When Tapan Kumar Das came to Bangalore, he observed that people were not eating healthy. That was when the idea to spread awareness regarding the long-term benefits of healthy food struck him.

Tapan launched iTiffin in 2013. It’s an online-cum-offline tiffin service company that offers high quality healthy and delicious meal plans for homes and offices. With a seamless blend of advanced nutrition, food science and food service, it offers wellness meals and calorie-defined meals that are in accordance with the customer’s preferences.


The company assures qualitative and wholesome food to its patrons. “The idea behind launching iTiffin was to provide people with nutritious meals at their doorstep and make them aware of how lifestyle disorders can be prevented through good food,” says Tapan.

Early days of iTiffin

Although getting early customers and raising initial funding was difficult, in spite of these hassles, iTiffin delivered over one lakh meals in the first year of operation.

“Initially, it was a cumbersome task to maintain the quality of food as well as retain potential customers, but as time passed and people started realising the importance of healthy eating in the country, it became easy for us to deliver high-quality meals to our patrons. Since our inception, we have been bringing innovation and variety in the menu to avoid monotony and lure customers to opt for healthy meals,” points out Tapan.

Growth of business

The Bangalore-based company has grown remarkably during last year attaining the delivery milestone of over one lakh meals in the first year of its operation itself. “With over 5000 loyal customers in our kitty and an average customer retention period of 60 days, we were able to clock revenue of around Rs. 3 crore in the fiscal year 2014. Our USP of providing scientifically-designed nutritious meals for our patrons is the reason behind the immense success of iTiffin,” adds Tapan.

The company is looking forward to expand its orbit to each and every city across India. “We are also extending our product line by launching innovative meal plans that suit the requirement of our patrons,” adds Tapan. iTiffin is looking to raise $10 million to increase its product portfolio and propel its pan India reach.

Why healthy food segment is hot for startups?


The health food domain of the country has been growing at a phenomenal rate since the past few years, owing to the increased level of awareness among people regarding the benefits of a nutritious and balanced diet. The market is new and lucrative as not many players have entered the landscape yet. Over the past one year we have been witnessing a slew of startups making debut in the healthy food segment.
The brainchild of IIT Delhi alumnus FRSH offers healthy food like salads, juices and wholesome cereals among others. , Spoonjoy, offers freshly cut fruits, sprouts, a combination of both, lunch, snacks on a weekly subscription basis. Another New Delhi-based startup Fresh Food ventured into nutrition food market with its flagship product Juice Up which offers a range of 100 percent raw and fresh cold pressed juices.

“Whether in the online or offline space, the health food segment is going to see a positive growth graph. As people grow more conscious about their health and develop an understanding about the importance of having a healthy lifestyle, food companies are going to see enormous growth,” says Tapan.

With the increasing trend of nuclear families, hectic schedules of the working population and the escalating demand for wholesome food at one’s doorstep, the future of the health food segment is promising in the country.

The segment of health and wellness food is estimated to rise to a whopping Rs. 55,000 crore this fiscal year. Due to the increased prevalence of lifestyle diseases in the country, people have now become more aware of the causes of these diseases. This has hence increased the market size of the health food sector, providing umpteen opportunities for food companies to launch healthy and nutritious packaged foods in the country. The fast-paced and hectic life of people has broadened the health-food market enormously.

Source: your story

My mother taught me how to make tea when I was very young. And ever since, I have always been particular about my cup of chai,” says Nitin Saluja, Founder of Chaayos, an NCR based chain of tea outlets. Their tagline reads ‘Experimenting with chai’ and it reflects when you look at their menu where you’ll find teas like ‘aam papad chai’ or the rose cardamom chai. Launched in November 2012, Chaayos currently has eight outlets in NCR and is now planning to expand to Mumbai and Bangalore.

The back story

Chai was always a crucial part of Nitin’s life but he had never thought of opening a chai outlet, especially not after getting through IIT-Bombay! But life always has interesting cards to deal out; one only needs to be open to possibilities.

In the final years of college back in 2006, Nitin was pretty sure that he didn’t want to get into a dull job routine. He got along with a few friends and started a robotics company, Think Labs. Incubated at SINE-IIT Bombay, the company has morphed into a dedicated provider of hands-on science and technology education in India and is currently valued at over $10 million. Moving on from the operations at Think Labs, Nitin moved to Opera Solutions for a five-year stint before the entrepreneurial bug bit again.

