CONTENTS

- THE BELIEVERS - THE OPPORTUNISTS - THE ALTERNATE VISION

THE BELIEVERS
People who knew entrepreneurship was the Chosen Path. They took the plunge straight after their MBA or after working barely a couple of years. And they persevered until they made it big!

p02

THE BOOK OF JOB Sanjeev Bikhchandani (PGP 1989), naukri.com

Sanjeev is India's most successful internet entrepreneur. For close to a decade he struggled on the sidelines but never gave up on his Big Idea. In 2006, naukri.com became the first dotcom to IPO on an Indian stock exchange.

p18

ROCK WITH IT, ROLL WITH IT Shantanu Prakash (PGP 1988), Educomp
Despite a regular middle class upbringing, Shantanu went into business while doing his BCom. The entrepreneurial streak continued after the MBA from IIM Ahmedabad. His company Educomp is today the leading provider of digital content for schools across India.

p28

THE CAT WITH NINE LIVES Vinayak Chatterjee (PGP 1981), Feedback Ventures
Vinayak quit his job at Ponds because he didnt see the point of selling soap for the rest of his life. Originally set up as a market research company, over the years, Feedback Ventures morphed into Indias leading infrastructure advisory and engineering firm.

p40

SOFTWARE COWBOYS Ashank Desai (PGP 1979), Mastek

In the early 80s, much before IT was a buzzword, Ashank Desai set up Mastek along with a couple of friends. Mastek was the first company to focus on India as a market and is today one of the top 15 IT companies in the country.

p54

GIVER OF ALL GOOD THINGS R Subramanian (PGP 1989), Subhiksha

He quit his job at Citibank 15 days after joining, feeling restless to do something 'more'. That something is today India's largest grocery chain Subhiksha. Subramanian famously rebuffed offers from Reliance Retail as he believes the best is 'yet to come'.

PGP is the two year Post Graduate Programme in Management at IIM Ahmedabad. The year denotes when the student graduated.

CONTENTS

THE BELIEVERS
People who knew entrepreneurship was the Chosen Path. They took the plunge straight after their MBA or after working barely a couple of years. And they persevered until they made it big!

p68

SWEET SUCCESS Narendra Murkumbi (PGP 1994), Shree Renuka Sugars

He shut down the first company he started after graduating because a Rs 5 crore turnover was not 'large enough'. His second venture Shree Renuka Sugars is today a Rs 1000 crore company, and has changed the lives of hundreds of sugarcane farmers.

p80

AT YOUR SERVICE Chender Baljee (PGP 1972), Royal Orchid Hotels

His family owns Baljee's, Simla's most famous hotel. Yet as a young management graduate, Chender decided to carve out his own niche. It took him 35 years but today Royal Orchid is a Rs 150 crore hospitality business.

p88

SUCH A LONG JOURNEY Madan Mohanka (PGP 1967), Tega Industries

In the 1970s it took Madan seven years to get government approval for a foreign collaboration. But he persevered with his dream of excellence in engineering and today, Tega Industries is the world's third largest company designing solutions in the field of mining equipment.

p102

THE ALCHEMIST Sunil Handa (PGP 1979), Eklavya Education Foundation/ Core Emballage
As the force behind the LEM (Laboratory in Entrepreneurial Motivation) course at IIMA, Sunil Handa has inspired countless students to become entrepreneurs. From a hard nosed businessman to an educational entrepreneur, his is a fascinating journey.

p120

YEH HAI YOUNGISTAN MERI JAAN Vardan Kabra (PGP 2004), Fountainhead School
In 2004, Vardan Kabra turned his back on an offer by multinational P&G to pursue his dream of starting Fountainhead School. He represents a new generation of young MBAs who are giving up seven figure salaries for the kick of being an entrepreneur.

