early. Other key points in the book include the technique of being customer-centric in your product design and starting at the market-end, not at the engineering-end. They also list pitfalls that web-application-developing entrepreneurs commonly run into, and suggest how those can be avoided.

I lived in India for 19 years, and feel fortunate for my wide range of experiences in this blessed land. Born in a business family with a silver spoon, I never had any shortage of resources for learning and growing.

I grew up with the strict discipline enforced by my parents and grandparents and the high standards set by them. I was a class topper all throughout my primary and secondary school, and received tremendous love and support from my teachers and friends.

After my 10th grade, when I went for my diploma in computer engineering to Government Polytechnic, Mumbai, I got to see a very different side of life. I learnt to do hard work with my hands as I learnt things like carpentry, welding, plumbing and smithy along with the basics of technology and engineering.

I recently put my thoughts together in retrospect and carved out this article on "How India can be the most innovative place".

The URL is :
http://in.rediff.com/money/2005/dec/26bspec.htm

Please check it out.

The Innovation Trip that I have created based on the thinking mentioned in the article is here:

http://www.innovationtrip.com

It also includes workshops focused on KPO (Knowledge Process Outsourcing) related innovation.