Wednesday, 28 December 2011

SSILS2012 Speakers

DR.Kiran Bedi
(First and Highest ranking Indian women IPS)

Kiruba Shankar
(CEO, Business Blogging,
Indian Ambassador, TEDx)

Babar Ali
(Youngest headmaster in the world)

Madhan Karky
(Lyricist- Endhiran, 180, Nanban; Prof- CEG)

Phanindra Sama
(Entrepreneur, CEO, Redbus.in)

Vijay Anand
(Founder, The Startup centre)

(IIM-A, Author, Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish)

Tuesday, 13 December 2011

Start Up Story Telling

SSILS 2012

Fearless Leadership..!

Description of start up story telling event.

Start-ups story telling

- A tribute to Steve jobs.

Overview:

An Apple a millennium keeps the “Human Normalcy” away. After the classical Adam and Eve’s forbidden Apple episode, the Sir Isaac Newton’s Apple Eureka moment and the fresh Steve Job’s Apple saga, are you the FOURTH to be smitten by a revolutionary Apple?

Well, come and entertain us with your story!

Sri Shakthi India Leadership Summit 2012 provides you a platform to propel innovation, entrepreneurship, and positive change in the country around the challenges in the realm of Energy, Education, Environment, Healthcare, Infrastructure, Terrorism and Population explosion.

Do you have a Business model solution to the challenges in these domains? Come and narrate the story of your Startup (in concept or pilot phase) or your Business plan. Perhaps, the single differentiating factor that set Apple inc. apart is the ability of Steve Jobs to get people super excited about its super products. We believe the leaders of tomorrow are the ones who go beyond the Return of Investment in a venture or the Functionality of a product and make people willingly buy into their ideas. So, this will be a typical Business plan with an additional focus on the ability of an individual/ team to present the idea packaged with a compelling story.

The Reward

1. Cash prizes

a. First prize winning team: Rs.50,000

b. Second prize winning team: Rs.30,000

2. Get nominated for NSEF Fellow Student Social Entrepreneur

3. Get Funded from Springboard ventures

4. Get your story profiled in The weekend Leader

What do we mean by a ‘Start-up’?

A typical startup is an initiative of an individual or a team to combine business management skills with innovations in technology or services. For instance an attractive technical idea to improve the security of vehicles can be elevated to the next level where the conceiver finds out the ways to implement the idea in mass, to market, to sale, to brand and to sustain the operation. On the other hand it can be a service like catering or transport or anything similar to that which is executed in an unconventional way.

Who can participate in the event?

The summit invites Engineering and Management student teams who are passionate about entrepreneurship. The team may be in different levels of their mission from a basic business idea to a fully evolved business. We welcome the teams from all the levels of maturity for the contest. This can be illustrated by the following sample cases.

1. You are a student team who have conceived an idea and believe that could make a great business opportunity. The idea appears to be unique and no specific predecessor. The entire idea needs to be discussed, analyzed and guidance required from qualified team of experts. As of now, it remains just as an idea and you are looking for nourishing it to next level by identifying the opportunities and challenges. YES, you can participate in the event.

2. You are a student team who has an idea about a startup, drafting down the business plan, studying the market and strong desire to make it happen, but not having started it. For instance you have an idea to build up a catering services point for your institution. You have estimations about the requirements, market, financials and a basic plan to execute. But just in paper. YES, you can participate in the event.

3. You are a student team who has initiated your startup after finalizing your business plan and market analysis. Currently you are concentrating in developing the activities of your startup and want the name of your startup to reach significant places and it needs to be discussed among people. YES, you can participate in the event.

Team Composition:

The team can contain maximum of 4 members.

The members can be from different departments.

The three stages of the event

STARTUP STORY TELLING
Stage	Event	Date	Details
1	Executive summary submission	February 3 2012	The executive summaries need to be submitted online. The results will be announced on February 10 2012
2	Startup story telling – the presentation	March 2 2012	The Presentation would happen in front of a judging panel and the winners will be selected based on their ability to speak about their startup.
3	SSILS-2012	March 3 2012	The ultimate event where the winners will get an opportunity to participate in the whole summit and listen to eminent personalities.

