Avashya May 1, 2008
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Blogs, Technology , add a commentAvashya is a site tracking news and analysis of web 2.0 happenings in India. Besides web 2.0 tech type content, they veer into bollywood and cricket too (which is a bit puzzling for me to see in a site with a web 2.0 tagline). Regardless, their tech section is somewhat useful since they aggregate posts from well-read sources. Site may not be the most good-looking but is functional and easy to navigate. One of these days I’m going to make a blogroll for eIndia, and stick Avashya in there.
Pluggd.in March 12, 2008
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Blogs, Individual, Technology , add a commentPluggd.in is Ashish Sinha’s blog where he reviews Indian tech startups. It has an excellent inventory of upcoming startups, and useful resources like interviews with Indian entrepreneurs, VC insights, jobs, forum etc. It’s a regularly updated site (unlike eIndiaEmoticon Grin) and I found lots of cool links there.
It’d be nice to have a index or categorization of some sort, though. I wanted to see healthcare related startups and didnt find keyword search efficient from that perspective. Nevertheless, a very useful site if you want to keep a pulse on the Indian startup scene.
ByIndia December 6, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Technology , 1 comment so farThe nascent Indian online-businesses space has been growing like cancerous tissue- with no particular direction, an undifferentiated intense growth that has (almost) no cure. Local Indian content search is yet another niche in that growth.
Byindia found limelight when it was bought in October 2006 by Web2Corp, a U.S.-based technology company, with an intent of doing what Baidu did for Chinese people. The big additions planned are social networking, auction, classifieds, video and syndicated advertising elements. Great. That’s what we need- another horizontal portal. Why can’t these ambitious technology companies hunting in developing countries understand the stickiness of Google- it offers simple, reliable search without diluting it with superfluous additions. Heck, even Baidu does that. Focus! People, Focus! It’s not just about the search algorithms.
Anyway, there is no doubt that for Internet to get ubiquitous in India, people need local content; and users seeking that local content, need a focused search tool. There is significant leverage to be found in being a first-mover for local search, because all the big boys of search (Google, Yahoo, MSN, Ask..) are ultimately going to fight for domination outside US too. That would be a sweet time to flip over a successful local search engine for a truckload of money.
My ByIndia search with ‘car rental Delhi’ bought back a terse “did not match any documents” result. Same keywords in Google retrieved multiple websites of actual rental companies in Delhi. So Google won. What a surprise.
Indiblogger.in December 6, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Blogs, Technology , 5commentsIt may now be time to start a list around Indian blog directories. Indiblogger.in is another addition to that group of directories specifically listing blogs of Indian origin.
It’s hard to set your site apart in a growing commodity-like space, but Indiblogger does a good job of being distinct. Apart from the hip language ( ‘no dogs were injured in making of this website’, ‘Indified by..’, terse FAQ page), they offer some niceties like badges (multiple flavors of graphics that bloggers can display on their blog), wordpress theme and Google-powered custom search for Indian blogs. All of these are good ideas that can make bloggers look at Indiblogger favorably.
Although I couldn’t find details on who actually is behind Indiblogger, the fact that they have a relevant, concise and lucid blog gives me an impression that the founders are passionate and serious about it. According to their blog, they recently added a social networking feature that will enable users to build a network of blogs they read. I couldn’t figure out the details of that feature (guess I’d have to register for that insight). Like I’ve said in the past, it’s always a good idea to put a ‘How it works’ or ‘Features’ type link from homepage so potential registrants can understand the benefits before they go through the effort.
That being said, eIndia and Indiblogger.in have one thing in common: no apparent business model 
(except the ubiquitous model of advertising, of course!). PS: Indiblogger does claim to be non-profit enterprise.
Update: On Jan 28th, Indiblogger team launched Indiboogle.in, a google custom search powered search engine for Indian blogs. I haven’t had time to play with it enough to review it’s performance yet, but if you did, leave a comment below.
BlogAdda October 16, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Blogs, Technology , add a commentBlogAdda was started on Aug. 15, 2007 by Nettalk as a one-stop resource for Indian blogs. Bloggers can list their blogs here and prospective readers can discover them based on tags, read the latest posts and rate them.
