HaritWorld August 23, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Business , add a commentHaritWorld is India’s answer to the ongoing ‘think green’ trend in the west. You can think of it as an outdoor activity camp, with aim to introduce attendees to ecology and nature. They current operate ‘CampHarit’ and ‘Ranger’s Club’ near Mumbai and offer wildlife tours to national parks and preserves.
There are activities for adults too- ‘HaritAcademy’ membership offers outdoor learning camps for yoga, stress management, team building etc. They also showcase tribal art and organize special events on a nature theme.
I like their site- it’s simple and informative. Its refreshing to see an organization built around activities that provide an escape from daily hustle of metro life and promote nature awareness.
SaharaCareHouse August 3, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Business , 1 comment so farI was never much of a visionary. Maybe that’s why the concept of online NRI Concierge Services never seemed to have a business potential in my mind. Obviously, I was wrong.
Sahara Care House is a venture of Sahara India Pariwar, the $10 billion Indian conglomerate. It provides over 60 support and concierge services in India for non-resident Indians. They aim to be a single-point facilitator for services in four categories: Healthcare (like medicine delivery, ambulance), Utility (paying bills, finding a lawyer, security guard etc.), Personalized (like travel arrangements, tax filing) and Relationship (Gifts, flowers, etc).
If you are an NRI, think of it as outsourcing some of your responsibilities and life- you can get your family’s electricity bill payment task for $4 a pop, or find them a security guard for $17. (Note charges may be a bit higher if you are not willing to shell out $110 membership + $1000 advance deposit).
Pun aside, this leaves me a bit more convinced about the viability of the ‘concierge’ business concept. Most NRI’s have the cash and the guilt (of not being there for families back home) to avail of these services. YourManInIndia is another such service by the ttk group. But it remains to be seen how these paid relationship ambassadors can handle both sides of this equation- NRI’s are bound to be over demanding and execution of such tasks is never easy in India.
Meanwhile, I’m tickled by the $17 ‘Kundli Matching’ and ‘Janampatri Making’ services. It’s outsourcing at it’s best
.
MouthShut May 3, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Business , 1 comment so farMouthShut is an review website focused on Indian consumer. It was started by Faisal Farooqui, a returning NRI, in 2000. The site claims around 80K members today (need to confirm this, I read it somewhere but can’t locate the source now) and is privately held, with some angel funding. Their compete stats confirm unique visitors to be consistently above 60K per month, which is pretty significant.
Let me start by saying that we need something like MouthShut. The average Indian consumer has practically no other way than word-of-mouth to research before shopping for products or services.
On the flip side, I’m disappointed with their user interface. Surf to the homepage and the first few seconds are spent absorbing the fragmented look-and-feel: inconsistent fonts, blinking graphics, numerous sub-sections, overloaded info.. the usual (see my post about hallmarks of an Indian website). I realize it’s hard to make a horizontal portal that has good navigation because there is simply too many categories and subcategories, but one can counter it by professional design. After 7 years of existence, the need for professional web design shows in various places at MouthShut. Maybe they need some good venture backing to go full throttle now. Content is spotty… good in some places (like website, cellphone reviews) where you would expect indulgence from net-savvy consumers, and not-so-good in others (like hospitals).
For sites that are horizontal in nature and go across the infinite sea of categories, I think the crux of usability is to know when to stop categorizing and consolidate. After one point, you tend to loose reader interest simply because it becomes a pain to navigate. For example, the main navigation bar at MouthShut (right below their banner) starts with the very logical categories of ‘Airlines’, ‘Appliances’, ‘Books’… but goes on to include ‘Microwave Ovens’ and ‘TV Commercials’ (!!).
Don’t get me wrong, I like MouthShut overall. It surprises me how much can one establish in the growing Indian internet space, even with a service that is not highly usable. In MouthShut’s case, maybe the key was to survive the initial four/five odd years and build up user base in a startup mode. We’ve got more than a billion people after all, even a fraction of that amounts to a lot 
Band of Angels February 6, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Business, Technology , add a commentI don’t feel like posting about VC’s. There are too many of them, and most of their websites are nothing but immodest showcases displaying their ‘expertise’ and portfolio. Reluctantly, I sometime do write about them because they are the driving force- unloading the equity in the Indian IT startup scene.
Band of Angels is a Delhi based group of individuals, some of them veterans of the IT industry in US. They have 3 investments currently (of interest is madhouse.in, the online movie rental for Delhi/Chandigarh).
Update: In July 2007, Google announced that they have joined as an institutional member of Band of Angels. Mo’ Money to go around..
Yo-China January 13, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Business , add a commentA fast rising chain of chinese food restaurants in India. They got some VC funding recently. Hear more about Yo-china on the podcast at IndiaTech.
IndiaPicture January 12, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Business , add a commentI like writing about sites like IndiaPicture. They seem to give hope to rising entrepreneurs, making a functional business case out of digitizing old business models.
The online media company was started by Dushyant Mehta in 2003, and now has over 60,000 images. It now claims to be the one of the largest repository of stock photos in south-east asia (though pictures are reportedly in the 100$-400$ range…even for India!). Dushyant tells more about the company and its history on a podcast interview given to IndiaTech.
Indiapicture was recently in news after signing up a deal with Corbis to be their exclusive distributor in India. Corbis is the world’s second largest stock photo website, famous for being funded by Bill Gates (interestingly enough, they were founded in 1989 and broke even only a year ago - way to go, Bill).
Novatium January 11, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Business, Technology , add a commentNovatium is a Chennai-based technology products and platform company that is famous for its mission of designing, developing and marketing the 100$ comptuer. The company ’s vision is to provide ‘Computing for the next billion’. Very professional and mature web profile.