“Somehow chai was always there at the back of my mind. And when I asked myself if there is a place in India where I can find ‘meri wali chai’, the answer was no,” says Nitin. This is when he decided to go ahead with this seemingly crazy idea of starting an outlet of chai. The idea was to have something like a Starbucks for India and that of course has to deal with ‘chai’.


Starting up

While thinking of this, Nitin was introduced to Raghav Verma, an IIT Delhi graduate of batch 2010 by a common friend and the two hit it off straight away. Nitin took care of the product development, settling the supply chain, setting up processes while Raghav took care of marketing and business development.


Founders- Nitin Saluja and Raghav Verma
Settling for the name Chaayos, the duo opened their first outlet, got the unit economics right and charted a scaling up plan. Over the last two and a half years, they have opened seven more outlets with a core team of eight people and a staff of 50 as the ground staff.

“The challenge which most people face is to maintain quality while scaling up. This is one area which we think we’ve got covered and gives us an edge. Each of our cups can give that ‘meri wali chai’ feeling,” says Nitin. Their highest grossing outlet turned in an annual revenue of INR 1 crore. The target market for Chaayos is the upcoming middle class that has money but is equally conscious of the value they get.

Interiors at Chaayos

Making chai a venture backed business

Great. All this sounds good but Chaayos has also been able to raise an angel round from the likes of Zishaan Hayath. How is chai a venture-backed business? Don’t investors look for a 100x return? Nitin gives us Zishaan’s perspective to this:

Is the market there? Well, chai is a product that doesn’t need any marketing.
And if one outlet is doing INR 1 crore annually, it is pretty easy to scale up to INR 100 crores in total in the next two years (Math – 60 Stores X 1.5Cr per store = 90Cr ~ 100 Cr)
And chai is not restricted to India alone; Chaayos will be keeping an eye out for SE Asia, the Middle East and other regions as well.
The plan for Chaayos is to setup 60 more outlets in 2015 and scale up rapidly. Apart from outlets, they already have tie ups with corporate for deliveries. Their app is coming out soon which will be opening a B2C subscription channel as well.

Is Chaayos alone in the race? Ofcourse not. Chai Point is perhaps the largest player in the area which already has 60+ stores. There are many other chains as well like Infinitea, Chai Thela, Chaipatty, etc. but most of them haven’t been able to scale up quickly enough (and everyone doesn’t have to). Nitin and team are currently focusing on getting the deliveries kick off with their app launch along with a fund raising effort to fuel growth.

Source: You're story

When the first season of ‘Satyamev Jayate’ was launched, it had the country talking about unspoken issues faced by people around us. Be it casteism, healthcare, Khap Panchayat or the stigma of bearing a girl child, every issue was raised.

Madhu Gupta was one of millions who watched Satyamave Jayate and was shocked to find out how almost no doctor prescribes cheaper generic medicines. The cost of these medicines is close to 40-to-60 per cent of branded medicines. They also have the same compositions and effects as their branded counterparts.


Madhu decided to take responsibility to change things. She started discussing the prospects of starting up to provide generic medicine to people. Madhu teamed up with her husband Pankaj, and both of them started MereMedicare.com- an e-commerce portal for generic medicines.

Prior to starting MereMedicare, Madhu was an associate consultant at Oracle India Pvt Ltd for two years, while Pankaj worked with Veeco instruments in various capacities. Both are based out of the US, but the fact that they were away from India did not deter them to startup.

At present, they have close to 5000 registered patients and more than 250 pharmacies in their network. After deliberating and researching various aspects of running an e-commerce business in the pharmaceutical industry, Madhu and Pankaj finally started up in July 2014. For every medicine, customers can buy either branded or generic versions. While branded medicines cost more, generic medicines are cheap in comparison with the same benefits. The company has its presence in Delhi, Noida, Gurgaon and Bangalore.

Talking about funds, Pankaj says, “So far, we’ve been bootstrapping to run and expand our business. We believe that personal funds will be sufficient to expand Mera Medicare in at least 10 cities. For expanding more and adding more business segments, we`ll definitely need funds. In the last six months, we’ve received offers from three good investors, but we politely declined them. We plan to re-engage with them at the right time.”