How to participate in ‘startup story telling’?

Stage 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY SUBMISSION

Rules and regulations

· The summary should talk about the following basic aspects.

1. How did we get this idea?

2. The way we launched the start up

3. The business model

4. Our strategy towards the market and sales

5. The experience so far and the future plans

· The following supporting documents can be added based on the appropriateness to the case.

1. Bona fide certificate from the college. (Mandatory)

2. Proof for articles published, honors received etc., if any.

3. Details about the references, inspired articles,

4. Photographs and videos of the startup.

· Necessary diagrams/photographs can be added.

· The summary should be a MS-Word document which is not more than 3 pages

· The document should be typed using Times new Roman font of size 11.

· The name of the document should be the name of the startup.

· The names of the team members and their personal contact details should be included in the last page

· The summary should be sent to startups@siet.ac.in

Please refer the sample executive summary at the end of this document

Selection Criteria

· The submitted executive summaries will be scrutinized by an expert panel and the finalists will be selected based on the following criteria.

1. The uniqueness or the specialty of the idea

2. The fortitude of the people behind the startup

3. The sustainability factor and the scope for extensibility

4. Possibilities of attracting capital

The results

· The selected teams will be intimated by mail on February 10^th 2012. The teams will participate in story telling event of SSILS 2012 where they are expected to give a power point presentation and an optional video presentation.

Stage 2 STARTUP STORY TELLING - THE PRESENTATION

Format for the presentation / Rules and regulations

· The selected teams should give a power point presentation during the event where they need to explain the following.

1 The objective behind the startup and the journey happened so far

The key learning and experiences.

3 The challenges faced and the achievements done.

· The teams are advised to create and present a video along with the presentation which exhibits their vision, mission and the dream behind the startup.

· It is advised to prepare the presentation by keeping the selection criteria in mind. i.e., the learning and experiences part of your presentation may address the ‘Entertain’ factor of selection criteria where it talks about innovation and sustainability of the business. There may not be a concrete association of your presentation to the selection criteria, but ensure that addressing the three areas of selection criteria is done specific to your case.

Selection Criteria

· The panel of judges will interact with the team during the presentation for evaluation. The teams will be assessed based on the capabilities to

1.Entertain

- Vision & Mission

- Innovation and Sustainability.

- The potential to improve or impact the quality of life

- Areas of application

2.Educate

- Market potential and traction

- Value Proposition, Key Products/Services and Differentiation

- Competitive Scenario and Entry Barriers

3.Inform

- Management Team

- Capital & Financials

- Business Model and Sales/Marketing Strategy

- Exit strategy

- Risk & Gaps

The results

Two teams will be selected for the award at the end of the presentation. The teams will be honored during the summit and they might get a chance to present their product in the grand function.

A Sample Executive Summary

[This is just to illustrate the format and the flow of the expected executive summary. It may be modified appropriately based on your case]

“CLICK ONE”

Introduction

‘Click one’ is the name of our startup, where we transformed our hobby to a business. Yes, we are speaking about Photography and how our interest towards the art and the business changed our life in a span of 6 months and placed ourselves in an exciting territory. In this summary we are sharing our story where we identified our potential through our passion and we believe it would impress you a lot.

The story behind the startup

We are four mechanical engineering students Ajay, Ram, Manzoor and Thilak studying in final year. When we were celebrating the twenty first birthday of Manzoor, we had not known how that day would become an important day of our life. That day he got a presentation from his dad, which was a Digital single lens reflex camera, shortly known as DSLR.

Though we had enough experience with normal point and shoot cameras, operating an advanced DSLR camera had its own challenges. The next week end we had a walk in the evening across the nearby woods just to experiment the equipment. We managed to click randomly without worrying about all the complex settings. It was a digital one and we were able to see the output instantaneously in the small screen. But it was a great disappointment when we observed them in the computer screen.

This experience created uncontrollable curiosity in us to handle the device with more command. We spent next three months aggressively in speaking with experts, downloading tutorials from net, participating in various competitions held in web and most importantly continuously using the camera and to learn out of it.

