In may 2015, Sushanto Mitra, founder and CEO of Lead Angels Network, an angel investment firm, decided to bet on the business prospects of MyCuteOffice, a Mumbai-based online portal that connects users to shared office spaces in six cities across the country. Mitra’s company invested an undisclosed sum in the marketplace for co-working spaces for one specific reason, its asset-light model, which he says provides opportunities to grow and scale the business much faster.Though Mitra’s investment was in the digital platform, MyCuteOffice derives its core value from the brick and mortar business of the fast-growing co-working space. The cities — Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Mumbai — which the portal covers are all startup hubs, where there is an ever-increasing demand for cost-effective office space for budding entrepreneurs.MyCuteOffice is adding one new city to its portfolio every two months, a clear indication of the growing presence and demand for shared office spaces all over the country including in tier-two and tier-three pockets such as in Barauni, Bihar and Nagpur.Roaming WorkersWorld over, the concept of co-working places, where different companies or individuals share working space, gained steam with the increase in the number of individual workers and freelancers. According to a survey done by online co-working magazine Deskmag in February 2013, there was an increase of 83 per cent in co-working spaces in just one year serving a total of 117 per cent more members.Unlike globally, there is no concrete data on co-working spaces in India, perhaps because it is still in its nascence. A broad indication though, comes from the number of people who are opting to freelance. The Global Online Work Report 2014, published by California-based online staffing platform Elance-oDesk, says there are 1.9 million Indian freelancers (or potential co-working space hunters) registered on the site and this number has been increasing at 62 per cent for the past three years. The report lists India among the top 10 freelancer-earning countries globally with a growth rate in these earnings of 22 per cent year on year.Success FormulaOne of the main benefits of co-working spaces is that they provide the infrastructure which otherwise would have been prohibitively expensive. Aakriti Bhargava, co-founder of startup marketing firm Boring Brands says: “I used to work out of Gurgaon-based co-working space 91Springboard for a year. What helped is the easy access to facilities such as a meeting room and the fully-equipped, 24/7 corporate canteen which is difficult to afford in a rented office. Also, there is absolutely no hassle of handling the administrative work and one can focus on getting the work done. The place also helps to attract good talent as they expect a certain quality of workplace hygiene in addition to a decent pay and benefits.”The presence of like-minded people under one roof also helps with opportunities to exchange ideas, barter services or boost each others’ morale, which comes in handy especially in the startup culture that is otherwise replete with ups and downs, say people who have used co-working spaces in their entrepreneurial journey.Bang For The Buck: (Left): Sharin Bhatti (sitting)and Sudeip Nair (standing) of Mumbai-based The Hive convert their co-working space into an events venue in the evening for additional revenue (below): an event at The Hive. (Photographs by Umesh Goswami)While customers find co-working spaces convenient, providers of these services are yet to find a sure-shot formula for success. Says Pranav Bhatia of Stirring Minds, an 8,000 sq. ft co-working space in central Delhi, “We keep the margins low to ensure full occupancy of the space and sometimes give the space at half price or even less to social enterprises.” Bhatia, in fact, started a co-working space in August 2013 because he wanted to create a ready pool of talent to outsource projects for his California-based tech startup Lemon Interactive Inc. But as he grew more involved with the co-working space startup, VCs and individual investors began contacting him for steady advice. Now he too has become an investor with equity in four startups.Most of these spaces charge per workstation and one can rent a place on a day-to-day, monthly or an yearly basis. Pranay Gupta, co-founder of 91Springboard says the payment model of co-working spaces can be compared with that of Amazon’s Web Services — pay only for what you use.The Side ViewIt isn’t just service providers who are experimenting with different models but developers who own the real estate as well. One basic model involves earning more cumulative rental income from different clients than what one would have got from just one customer. “As a developer if one can get better rent from the property by renting it as a co-working space then it’s a no brainer. Another way to rent out the property is through revenue sharing so the co-working space provider pays the property owner a certain amount as the base rent component and the remainder in revenue share. Co-working space providers prefer this method as it saves them from paying large rents upfront, especially when they are starting out the