The company works as a marketplace connecting buyers and sellers in the healthcare industry. The founders are based out of the US, while the team is set up in India. At present, the team coordinates through Skype. MeraMedicare has four full-time members on board and a team of over forty interns working from different locations. The company works on a subscription model for regular patients and healthcare professionals, while others can purchase medicines online -just like any e-commerce site- with a delivery time of around 2-4 hours.

Talking about their future plans Pankaj says, “Overall, we want to be the Flipkart of healthcare sector. We would like to expand in 25 major cities of India in the next two years. We plan to be operational in six more cities in India, which are tentatively Mumbai, Hyderabad, Pune, Surat, Chennai and Jaipur. “

While e-commerce is on the rise, healthcare commerce still has a long way to go, and the market is ripe for more players. At present, we have companies like HealthKart, Medidart and Medist working on this front, too. But considering the population and the market, we still have a lot of opportunities in this sector.

Source: Your story

Bengaluru-based Qyk, a mobile marketplace for finding local services, has raised angel funding from a group of angel investors, including early investors of Ola, Housing and Delhivery.
 Deepak Singhal, Co-founder & CEO of Qyk, said, “Hiring a local service provider in India is a big challenge and we feel the timing is perfect to build a mobile-first solution given the rapidly increasing smartphone penetration.”

Keeping up with uberification of services’ trend, Qyk seeks to serve as a one-stop platform for availing a range of local services from local service providers in the vicinity. The mobile marketplace connects service seekers with service providers. They are doing what JustDial has been doing for the web and call centre for a mobile and messaging era.Qyk founding team - Deepak Singhal, Sangharsh Boudhh, Shobhit Singhal and Anubhav Sahoo

The founding team comprises folks with relevant experience in building scalable Internet and mobile products. Qyk was founded four months ago with a vision to build a hyper local solution for customers. Founders are alumnus of IIT Bombay and IIT Kharagpur -- Deepak Singhal, Sangharsh Boudhh, Shobhit Singhal and Anubhav Sahoo -- who come with past experience of working with companies like Ola, InMobi, Practo and Deutsche Bank.

How does Qyk work?


The app asks users to specify his/her service requirements and it pushes aggregates competitive quotes from the most relevant service providers. It makes it easy to compare and save time and money.

Qyk is a mobile platform that enables customers to hire trustworthy service providers and professionals near their area. This includes service providers other than ‘home services’. Finding a reliable and competent local service provider specific to one’s requirements is difficult and time consuming. Qyk offers the customer, options tailored to his personalized needs by enabling comparisons and competitive quotes. This enables them to make a well informed choice.

Regarding the future potential of Qyk, “Local services solutions market is ready to be disrupted and this is a team which has the vision and skill-set to do it. We need a mobile solution like Qyk to help businesses grow and enable customers to find the right service providers,” says Zishaan Hayath, who is early investor in Housing and Ola.

Angel investors

Investors include Zishaan Hayath (Co-founder of Toppr and Powai Lake Ventures), Abhishek Goyal (CEO and Co-founder of Tracxn.com, ex-Accel Partners) and Sahil Barua (CEO and Co-founder of Delhivery).

Abhishek Goyal, early investor in Delhivery, says “Qyk is a great idea that helps us find local services that are more professional in nature. There are two large plays in local services, one is on-demand and the other is reverse auction. Reverse-auction business model is largely a technology play. Team Qyk’s approach of solving this problem via a mobile first product and their extensive experience in technology gives them a very big advantage to be the market leader."

Now in Bangladesh, Our peon is providing this type of services. They do not develope any app for this service. But on demand of the customer they are dedicated for those services booked over the mobile. Our peon will develope the app so that they can provide services on technology based.

Late in 2013, GM started a campaign Shop-Click-Drive with 100 dealers across the US via which customers could buy cars online. In the pilot, 900 cars were sold and over the next one year, GM had sold 13,000 new vehicles online. The service is currently available in all 50 states in the US with over 1,600 dealers covered. And this is a trend which is expected to spread across the globe over the next decade.