After a period of 6 months we realized we were able to take near professional quality pictures which could appeal the viewers. Gradually our focus turned towards using our hobby in a business so that we would get more opportunities to explore in our field of interest and it appeared with prospectus to earn as well.

The initial phase

When we decided to shoot professional quality photographs for money, the question was about marketing. Our methodical analysis for a period of two weeks, made us clear about the potential marketplace to sell ourselves. That is to start from students and institutions where we could get considerable opportunities. Initially we spoke with our Head of the department to shoot for a function conducted by our association. Obviously they were reluctant and not ready to take risk with new comers.

To overcome this, we got their permission to shoot the function along with the college appointed photographer. Of course for free of cost. Everyone agreed that our snaps are not bad or unacceptable. But they felt it could be competitive if some more practice is done.

We spent another 2 months in keenly studying the photographs of our family functions and other occasions to understand the nuances of the art. We tried shooting as a secondary photographers to few more functions and finally at the end of 9 months since we started this initiative we had been accepted as photographers. Our first serious assignment was the inauguration of a student’s club where we demonstrated our skills without any disbelief from anyone. This was how our journey started.

The marketing strategy

We were able to win the opportunities for most of the functions happened in our college and every time our quality was seen improving. Our charges were very attractive compared with other professionals but there was no compromising in the quality. When we managed to shoot for most of the occasions in our college we started marketing ourselves in other colleges. The internet was extremely helpful in serving as a platform for our marketing. Our facebook page was made popular in the nearby colleges by word of mouth and mail forwards.

The photographs taken by us were displayed in the public domains like flikr and Picasso, where we use to get hundreds of views and comments which are instrumental in shaping ourselves further apart from gaining us a wonderful popularity. We were able to create a network of acquaintances across colleges, clubs and associations from whom we were able to get business. In most of the situation we proved to be the most appropriate choice for them due to our competitive pricing.

Our achievements:

The achievements in our journey happened so far is

1. The opportunity to shoot the convocation function happened in our college, where we shot the precious moment of 450 degree holders, the pride and happiness in their parents’ faces and the exhilaration of the whole environment. This gave us enormous good will across the departments and the college management.

2. The special occasion called ‘TechNic’ – the inauguration of industry-university association wing- which happened in the university campus won accolades for our work from the vice chancellor of the university and the honorable guests.

Conclusion

We have shared our story in which a hobby was transformed to business due to our continuous learning spirit and curiosity towards mastering an art. The next phase of our activities will be aiming at encouraging more student groups towards entrepreneurship and similar initiatives.

Image courtesy: Internet

Sample start ups for reference.

1. Indore Fresh

We provide food solutions for working women and for families who reside far from the city or the vegetable market, and for people who have a shortage of time. We provide clean, fresh, packed vegetables and fruits on order basis delivered at doorstep. The Needs or challenges addressed are the problems like non availability of fresh and good vegetables and fruits in the nearby area, bargaining with the vendors, time, and inconvenience. We eliminate the need for bargaining for an optimum price for the vegetables and fruits, with our cost-effective, competent pricing. Strategy to maintain the advantage is On-time delivery with quality maintenance.

2. Golunu Soft

We operate an online college management system. There is no need of backups and security will be high as it is stored in servers. Customers have an option to customize their product for their own use. From the admission of the student to leaving, our software will manage everything related to student and staff affairs.

For eg:

-- Admission of the student/staff

-- Department based details

-- Exam and exam control

-- Room management

-- Exam hall arrangement

3. OM Shanti Traders

People say, "You showcase your lifestyle by showcasing things around yourself ". Our very own Indian art culture is having a huge influence by the foreign culture, which has established a gap in the thinking of teenagers. Our product is to look at some of the valuable product/item which tends to get overlooked in some of the market & about showcasing our Indian culture through the art pieces which is used as decoration item at household or commercial places. The Needs or challenges addressed are the problems of finding a right thing for a right place. We generally get confused with what should we buy to showcase our house more attractive, thus we provide them a right art piece to place at a right place.