Indian blogs may eventually need a content-aggregators like BlogAdda, but I’m not sure if the compelling need exists today. The vast majority of Indian blogs are individual efforts, with no regular updates and minimal reader-base (yeah, I know…eIndia falls into the same category). I’m unclear as to how BlogAdda would make money while the market matures in terms of demand. BlogAdda claims more than 600 users and 200 blogs listed as of September 2007.
The site is good-looking, and has a prudent “Beta” sign up. The content is not much at present, compared to the other alternative Indian-blog/blogger directories like Labnol’s India Blogs 1.0, BlogStreet, Indian Blogger List, DesiBlogs or Technorati’s India Blogs.
eHealthOpinion September 13, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Healthcare, Technology , add a commenteHealthOpinion is an upcoming Healthcare IT startup by Ahmedabad-based MediSoft Telemedicine Pvt. Ltd. Launched on 24th July 2007, eHealthopinion aims to provide a platform for patients and doctors to connect remotely.
Basic idea is that patients (along with referring doctor) can initiate an online ‘case’ that can then be taken up by one of the registered ‘expert’ physicians. The service is free for the patient (and referring doctor) to submit the case, and free for the expert doctor to have a basic response functionality. The business model seems to be around a paid ‘premium’ membership for expert doctors, not sure if eHealthOpinion also takes a cut of the fee charged by expert doctor per case.
I think eHealthOpinion is a great networking tool for doctors- it a viable alternative for building professional relationships by directing referral traffic from a generalist to a specialist physician. It’s also an avenue for distressed patients to get virtual second-opinions, and can play a significant role as our healthcare economy moves online.
Having said that, the scope of clinical conditions that can be assessed just on the basis of written text is limited. Telemedicine is a spectrum of solutions- it can range from a simple phonecall/email to remote-monitoring (like ideatel or visicu) or domain solutions like PACS and robotic surgery. Even telepathology and teledermatology are on the horizon. Every one of these involves a wide array of technologies to solve clinical conditions and/or help care providers. Another issue with any web 2.0 solution is that the audience is fickle, they may start using the site in droves, but leave just as quickly when the initial enthusiasm dies. eHealthOpinion has impressive numbers for a fresh startup- 175 patients, 109 doctors and 27 hospitals from 20 countries had registered as this post goes online (official stats from the founder via email on 13th September 2007).
The website is quite professionally done with a neat design. Since it focuses on a relatively unconventional concept (of online consultations), it’d have been prudent to include a “How it works” section on homepage. Although the concept becomes clear once you click on the FAQ pages (buried in the menu), it’s still a good idea to allay the newcomers anxiety right away.
MediSoft has been operational since 2001, and besides eHealthOpinion, they have another product called ‘Tele Doctor 2.0‘ which is a desktop-based telemedicine system. Company statistics show that it has been installed in 105 locations in five countries. It’s heartening to see Indian entrepreneurs taking tangible steps in defining this upcoming market already.
YosCare.in September 7, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Healthcare, Technology , 1 comment so farYosCare is the product website for Yos Technologies, a Bangalore-based healthcare IT startup. The company seems to have formally come together in May 2007 when it secured its first round of funding- $1.25 million. Among its angel investors is the notable Rajesh Jain who founded IndiaWorld in 1995 and sold it to Sify in 1999 for $115 million.
Back to YosCare, though. It’s projected as a ‘e-Health Gateway’ that connects providers, patients, hospitals, Labs, Pharmacies and other healthcare players together. A provider to be able to access medical record in an emergency, or to remind the patient of an appointment are few of the much-needed improvements that YosCare can provide to Indian healthcare. But, as usual, I’m going to play the devil’s advocate more than the optimist.
In my view, having foreigners in the website graphics (even though its an India-focused company) is least of YosCare problems. YosCare has a lofty goal overall- the IT infrastructure and basic applications need to be pervasive enough in Indian healthcare economy for such product to be commercially viable. Although YosCare is sticking to international standards like HL7 , it doesn’t really matter If most pharmacies/labs/hospitals the patient goes to don’t have IT systems (and in the rare chance they do, it’s not necessarily HL7 compliant). I know its a chicken-and-egg situation, but that’s the Achilles heel- the overall penetration of IT as such is low for YosCare to leverage it effectively for a “gateway”. That argument aside, a remote-hosted model needs a minimum level of connectivity. What happens when the connection is down?