In India, we’re still far from it but advances are being made in that direction. In the last few weeks, there have been many announcements about investors backing various players in India. There are four major players in the segment right now and here is how they stack against each other:


(image credit: Shutter Stock)
1. CarDekho: A product from Jaipur-based GirnarSoft, CarDekho is an auto platform catering to aspiring car buyers, car owners, fans and car dealers across India. CarDekho was started by brothers Amit Jain and Anurag Jain way back in 2008 and it raised $15 million in funding from Sequoia Capital. Recently, CarDekho joined hands with Ratan Tata and further raised a $50 million round of funding led by Chinese firms Hillhouse Capital and Tybourne Capital. The company has about 1,800 used car dealers and has tied up with about eight auto manufacturers. It claims to get 11 million visits per month (7.5 million unique visitors).


2. CarWale: CarWale calls itself an auto media vehicle and was founded in 2005 by Mohit Dubey, Arun Sahlam, Gaurav Verma and Tufail Khan with the backing of Seedfund. It is a platform where car buyers and owners can research, buy, sell and come together to discuss and talk about their cars. In 2008, CarWale completed a Series A round of funding with Sierra Ventures. By 2010, it was getting over 1.3 million visitors and 17 million page views a month. At this point, they were acquired by Axel Springer AG and their Indian partners the India Today Group. The portal recorded 13.2 million visits in January 2015.

3. Gaadi: Founded in 2008 by Ankur Warikoo, Vivek Pahwa, and Umang Kumar, Gaadi lets users buy and sell new and pre-owned cars along with providing them with reviews, comparisons and other related content. Gaadi was acquired for $2 million in 2011 by Ibibo which later sold it off to CarDekho for $11 million. Gaadi.com still operates separately with a healthy traffic which is managed by the team at Girnaar Soft. Accentium Web, the company that owned Gaadi initially, has started up 99cars.com  in the same sector.

4. ZigWheels: A property of Times Internet, ZigWheels started in 2007 with Vijesh Sharma handling product and consumer experience. Now headed by Akshay Chaturvedi, Zigwheels remains a key property of Times Internet. From their website ranking, traffic can be estimated to be about 5.5 million monthly unique visitors. (ZigWheels follows ComScore numbers which are appended after the list)

5. Cartrade.com: MotorExchange was founded by Vinay Sanghi and Rajan Mehra in 2009 and it owns cartrade.com. The company raised a Series A in December 2009 from Canaan Partners and other investors and then In October 2014, it raised $30 million from Warburg Pincus, Tiger Global and Canaan Partners. More recently, ex-auto trader CEO Chip Perry has topped the funding round. The company claims to have listings of more than 100,000 used cars in India and traffic of more than four million unique visitors every month.

6. There are others in the space like India.com’s Oncars.in and MotorTrends.in which was initially Carazoo.com. SAIF Partners recently invested $1 million in Zoomo which is a used cars marketplace with a mobile first approach. Classifieds sites like OLX and Quikr are also competition as they have an auto section.

Alexa has been used as a tool above for comparing but like any tool, there are always concerns about measurement methods. TimesInternet follows ComScore numbers from which Akshay shared the data with us.  Their claim is that ZigWheels has been doing better in terms of unique visitors every month, here is a screen shot from the sheet for the last 6 months of 2014:


The sector has suddenly become visible and one wonders why. Vinod Murali, MD of Silicon Valley Bank, India was part of the deal that had provided venture debt to Carwale and they exited along with the acquisition by Axel Springer/India Today Group. He tells us, “This is a sector which is currently going through its second wind. Along with online travel, the used car classifieds segment was seen to be highly promising a few years back but saw a lull in investor interest till fairly recently.” With one investment going through, others followed. For every new car sold in India last year, a used car was also sold, according to consultancy and market research firm Frost & Sullivan. Reports suggest that 2.5 million new cars were sold in India last year while 3 million used cars were sold. In developed markets, the ratio of new passenger vehicle sales to used passenger vehicle sales is 1:3. This is where India is heading.

All the companies in the fray started during the middle or second half of the last decade and had their own reasons. “We are a bunch of car enthusiasts and back in the time when internet had hardly penetrated India, we knew that the power of technology could be used to make the car buying experience a better one,” Mohit of CarWale told YourStory over a phone conversation. Auto Classifieds is suddenly in the news because of the funding but Mohit says they are unperturbed and will keep marching closer to their goal of making the car buying process easier. They are also confident because of the leg work they’ve done to maintain relationships with dealers. For GirnarSoft, CarDekho quickly became their flagship product with PriceDekho and BikeDekho playing the supporting role. Cardekho.com had close to 3,00,000 used cars listed on the website during 2014, up by 110 per cent from last year’s data and about half of the traffic came via mobile.