4. Infinity Plus One

Infinity Plus One, as the name suggests, is a strive towards reaching beyond boundaries, is a step towards meeting expectations in a way beyond the usual approaches. Infinity Plus One, or IP1 Computer Solutions, a brainchild of 3 aspiring engineers, is a complete computing solutions company offering a variety of services in the field of computers. IP1 in a nutshell deals with quality PC maintenance and repair, eye-catching graphic designs, data entry and documentation. Our specialty is old computer upgrade & revival. IP1 believes that no computer can be junk, when it is in any state of working condition. IP1 engineers analyze the state of the computer and perform the ultimate upgrade and tune up of the computer until it achieves its full potential of performance, hence making it satisfy at least the minimum standard of performance, for present generation users. This reduces wastage of money on the part of user by preventing them from buying a brand new computer, reduces the potential waste of resource by reviving the old computer for reuse.

5. Camouflage

CAMOUFLAGE - the changing colors, is an on-campus screen printing unit run in the premises of our college by a group of aspiring energetic students. We print visiting cards, certificates, and invitations at reasonable market prices. Our company's main strength is unity and we operate as a team. Punctuality and personal touch is something that we assure to our customers. We make decent profits and a part of it is saved for future expansion of our business. The challenge addressed is completion of work within very short stipulated period of time, which is actually tiring. Customers rush up only at the last minute in a hurry to get work finished. We are evolving continuously to address the challenges.

Products story telling

SSILS 2012
Fearless Leadership..!

Description of product story telling event.

Products story telling

- A tribute to Steve jobs.

Overview:

Well, come and entertain us with your story!

Do have a Product innovation solution to the challenges in these domains? Come and narrate the story of your patented innovative Product or your promising Product in development. Perhaps, the single differentiating factor that set Apple inc. apart is the ability of Steve Jobs to get people super excited about its super products. We believe the leaders of tomorrow are the ones who go beyond the Return of Investment in a venture or the Functionality of a product and make people willingly buy into their ideas. So, this will be a typical Product presentation competition with an additional focus on the ability of an individual/ team to present the idea packaged with a compelling story.

The Reward

1. Cash prizes

a. First prize winning team: Rs.40,000

b. Second prize winning team: Rs.20,000

2. Get nominated for NSEF Fellow Student Social Entrepreneur

3. Get Funded from Springboard ventures

4. Get your story profiled in The weekend Leader

What do we mean by a ‘Product’?

A ‘Product’ can be a bundle of electrical, electronic, chemical, mechanical or any other physical components which are integrated in order to solve a problem in any area of human life. It could be even a software component which can stand as its own like the famous folder lock or file splitting tools, but with a requirement behind it which is not being addressed very commonly. If it is hardware, it is not necessarily to be an eye-catching gizmo, but an object which is powered by a unique idea targeting the problem in an unprecedented approach.

Who can participate in the event?

The summit invites Engineering and MBA student teams who are passionate about new product development. The team may be in different levels of their mission from a mere inception to a complete implementation with an acquired patent.

We welcome the teams from all the levels of maturity for the contest. This can be illustrated by the following sample cases.

1. You are a student team who has an idea about a product, unshakable confidence in the idea and strong desire to make it happen, but not having started implementing it. For instance you have an idea to develop a software product which can help the students to organize their learning assignments, placement preparations, personal tasks and other areas of his personal life effectively. But you don t have a concrete implementation in your hand and just working on towards developing a prototype. YES, you can participate in the event.

2. You are a student team who has conceived an idea and worked on it to have a prototype developed. You are willing to test it, to show case it in front of qualified people from different areas of expertise and you want to move it to next level. For instance, you have a design for developing a water purification plant for domestic purpose. You have completed the design and developed a prototype. But you want your system to be displayed to public and you need constructive comments from people before you start implementing it. YES, you can participate in the event.

3. You are a student team who has developed a product and tested it. You may even have acquired the patent for it. You want to promote it to the public and you want to speak about it in a summit which is filled with people with the same innovative spirit and zeal of yours. YES, you can participate in the event.