CONTENTS

THE OPPORTUNISTS
These entrepreneurs did not plan to take this path but when opportunity knocked they seized it. Their stories go to show that you don't have to be 'born with it', you can develop an entrepreneurial bent of mind at any age.

p130

TRIPPING ALONG Deep Kalra (PGP 1992), makemytrip.com

Deep went into business the way every entrepreneur dreams it will happen: a venture capitalist offered him $ 2 million to start up. But with the dotcom bust he had to invest his life savings and buy back his own company. Makemytrip.com is today India's leading travel portal.

p144

BLOOM AND GROW Rashesh Shah (PGP 1989), Edelweiss Capital

In a world dominated by the likes of J P Morgan and Merrill Lynch, Rashesh Shah set up a large and successful homegrown investment bank in a single decade. But it wasn't a straight path to success - there were many bumps and detours.

p156

IT'S ALL ABOUT THE HONEY Nirmal Jain (PGP 1989), India Infoline
Nirmal shut down his information services business in 1999 and put all his eggs in the internet basket. His gamble paid off and today India Infoline is one of the country's biggest online trading platforms.

p166

IT'S NEVER TOO LATE Vikram Talwar (PGP 1970), EXL Service
After a long and distinguished career with Bank of America, Vikram Talwar could have spent the rest of his years playing golf. Instead he chose to set up a company which is today one of India's largest BPOs.

p176

DRUG BARON K Raghavendra Rao (PGP 1979), Orchid Pharma

Raghavendra Rao has built up a $300 million dollar pharma company in 13 short years. The son of a working class Railways employee, he now dreams of making Orchid India's first $1 billion pharma company.

p192

THE BANKER WHO BLINKED Jerry Rao (PGP 1973), Mphasis

A career Citibanker, Jaitirth (Jerry) Rao was bitten by the entrepreneurial bug in his late 40s. He built up a large and profitable company (Mphasis) but recently sold out to EDS because business is about passion as well as knowing when to let go.

CONTENTS

THE OPPORTUNISTS
These entrepreneurs did not plan to take this path but when opportunity knocked they seized it. Their stories go to show that you don't have to be 'born with it', you can develop an entrepreneurial bent of mind at any age.

p204

ICH BIN EIN ENTREPRENEUR Shivraman Dugal (PGP 1976), Institute for Clinical Research in India (ICRI)
Shivraman is someone who is always looking for the Next Big Thing. After a string of interesting jobs he set up one of India's first private colleges with a foreign tie up (Wigan and Leigh) and is now pioneering clinical research education in India.

p216

FOR LOVE, NOT MONEY Shankar Maruwada (PGP 1996), Marketics

He entered entrepreneurship by accident and his first venture folded up. But Shankar and his team used that failure to get it right the second time with 'Marketics', an analytics company which recently sold out to WNS for an estimated $65 million.

p230

MILLION DOLLAR SEAMSTRESS Ruby Ashraf (PGP 1983), Precious Formals

Ruby turned her hobby of designing clothes into a flourishing business. Her company Precious Formals, is one of the leading suppliers of prom dresses in America.

p242

ORDER OF THE PHOENIX Deepta Rangarajan (PGP 1989), IRIS

Deepta worked with American Express and CRISIL before starting IRIS, a financial information management service.

p254

HEALTH IS WEALTH Cyrus Driver (PGP 2000), Calorie Care

Cyrus quit his private equity job in Singapore to launch Calorie Care, India's first professional, calorie-counted meal delivery service. His own battle with weight prompted the idea for the business!

CONTENTS

THE ALTERNATE

VISION
These individuals are using entrepreneurship to create social impact. Or as a platform which allows them creative expression.

p262

THE ART OF GIVING Venkat Krishnan (PGP 1993), GiveIndia

He's worked with a newspaper, a television channel and as Principal of a school. Venkat then launched GiveIndia, to promote the culture of 'giving' in India. He is an entrepreneur but his mission is one with a difference.

SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL
p286

Anand Halve (PGP 1977), chlorophyll

After two decades in advertising Anand set up a brand consultancy called chlorophyll. He believes small is beautiful because in the quest for size and scale you lose out on the joy of creation. This is an alternate model of entrepreneurship.

A SENSE OF OWNERSHIP
p298

S B Dangayach (PGP 1972 ), Sintex

He is not the owner of the company but in every other sense works like an entrepreneur. The man behind the iconic Sintex water tanks believes in constant evolution and creation of new products. And after 34 years with one company he is still passionate about it!

BASIC INSTINCT
p310

Vijay Mahajan (PGP 1981), Basix

An IIT-IIM graduate, Vijay has devoted his life to addressing issues of inequality and social justice but through management techniques. He pioneered the concept of microfinance in India through an organisation called Basix which gives loans to the rural poor.

CONTENTS