PGP 3 credits, Term VI Elective MIS Group, Academic Year: 2011-2012

Creating and Managing Innovative ICT Start-ups

Course Coordinator: Somprakash Bandyopadhyay** Course Instructors: Somprakash Bandyopadhyay and a few Guest Speakers

Course Introduction:
This course provides a basic understanding of the personal, technical, and market success factors of a new high tech venture. Partly derived from different offerings from Stanford Technology Venture Program of Stanford University, it introduces strategies to assess the potential of new ICT-based product concepts and to translate that potential towards creating and managing high-impact ventures. It covers methods for analyzing, specifying, designing and launching high-tech businesses along with the knowledge and skills required to prepare a business plan for a new business venture. The course will draw on case studies of technology-based businesses. Students will work in small groups to develop a state-of-the-art ICT-based product concept and a business plan around a new innovation in their selected area The course also provides a broad practice-based experience in Indian context to shape student abilities to think about creating their own business in India, evaluate situations from a strategic perspective, and each strategic decision. Accomplishing these objectives entails introducing students to how an enterprise must deal with all complexities and constraints in Indian scenario, why none of these can be assumed away or ignored, and how situation factors impact strategic decisions.

Course Outline
1: Course Overview (1 session) This session will provide a complete overview of the course. We will discuss our goals and objectives in examining the fundamentals of technology entrepreneurship. 2: Creativity & Improvisation (2 sessions) Every entrepreneur faces endless challenges along the way. These problems never have one right answer, and often they have never been solved before. The only way for an entrepreneur to succeed is to view each challenge as an opportunity for a creative solution. In this class we will focus on the role of creativity and innovation in this context. 3: From Idea to Opportunity (1 session) We will discuss the differences between an idea and an opportunity. In this session, we look at the particular challenges of new ventures in information technology.

** Prof Bandyopadhyay is in the Board of Directors of Pervcom Consulting , a high-tech start-up in Kolkata, working in the area of wireless tracking and sensing technologies.

4: Product Development (1 session) We will discuss different issues related to productization and the methods of translating a labscale prototype into a product. 5: Customer Development (1 session)
Once you have an idea, sized the opportunity, and have convinced yourself it is a business worth Pursing, what do you do next? Effective entrepreneurs understand that startups are not small versions of large companies. Bringing startup products to market are not the same as launching products from large established companies. This session will examine the process of customer development.

6: Entrepreneurial Marketing (2 sessions) The importance and implications of the technology adoption life cycle are examined. We also survey the key elements of entrepreneurial marketing including a compelling product/service strategy, a well-crafted positioning and competitive differentiation and a subsequent penetration strategy (including distribution, promotion and pricing). 7: Legal Essentials (1 session) The session will focus on intellectual property (IP), which is the cornerstone of a technology venture. Whereas old economy businesses built value in the form of factories and equipment, new economy businesses create the lion share of their value in intangibles; patents, copyrights, trade secrets and trademarks. 8: Introduction to Venture Resources (1 session)

How do entrepreneurs set priorities when gathering financial resources? This session introduces the topic of venture finance. Raising money is arguably one of the most important decisions a founding team has to make. How much to raise? How much equity to give up? What is a fair valuation? What does the term sheet really say? In this session, we will try to address some of these questions by looking at funding options, term terms to lookout for, and learning some basic venture math.
9: Building the Startup Team (1 session) Entrepreneurship is a team sport. What are the critical human resource issues for new ventures? This session will focus on: assembling a team, developing a compensation policy, and creating an innovative culture. 10: Team Presentations and discussions (6 sessions) Team formation and assignments will be given at the second session of this course. 11. Guest Lectures (3 sessions)

Text Book: Technology ventures : from idea to enterprise : Richard C Dorf and Thomas H Byers Tata McGraw Hill Publ 2010 Additional Reference:
Stanford Technology Venture Program: http://stvp.stanford.edu/

Mode of Evaluation:
Presentation: 30% Assignment: 30% Examination: 40%

Guest Speakers: Video Presentations: Mark Zuckerberg : founder of Facebook Tina Seelig: Stanford Technology Ventures Program Steve Blank : Serial Entrepreneur Larry Page : Founder, Google Bob Sutton : Stanford University Reid Hoffman : LinkedIn And many others.. Possible Guest Speakers : Class-room lectures: Prof Dhrubes Biswas, I I T Kharagpur
Dr. Dhrubes Biswas is the Professor of Electronics and Electrical Communication Engineering, Professor-in-Charge of Incubation and Entrepreneurship, Managing Director of Science and Technology Entrepreneurs Park and Adjunct Professor of Vinod Gupta School of Management of Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur and directing International University Collaborations, Technology Parks, Business Incubation, Technology Business Incubator for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (Govt of India), Entrepreneurship Programs at IIT, Coordinator, Technopreneur Promotion Program for Innovation grants (Govt of India), Technology Entrepreneurship Development Program for grassroot entrepreneurs (Govt of India), and business liaisons with IITs industrial partners and international collaborators.

Mr. Shoummo Kanti Acharya, President, TiE Kolkata and Founder-CEO, eTrans Solutions Private Limited.
The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) was founded in 1992 in Silicon Valley by a group of successful entrepreneurs, corporate executives, and senior professionals with roots in the Indus region. There are currently more than 11,000 members and over 2,500 charter members in 53 chapters across 12 countries. TiEs mission is to foster entrepreneurship globally through mentoring, networking, and education. Dedicated to the virtuous cycle of wealth creation and giving back to the community, TiEs focus is on generating and nurturing our next generation of entrepreneurs.

Dr Prabal Sengupta, Director, Alumnus Software :

Alumnus Software was founded in November 1996 by Arindam Mukherjee and Probal Sengupta. The goal of the founders was to create a profitable and reliable software outsourcing alternative in India. From modest beginnings Alumnus has grown to a respectable size, with high potential for continued strong growth. Growth at Alumnus has attracted the attention of the UK-based funding agency. CDC CapitalnPartners, which has made a substantial investment in Alumnus. This funding has enabled Alumnus to aggressively develop the companys growth potential by increasing physical presence across North America, expanding the sales force, increasing recruitment activities, and acquiring engineering expertise in cutting-edge technologies Alumnus focuses on business applications as well as emerging technology (data and voice networking) and has worked for numerous medium and large sized clients in the United States and for several companies in Europe. In the current year Alumnus has introduced its services in Asia.