business,” says Ankush Johar, partner, Lloyd Venture, a multinational investment company that has recently invested in a 10,000 sq. ft co-working space in Gurgaon. Full House: Pranav Bhatia of Stirring Minds, a co-working space in Delhi, keeps the margins low to ensure full occupancy, sometimes even giving the space at half price to social enterprisesThe revenue share percentage depends on the negotiation between the two parties. Usually, there is a base rent to be paid and the revenue sharing can be in 50:50, 70:30 or 80:20 ratios. The terms of the negotiation are based on the risk appetite of the real estate owner and also on the trust and goodwill of the operator.Topping UpLloyd Ventures may have invested in the co-working spaces business, but the fact remains that building and managing space is capital-intensive and not many investors are willing to fund the developers. “The returns one can expect in this business aren’t as high as one can get from successful exits from a mobile business, where it can go as high as 100x. The returns usually vary 20-40 times depending on investment made in the co-working space,” explains Stirring Minds’ Bhatia.To meet the high cost of investment this business requires, these entrepreneurs have come out with alternative streams of revenue in addition to the fees they charge their users.One way is to collect a finder’s fee by connecting freelancers to companies who want to outsource projects or by helping the VCs identify potential startups for funding. Sobin Thomas, founder of Geek Out, a co-working space for techies, with two locations in Mumbai, says most of the revenue that they earn is from the finder fees alone. “In this industry, the finder’s fee varies from anywhere between 5 to 10 per cent depending on the project. There are companies who contact us on a weekly basis for outsourcing the projects. The average cost of these projects is around $4,000 which the developer gets. We charge 5 per cent of the total project’s cost,” he explains.What makes it easy for space providers is their ready access to the community of freelancers and startsup and also the insider’s information they have about their products and services, talent, etc., information that would interest the venture capitalists intensely. Being able to connect these dots is a win-win for all the entities — more revenue for the operator, the VCs and for the users who get greater exposure and recognition.Another source of revenue for co-working spaces is through events to provide mentorship, technical skills and networking opportunities to these young companies. The promoters of The Hive see their co-working space as a place that metamorphoses into an events arena in the evening for performance artists, stand-up comedians, or music groups. “What we are trying to do is build the business model focused on where the maximum returns are. So, we have divided this place into a co-working space during the day and for hosting events at night for full utilisation,” says Sharin Bhatti, co-promoter of The Hive. In fact they designed their three-storied bungalow into a co-working space, a workshop and a cafeteria so there is enough space for all kinds of events — founder-dating events, hackathons, bookkeeping or taxation workshops.Co-working spaces are trying every trick in the book to create a sustainable business for themselves and a self-sufficient ecosystem for startups. The investment Mitra’s Lead Angel Network made in MyCuteOffice could just be the beginning. If the new approaches enhance the business prospects for these co-working space providers, the target of future investments could well be these brick and mortar co-working space entities themselves instead of online portals. If WeWork, a New York based shared office space provider can raise its fourth round of funding of $355 million in December 2014, can Indian players be far behind? sonal@businessworld.in, @sonalkhetarpal7(This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 13-07-2015)
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An American business group will be in India next month to meet investors keen to take up projects that come with a promise of US residence permit. The Ashcroft Sullivan Economic Development Centers (ASEDC) and The Jha Group (TJG) have formed a partnership to bring investment and economic opportunities to India under the EB-5 program. Overseen by the US Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS), the US Immigrant Investor Program (EB-5) provides foreign nationals the opportunity to become residents in the US for a period of two years upon making an investment of $1 million, or $500,000 in a designated Targeted Employment Area, in a new commercial enterprise. The new joint venture, known as Ashcroft Sullivan Jha, will hold its initial launch in India. It will set up offices in the country and educate investors about the opportunities available to them through the EB program. The Jha Group is headed by its founders Vibhuti Jha and Satish Jha. They lead a group of professionals with experience in banking, finance, media, international business, technology and entrepreneurship. "We are thrilled to be partnering with the Jha Group to bring economic