Bengaluru is the startup Hub of India and SCALe (SIBM B Center for Advanced Learning & Entrepreneurship) is the startup hub of SIBM-B. All activities are dedicated to encouraging and discover the entrepreneurial streak in all the students of SIBM-B.
When you know one of your own took the plunge and made it, this helps in allaying the fears of starting up. With this thought, in its monthly newsletter, E-Cell includes conversations with alumni who have started their own businesses. A sense of belief gets instilled amongst the students whilst interacting with those who stood in the same position as they are today. They push students to come up with their own business ideas and encourage them to make a revenue-generating business model for the same.
To get the students to recognize what it resembles to begin a business, what obstacles they confront and what the future holds for enterprises in the Indian setting, guest sessions are organized where entrepreneurial consultants and investors were invited to take the sessions.
Igniting the spirit of entrepreneurship is one step, the next step is to take them on the path of startup ideas and B-Plans, internal B-Plan competitions are organized exclusively for the students of SIBM Bengaluru to showcase their business ideas and go through the scrutiny of a jury comprised of the faculty members of SIBM B. The winners were encouraged to pursue their ideas further and launch their startup.
The core belief of is that there is an entrepreneur in each one of us and in line with the vision, the hope is to create bigger and more engaging events in the coming years to put our college right up there with the leading nodes of startups in India and also launch more startups from the students of our college.
Q & A with Pranav Ankush (Co-Ordinator | Symbiosis Centre for Advanced Learning and Entrepreneurship at SIBM Bengaluru)
1) How has your journey been at SIBM B, especially in the field of entrepreneurship and start-up domain?
The journey with SIBM-B has been incredible. SIBM-B provided me with the guidance and resources to direct my idea in a proper direction. As a fresher, I had no idea on how to start and where to start building your idea to a business solution that can be converted to a profitable and sustainable business.
SIBM-B provided me with the proper guidance from faculty mentors which helped turned the idea into a business solution that it is now. Also, the case-based methodology of learning helped me understand various hurdles that businesses in varied fields have faced and how to overcome them. SIBM-B helped me create the overall business perspective of the idea that I was nurturing
2) What is the one characteristic that you’ve found to be common amongst the start-up founders you’ve interacted with?
I have participated in various competitions and also interacted with various entrepreneurs all across the country. The common characteristic that I have come across amongst all of them is that everyone nurtures their own idea as their own child, i.e. their focus and determination towards building on their idea and each of their ideas is built from a problem statement that they have come across or common problems they have heard of. Each and every founder goes through different phases of the idea that he is nurturing. Some are focused and determined to grow it to the profitable business and some leave it in the midway without testing the feasibility.
Thus, those who believe and are focused and determined towards the idea or the problem they are solving are moreover successful in implementing it.
3) Do you believe that superior technology is the only major factor in the success of a start-up since most start-ups are in the field of I.T?
Yes, I do believe that the use of superior technology helps in creating a competitive edge in the start-up world. The use of various analytics software’s and tools helps in gaining an edge for predicting and meeting customer demand over the competitors as most of the start-ups are based on similar concepts or problem statements or ideas, but what differentiates them from others is the technology or the platform on which is built.
The capability of the start-up to maintain their position as a leader mainly depends upon their ability to use the technology and improve it continuously so that it yields long-term profits for them. As most of the start-ups are built on virtual platforms, it has become critical for them to have break-through technology to sustain their growth and profitability
4) What are your major learnings from the E-Cell? How have the experiences with E- Cell impacted your outlook towards the start-up culture?
E-Cell provided me the basic platform for nurturing my idea to a business plan Guidance from E-cell faculty mentor and the senior students provided a different perspective of implementing it. E-cell helped me analyze the feasibility of the idea that I had in my mind and guided it from a different point of each individual who was working on it.So, when I received the funding, it was an achievement of the whole E-cell team.
5) How does an MBA degree add value to a person interested in starting his/her own company?
MBA helps in creating business perspective in each and everything that we are experiencing in our daily life.
So, for a person who is willing to start his own business, it is an opportunity to learn the importance of integrating the various factors that are necessary for a successful business. The knowledge of various fields such as finance, Operations, Marketing & HR during the initial year of the course helps in understanding various domains that are necessary for each business.
For me personally, the purpose of doing MBA was to have a formal education and to understand various aspects for a successful business. The Business idea that I had in my mind was very Raw, MBA helped me shape it in the proper business and also helped me understand various risks that are involved in doing it.
So MBA doesn’t only provide you with the formal education but also helps in creating a business angle to various thing that you see in your surroundings.
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