Team Composition:

The team can contain maximum of 4 members.

The members can be from different departments.

The three stages of the event

PRODUCT STORY TELLING
Stage	Event	Date	Details
1	Product Abstract submission	February 3 2012	The abstracts need to be submitted online. The results will be announced on February 10 2012
2	Product story telling- The presentation	March 2 2012	The Presentation would happen in front of a judging panel and the winners will be selected based on their ability to showcase their product.
3	SSILS-2012	March 3 2012	The ultimate event where the winners will get an opportunity to participate in the whole summit and listen to eminent personalities.

How to participate in product story telling?

Stage 1 PRODUCT ABSTRACT SUBMISSION

Rules and regulations

· The abstract should answer the following basic questions.

1. What origin of the idea?

2. The uniqueness of the idea.

3. How did you elevate the idea to the next level?

4. The technicalities of implementing the product

5. The learning and experiences

· The following supporting documents can be added based on the appropriateness to the case.

1. Bona fide certificate from the college. (Mandatory)

2. Proof for articles published, patents obtained, honors received etc., if any.

3. Details about the references, inspired articles,

4. Photographs and videos of the product.

· Necessary diagrams/photographs can be added.

· The abstract should be a MS-Word document which is not more than 3 pages

· The document should be typed using Times new Roman font of size 11.

· The name of the document should be the name of the product.

· The names of the team members and their personal contact details should be included in the last page

· The abstract should be sent to products@siet.ac.in

Please refer the sample product abstract at the end of this document

Selection Criteria

· The submitted abstracts will be scrutinized by an expert panel and the finalists will be selected based on the following criteria.

1. The motivational factors behind the idea.

2. The uniqueness or the specialty of the idea

3. The concept development

4. Viability for implementation

5. The promising consequences

The results

Stage 2 PRODUCT STORY TELLING – THE PRESENTATION

Format for the presentation / Rules and regulations

· The selected teams should give a power point presentation during the event where they need to explain the following aspects.

1 The experience of conceiving and implementing the idea.

2 Business analysis

3 Implementation and Testing

4 Pricing and sales

The teams are advised to create and present a video along with the presentation which exhibits their vision, mission and the dream behind the startup.

Selection Criteria

· The panel of judges will interact with the team during the presentation for evaluation. The teams will be assessed based on the capabilities to

1.Entertain

-The journey towards the invention

-The need of the product

-The expected consequences

2.Educate

- The technical details

- Key learning

3.Inform

-About you (Personal profiles of the team members)

-Future scope

The results

· Two teams will be selected for the award at the end of the presentation. The teams will be honored during the summit and they might get a chance to present their product in the grand function.

A Sample Product Abstract

[This is just to illustrate the format and the flow of the expected product abstract. It may be modified appropriately based on your case.]

“Low cost blood pressure monitor”

Introduction

In a country like India, where the population has crossed 1 billion, adequate health care services are still unfeasible. The modern lifestyle with changing food culture is a colossal threat to the healthy living of a citizen. The advancement in the science and technology is steadily addressing the problems in providing quality healthcare to everyone. Low cost blood pressure monitor is one such product developed by us four electronics and communication engineering students to support our population against the most common disease seen across the country.

The spark behind this innovation

'Blood pressure' is known as the silent killer, since it is not identified in most of the cases in a timely manner. The only place where a common man can check the blood pressure is in a hospital which cannot be done frequently. There are some devices already available for this purpose, but with two major drawbacks. The first one is the price which is not affordable for everyone and the second one is the usability. The significance of this issue was realized by us when many of the elders in our families were requiring a product of this kind every single day.

During a technical symposium in our college, we were asked to think about the areas in which we need to bring down the technology to the benefit of ordinary people. Without much delay we identified this was one of the major places where something needs to be done to solve the common problem. We proposed this idea in front of a panel of professors and requested them to recommend inventing a product of this kind to the health care ministry of the government or some private concerns. They simply diverted the question on us, "why should not you guys take this responsibility?" This made us to think in really a different pattern, whether possible or not, why should not we explore the unknown territories and put some efforts for the sake of our own people. Without second thought we drafted a plan with the help of our professors and started working on it.