opportunities to India. Vibhuti and Satish are leaders in their field and have deep roots in this emerging economy," Mike Sullivan, principal at Ashcroft Sullivan Economic Development Center, said in a statement. "They have been at the forefront of driving Indo-US relations since they came to the United States and will be a valuable partner to us in their home country," Sullivan added. Sullivan along with partners Joe Fitzpatrick and Brett Griffith, accompanied by the Jha founders, will be in India in late June for meetings and presentations in Delhi, Mumbai and Dubai. "Over the past decades people of Indian origin have flourished and taken pride in contributing with their technical knowledge and entrepreneurial skills in the US ecosystem and TJG is proud to partner with ASEDC to contribute in achieving the laudable objective of EB5," said TJG chairman Satish Jha. Vibhuti Jha has been an integral part of Indo-US relations since the early 90s, the group said in its statement. In his role as a senior executive with American Express Bank International, Vibhuti pioneered the development of investment/deposit programs for expatriate Indians living in the US to invest in India through the bank. Satish Jha served as an adviser to Dr Manmohan Singh at The South Commission in Geneva. As federally designated regional centers, ASEDC aims to create new jobs in the Mid Atlantic and New England regions, expanding economic productivity and help foreign entrepreneurs obtain permanent residency for themselves and their families. The ASEDC is led by the former US attorney general John Ashcroft, former head of the Department of Justice David Ayers, and former deputy director of alcohol, tobacco, and firearms Michael Sullivan. (BW Online Bureau)
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It’s the last 10 overs of a 50-over game, India is bowling first. The batting team has already crossed 250 run mark and are advancing steadily at 10 runs per over. India will have to bat exceptionally well to chase down the run mountain and win the ODI. The bowling changes are critical and the fielders have to be at the right areas. Senior players are chipping in with words of advice and there needs to be a constant check on the over rate. Bowlers need to stick to the plans. He needs to keep a hawk eye for each delivery bowled as he is the wicket keeper, he has to go down and wait for the ball, stand up after the bowl is bowled and run up to the stumps to create a run out chance. All this, and surely much more. How often have we seen Dhoni do this during the slog overs? Keeping the wickets and being the ‘finisher’ in the batting line up while successfully captaining the Indian team is a true mark of an all rounder. Dhoni took up all these challenges from 2007 when the Indian ODI cricket team was in transition. With the senior players no longer at their peak and new teammates still settling in , the ODI team then, can be tagged as more of a ‘startup’ in a corporate terminology. It required a leader, a true all rounder to lead from the front and elevate the team from a startup to the world champions in ODI and T20. The role of modern day CFOs in a typical startup environment is somewhat similar. A start-up demands that the CFO wear multiple hats, as the business negotiates its way through uncertainty, an ever present cash crisis and the operational demands of a rapid scale up. Restricting themselves to their ‘finance’ domain is not only sub-optimal for a CFO in a start up, it can be downright dangerous to the health and even the survival of the organisation. So, what should the CFO of a start up be thinking about? Cash, Cash, Cash: At a startup, cash flows (and not necessarily profit) are the make or break factor to determine whether the enterprise will survive. Demand, sales and revenues take time to pick up and the enterprise needs to be able to predict its cash burn accurately. Whether the startup is in the ideation stage or an in early growth phase and whether it is making ends meet or has got the initial round of funding from VCs / PEs, the CFO plays a critical role in fund raising, in monitoring the end use of funds and in tracking the cash flow runway to ensure that the Promoter/ CEO is not out of fuel (cash) in the lead up to achieving profitable scale. Forge a winning partnership with the CEO: Like a good ‘finisher’ in an ODI game, good CFO plays two critical roles for his/ her company. One, he plays according to the situation and two; he likes to stay till the end to see him team home. Promoter/ CEOs vary a great deal in terms of experience, ability, temperament, commercial awareness and response to risk. A good CFO needs to bring in aggression in the though process if the Promoter/ CEO is naturally conservative or as is often the case, bring in conservatism, if the CEO is of an aggressive mindset. A CFO also sees the team through to the end, by measuring progress against plans and ensuring that red flags are highlighted on time for corrective actions to be taken. Since most start ups have a very limited runway, helping the CEO to improve ability to spot, identify, define and correct mistakes is a critical role of the CFO. CFO - the new #2: Where the