Second issue is around the consumer-controlled Personal Health Record. How many of the inundating patient population today have the initiative or (more importantly) the means to access/maintain/own their ‘personal’ health records? Insignificant fraction. That’s not because Indians don’t value their personal health info, but because they don’t have an incentive for doing so. Even in paperwork-heavy US healthcare, PHR’s haven’t taken off because most consumers (who have acute health issues) don’t see the value for it. Mobile-based health info is also an exaggerated concept today- besides an appointment reminder and few other logistical items, what else can you send in an SMS? and how secure is that mode for personal information?
Anyways, I do applaud YosCare on being one of the pioneers in a market plagued with difficulties (they have a nice ‘beta’ sign overlay on the logo). They seem to have a competent team and decent funding, I hope all my dismaying rant about the market conditions is proved wrong by them.
TeleDoc.org July 8, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Healthcare, Non-Profit, Technology , add a commentTeleDoc is a project of Jiva Institute, an India-based non-profit research and development organization that aims to foster sustainable development by producing innovations. Launched as a pilot project in 15 villages in Haryana in April 2003, TeleDoc provides handheld mobile phone devices to village-based health workers in India, permitting them to communicate with doctors remotely.
TeleDoc uses java-enabled mobile telephones to provide real-time ability to record and transmit diagnostic information that doctors can analyze and then prescribe medication and treatment. At a regional office, medicines are prepared and picked up by field workers, and delivered to patients in their homes through a network of pharmacies and delivery personnel. The approximate cost of this entire process is 70 rupees (US$1.50) per consultation, which is pretty impressive.
TeleDoc won the World Summit Award for eHealth in 2003 at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva, Switzerland. Jiva is an organization based out of Faridabad (Haryana) promoting Ayurveda techniques.
In my view, TeleDoc signifies yet another indigenous IT solution to healthcare issues in India. There are plenty of such isolated efforts in existence today (just read about Andhra Pradesh and TamilNadu government’s Disease Surveillance Solution implemented by Voxiva) and hopefully will be the agents of change.
HISPIndia.org July 8, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Healthcare, Non-Profit, Technology , comments closedHISPIndia.org is a not-for-profit organization that supports design, development and implementation of Public Health Information Systems in India. The team behind it comes from University of Oslo (Norway), SCTIMST (Kerala), IIITM (Kerala).
Health Information System Project (HISP) activities started in India in 2000, and the resultant software (DHIS- District Health Information Software) software was deployed in the state of Andhra Pradesh. As the project grew, it led to formation of HISPIndia as an NGO in 2003. Today, HISPIndia has about 35 full-time staff and is active in Kerala, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh, and soon in Karnataka.
HISP projects are also being run in other developing countries- Ethiopia, South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania , Botswana, Malawi, Nigeria, Zambia and Vietnam. As a ‘network’, HISP aims to strengthen open source health software, share best practices and deploy the technology working directly with health services of each country. Masters and doctoral students from University of Oslo leverage HISP for research activities. If you are into Healthcare IT, check out their software resources section and wiki.
Soundbuzz June 27, 2007
Posted by Pallav Sharda in : Technology , add a commentSOUNDBUZZ is a prominent online music retailer for Asian market that does more than just music download. Since their inception around 2000, they have grown into a mobile+online content provider offering back-end technology, digital rights clearances, and acquisition of licenses from music publishers and recording companies. They serve music tracks, videos, ringtones for markets in India, Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore and 12 other countries.
Self-reported data states more than 200,000 online music track downloads, and 3 million mobile content downloads. The site interface does a decent job of cramming a lot of stuff in there. I checked some prices out- Indian songs are in the range of Rs.12 each, foreign songs are about Rs.19.99. English albums are Rs.200 (~$5) and Indian albums range from Rs.99-120. Just so you know, the content is windows DRM protected, and can be bundled with Creative’s mp3 players.
Interestingly enough, mobiles are increasingly being used to enjoy mp3 tracks in India. I guess the DRM-free wave hasn’t reached India yet, but till then, Soundbuzz sure has the upper hand in the Asian online/mobile music retail business.