The development of concept

We spent nearly two weeks in understanding the working principles of conventional analog blood pressure monitor. We had to sit with the medical officer of our college for half a day to understand clearly about the biological aspects of blood pressure and the related details. When we got a clear idea about what needs to be done we started planning about how it has to be done. Our electronics department professors and the medical instrumentation experts of our university helped us to draft down the exact plan and basically it appeared like this.

The reasons behind competitive pricing.

The components required for the entire development of the product are not manufactured specially for this purpose. Customized manufacturing of components will increase the price against the name ‘low cost BPM’. So we identified the commonly used components like ball point pen refills, printed circuit boards, relays available in automobile stores, multipurpose switches and similar items. They are not designed or manufactured specially for our instrument. So the cost to assemble a device came down a lot. Moreover for electronic components like integrated circuits we contacted the vendors who supply to our college laboratories and managed to get a good discount. All these factors really helped us to justify the name ‘low cost BPM’

Assurance about the quality

The ultimate precision could not be achieved in the first attempt. We had to rework our design and the setting nearly more than 60 times to achieve the perfect calibration of our device. We chose a set of 10 people with different age groups and physical parameters and tested our device against them along with the conventional monitors. After a strenuous testing and rework we were able to attain the present status of perfection.

Precious moments

Our product was displayed in the 20^th annual medical exhibition, Bangalore and observed by many experts and doctors. It was selected as one of the best innovations of the exhibition and made us all proud.

Conclusion

A spark of idea can do wonders if it is carefully preserved with the spirit of realizing it. The technology can be applied to help us in several challenges of our everyday life, for which we cannot expect some industry or government to step in. Having basic understanding of science and technology we certainly can materialize our ideas when we have the perseverance and smart work. We believe strongly that our story will encourage young engineers to think beyond text books and to contribute to the real world.

Courtesy: http://www.freescale.com

Sample products:

1. A Liquid cooling system for processor in computers. (Electrical)

Conventionally the processors in computers are cooled by a fan attached in the circuit board. Due to recent increase in the processor capacity they tend to get hotter in a short span of time. The space constraint does not allow incorporating bigger fans inside the cabinets. So we have designed a small water cooling system which can fit inside the cabinet of a computer to provide effective cooling. Basically we have assembled a water container of 30 cc with a set of 25 micro tubes which can function as a conveyor for water around the mother board.

2. Fire detector for home.(Electronics)

Fire detectors are very common in corporate buildings or public places. But they are not very common houses due to their cost and the complexity in installation. We have designed a very simple portable system which does not require intricate wiring or very costly components. This is has been designed for houses from 750 square feet to 4000 square feet. Testing has been done in our college building and the efficiency has been proved no lesser than the professional fire detectors.

3. Coconut opener (Mechanical)

Coconut is a very common thing available in kitchens all over the world. But using it instantaneously has a difficulty in the form of opening its shell. A device has been invented to break the shell with just the power of your hands. The basic level mechanism is used in the device where the coconut is placed in between the iron rods and they crack the shell when pressure is applied in the shaft provided. The unique design of the zigzag rods boost up the force and break the shell. The device is found to be less weight and very flexible to use.

4. Mobile based personal organizer tool for student information management

Mobile phones have become an inevitable equipment of everyone and they have proved themselves as a potential tool for many areas of applications including entertainment. There are many applications available for mobiles for personal planning, but they are all very generic and may not be addressing the needs of a specific community. Being students we could understand the challenges of the student community in managing their everyday challenges including projects, academic schedules, assignments, placement activities and personal interests. So we have developed an Android based tool which can run in mobiles and solve the information management problems of students.

5. Temperature controlled Jacket. (Textile and electronics)

We use different kinds of outfits for different climatic conditions. Usually they are designed for some specific kind of weather. The change in weather does not happen abruptly, but it has gradual changes over a period of time. So we have designed a temperature controlled jacket which can provide various sensations on different temperatures. This has been achieved by collaborating modern textile developments with the temperature sensor technologies of electronics.