CEO is busy building the business, acquiring customers and ensuring good customer experiences, the CFOs are taking on larger roles in start-ups and acting as the virtual #2in their organisations. This is a massive responsibility for the CFO to carry, as he has to share the same passion as the CEO, needs to have adequate experience of working in start up like situation, be functionally competent, command the respect of the operations team and help the CEO generate value from the enterprise. To build credibility and earn respect from fellow workers, a start up CFO needs to be hands on problem solver, not afraid of rolling up his/ her sleeves to ‘fix the plumbing’. The ability to help the CEO see the big picture (macro), yet zoom in to fixing the detail (micro) is not easy to find in one individual. In fact, MyCFO was born to fulfil this ‘hard to meet’ expectation of a start up CEO, of having the CFO as a sounding board and operational problem solver, while being functionally competent in the finance domain. Going beyond the ‘F’ word : Start up CFOs are usually young, passionate, all rounders who are curious and are proactive about being part of the solution. Wanting to get involved with everything that is to do with the growth of the startup and not be restricted to the ‘F’ (i.e. Finance) word is the hallmark of a good start up CFO. The CFOs for the start-ups have to be the C'X’Os; individuals with the ‘X’ factor and individuals whose presence can improve the ‘X’ (valuation multiple) for the business. The CFO brings strong execution will to ‘make things happen’. He is the go-to-person for solutions to practical business problems, not all of which are finance issues. A good start up CFO in involved in deciding monthly office overhead spends (admin role), designing an ESOP or defining a performance management scheme for senior managers (HR role) or in recommending whether allowing some freebies to customers to retain them or attract new ones is a good strategy (business development / marketing role), measuring the effectiveness of the sales process (sales role), having brain storming sessions with the Product Development team to provide his view on how a layman would perceive the product at the current price point (acting as dummy customer to the Product Team) and in chalking out medium term to long term strategies with taking responsibility for financial goals of the startup (board role). An all rounder CFO is what start-ups need. Good CFOs are adapting to this world of uncertainty and opening up to avenues way beyond finance and accounts. It’s time every start-up answers an imperative question “Do you have the Dhoni in your team?” The author, Anam Dhila, is a Chartered Accountant (CA) and Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA - US) by qualification. Anam works as Project Manager at MyCFO
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E-retailer Snapdeal.com said on Wednesday (8 April) it bought online mobile recharge firm Freecharge for an undisclosed amount in a bid to boost its reach in the fast-growing mobile transactions business. Snapdeal, backed by SoftBank Corp, competes with Flipkart and Amazon.com Inc's India unit in the country's online shopping market, which is expected to be worth $102 billion by 2020, according to Morgan Stanley. Easy availability of smartphones and cheap data plans have resulted in most of those transactions to be made via apps, where consumers use their mobile phones for everything from buying clothes to booking movie tickets. Freecharge allows users to top up amounts on their mobile phone or internet connections and get coupons as reward for using its service. Snapdeal Chief Executive Kunal Bahl said 1 million mobile transactions would take place daily once the companies are combined. About 75 percent of all Snapdeal transactions now are through mobile users, he said. Freecharge would remain an independent platform even after the deal, which is expected to close within the next 6 months, Bahl said, without specifying how much much it paid to buy the mobile recharge firm. With the acquisition, Snapdeal would become "the largest mobile commerce company in India," the company said in a statement.(Agencies)
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Small businesses with good time management are more likely to see growth and are perfect breeding grounds for new technologies. Enterprises, small and medium-sized, which are tech-savvy, tend to create jobs and drive more revenue as compared to their lesser tech-savvy counterparts. This fact has already been established in a research commissioned by Microsoft Corporation and another survey independently conducted by The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) which is a global management consulting firm and leading advisor on business strategy. The findings of both the surveys depict that if more SMEs in India adopted the latest IT tools, there is potential for SME revenue to grow by $56 billion and create 1.1 million new jobs.Event ticketing industry, which is estimated at $1 billion in India alone, excluding tickets sold for buses, trains, airplanes, movies, museums, art galleries, etc, has commenced leveraging the technology about a year ago. Technology has been deployed not only to list events, but to categorize tickets and enable their online sale by powering them with payment gateways. The e-commerce-enabled technology platforms are now moving to the next notch by becoming partners with large-format event organisers.The Indian economy today, to a large extent, is driven by the SME sector and there is a tremendous opportunity for economic growth. Technology has played a pivotal role in helping these SMEs expand their businesses. The organizations adopting technology have witnessed enhanced efficiencies that have brought visibility to key performance parameters. It also gives better control over operations, reach newer markets and grow their businesses. For instance, event technologies have evolved to encompass multiple segments. Their horizons have widened from not just selling tickets online, but the other products like attendee check-in, attendee networking, and enlisting of venues have all been brought onto technology platforms, making small and medium enterprises entrench themselves in this business.As per the survey, IT-enabled SMEs, which are denoted as technology leaders, grew in revenues faster by 15 per cent and were also able to create twice as many jobs as SMEs that use less technology. Such companies also reported greatly improved employee mobility, scalability and agility. The report also showed that the latest wave of technological advancement, such as cloud services, brings potential for the most far-reaching innovation and business growth ever. It also creates opportunities for more SMEs to achieve the growth rates of technology leaders by leveraging technology to fuel productivity and growth. It was also found that high performing SMEs were always ahead of the mainstream IT adoption and constantly integrated and upgraded the latest technology in their systems. This not only improved their productivity, but also helped them connect with new customers and markets, particularly outside their own region or country and compete with larger players. These companies employ the full range of available tools - from productivity software to Internet connectivity and cloud-based services.Small enterprises with less than a million dollar annual gross merchandise volumes are able to visualize a manifold business growth to the tune of almost $25 million annually, just because they are able to tap the technology resources and align them with the business.In the past few years, SMEs have played a vital role in developing the Indian economy and beyond. It has also been the primary driver of job growth. It, however, remains a large and informal economy in India, which mostly does not get reflected in the statistics. It is indeed true that these SMEs provide a large opportunity to increase output and employment substantially. They would also lead to a more vibrant economy by outperforming innovation. In spite of this, it has been revealed that the adoption of IT services by SMEs is absolutely uneven. Apart from this, many SMEs and their customers do not have access to modern broadband networks and many lack the skills to get the most out of it. These SMEs are also still using large amounts of old and less efficient hardware and software. The reason behind this is the highly priced new devices due to high import duties. SMEs are also concerned about online security and privacy. Despite these obstructions, the growth prospects described in the study are too important for governments and the IT industry to ignore.At this point, the event industry, which is on the forefront of leveraging the IT to the hilt, are now embedding live streaming as an added offering to the event organisers and also such offerings are seen as revenue grossers.One of the major drawbacks of the Indian economy is that almost 90 per cent of SMEs in India have no access to the internet as compared to only 22 per cent of SMEs in China and 5 per cent of SMEs in the US. As the government looks at making the most of the economic growth, it is important for the policy makers and the IT industry to implement strategies to remove barriers to IT adoption by addressing the top concerns of small businesses about using more technology. The author is Founder & CEO, MeraEvents.com
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The information highway, or the network, has been for many the hope of humanity in sharing knowledge. Yet the digital world, like the real world, is prone to focused attacks because some groups believe that information, when in the hands of large corporations, is not democratic. There are large gates or forts in the IT world that differentiate between those civilized and those that are not. Today large IT security companies like Symantec, RSA, McAfee and Norton are building these forts for Fortune 2000 enterprises and they secure data centres and networks for these corporations. But with the world of devices and applications converging on small enterprises, there needs to be an overhaul in the way IT security is looked at, both in terms of cost and its reach. Enter AppKnox, a quirky startup from Bangalore, whose business model is as unique as the individuals who run it. Incubated at Microsoft Ventures, their motto is to ready enterprises for the next wave of IT security, which is about being agile and proactive during the deployment of mobile applications. Three engineers, or the musketeers, Prateek Panda, Subho Halder and Harshit Agarwal have got together to tell the world that they need not build standard fences; instead they ask them to take the fight to the hackers by understanding security at the code's scripting level. "Security is the last piece which software developers think about, it is a procedure for them and therefore several applications out there, on all mobile operating systems, are vulnerable," says Subho Halder, co-founder at AppKnox. Early DaysThey met at a college in Orissa, seven years ago, and were looking at software programming through a different lens. For them every program could be broken into and reprogrammed to fit their commands. Their search for breaking code took them deeper into the dark world of the black hats, these were the wizards and sorceresses of the computer world or just plain people, who break into computing programs to steal information or to help organisations secure their applications. It’s a good thing that these guys have seen the dark side and are now out there to "serve and protect" the world. However, their learnings were not treated with fondness. Like all things unconventional, they were shunned by many. Once employed, after college, the curiosity to tell their organisations that their applications could be broken into led them to trouble. Their organisation put the brakes on them and the boys were pulled up for pointing out mistakes. They were hitting at the sanctity of the organisation, or more so the chief technology officer's ego. In fact, an IT services company, where Subho worked, threatened to sack him and warned him not to ever dabble with such things. "It's sad that a good intention is always hushed up because the company does not have good IT security policies and wants to cover it up," Halder says. Nevertheless, these experiences made them stronger since the business or market numbers proved that they could become entrepreneurs. Organisations spend $71 billion on enterprise information security. By 2020 the number could go up to $100 billion. Gartner predicts that this year alone enterprises would spend $6 billion for cloud based applications. With Gartner predicting that the world will have 50 billion devices being connected, protecting the information highway is going to be like the American movie Tron. For those who have not seen the movie, human beings enter the computer world to fight corrupt computer programs trying to extend their dominance in the physical world. Why AppKnox?The genesis of AppKnox in 2014 began with an intention to help software developers focus on security before they release their app. All that the user has to do is to send the binary of the app on AppKnox's website. Voila! The AppKnox "engine" will tell you about the flaws in the scripting code, the source code and the machine code. Their business model is based on software-as-a-service and will also consult with companies in making their IT security stronger for their mobile play. Their service will benefit a whole host of small companies that cannot afford proprietary security software. They have raised pre-seed money of $19700 from a Singapore-based incubator called JFDI Asia and are well on their way to raising angel money. But why do these market or industry numbers make sense? For that we need to go back to 1985 when the world's first virus was created, by two Pakistani software entrepreneurs, on a floppy disk. They created the software to corrupt information stored in computers. But the virus had to physically move from Pakistan to the USA through a 5 inch floppy disc to corrupt computers. From there on it brought down several university computers. It made those Pakistani engineers, Basit and Amjad Farooqi, world famous. Today information is sent over the network and the highway is open to information bandits. There are millions of viruses that sit in the network to destroy or steal information everyday. Therefore, the need to have more folks patrolling on the "civilized" side. The business for AppKnox will depend on its ability to sign up more customers. For this, it needs money, but finding it can prove hard for an IT security startup. There is a reason for that because the Indian market is still not concerned about network or mobile security. Earlier an innovative Bangalore-based startup called RedForce Labs, which pioneered protection - from hackers - of online money transfers, could not succeed because banks were not convinced of the hardware-oriented business model. The banks cited that the startup included, in their business model, payment for an external USB device that would infuse protection during money transfers. However, the idea was pure genius because any software can be broken into and the startup made an effort to protect information through a security code infusion from a plugged in external device. AppKnox seems to be the next extension. And their best bet is to scale up to survive.
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