Smartphone penetration will play a key role in going ahead and so we took a look at where the numbers stand currently:


CarWale: 36,937 ratings with 4.3, 500k downloads. CarWale’s homescreen straight away asks me to choose used cars or new cars. Other options come in at a later point.
CarTrade: 2,914 ratings with 4, 100k downloads. CarTrade takes the tile approach on the home screen making four things prominent: used cars, new cars, prices and sell my car’.
CarDekho: 2,076 ratings with 4.2, 500k downloads. CarDekho has a sleek UI with a wheel menu which stresses on research about cars and has clear buttons to check and compare old and new cars along with finance options. (Gaadi.com has 1512 ratings with 4, 50k downloads)
ZigWheels: 4546 ratings with 3.9, 100k downloads. The app takes an open approach with options to research new and old vehicles, read news, compare, view pictures and more on the home screen. It also has information for both cars and bikes, as opposed to others who have only cars.


In terms of usability, CarDekho and CarWale do have a better interface and experience (as the ratings would suggest) but all of them are completely functional. If I landed on either of them by chance, I wouldn’t really go looking out for another app and hence from a company’s point of view, discoverability will play a key role. As far as revenues are concerned, all the sites depend on: advertisements, premium listings, lead generation and other intelligence for car dealers and manufacturers.

Investors have made their bets and the market also looks prepared. Globally, there are many multi-billion dollar companies in USA, China, Australia etc that work as auto classified web portals. The According to a KPMG report, BRIC markets will dominate the global car market in 2020. But consolidation has to be on the cards. Vinod says, “I don’t think it is a sector which will have multiple strong players and is likely to end up with two strong players and maybe a third. I think the focus will substantially be in the used car segment rather than first hand purchases which do not have similar economics, have established offline dealer competition and could also depend a lot on broader auto segment performance which can be volatile.” He suggests that companies will need to invest in contemporary and relevant research, building smart rather than pretty interfaces and brand building. “More effort also needs to go into category development because I still hear the same concerns which were prevalent in 2010. Mostly regarding the discomfort of Indian customers towards used car purchases vs. the developed markets where it is a substantial part of the overall auto market. This could be covered through investment into quality assurances and certification which need to be a focus area and can generate service revenues as well,” he says.

In terms of recent events, here is a timeline which is not exhaustive:

2005: CarWale starts
2007: Times Internet starts Zigwheels
2008: GirnarSoft starts CarDekho, Gaadi.com starts, CarWale raises series A
2009: CarTrade starts
2010- CarWale gets acquired by Axel Springer AG/India Today Group
2011: Ibibo acquires Gaadi
2013: GirnarSoft raises $15 million
2014: CarDekho acquires Ibibo-owned Gaadi, Gaadi founder starts 99cars, CarTrade raises $30 million
2015: CarTrade raises from AutoTrade CEO, CarDekho joins hands with Ratan Tata and raises $50 million more, SAIF invests in Zoomo

This has been one hell of a ride for the companies involved and although the Indian consumer market is in the second phase now, we’re pretty far from maturing as a market. This is why more companies are focusing on certification, auto guides, auto news, and in turn building trust with respect to online. With all the companies flush with cash, the engines are revving up to go full throttle!

The Indian e-retailing industry is booming. Case in point, the market size has grown from $600 million two years ago to $2.3 billion. We are at a similar inflection pointasChina was 10 years ago. This is just the beginning. The e-retailing market is expected to reach $32 Billion by 2020.According to Matrix Partners, many ‘Billion dollar e-commerce companies’ are expected to be created in India by then. At present, there are just 3: Flipkart, Snapdeal and Paytm that has just joined the club. Notably, these 3 and the other big domestic and foreign players, namely Shopclues, eBay and Amazon, follow a horizontal marketplace model. As competition amongst them heats up and it is hard to distinguish from each other in terms of products and user experience, new players are emerging with a focus on differentiation.And not surprisingly, they focus on vertical or niche categories. Here’s a look at some ofthem.image credit:Shutter StockTradusandBigBasket(Groceries): Tradus has recently pivoted from being a horizontal marketplace to selling only groceries. While it remains a marketplace, connecting local buyers and sellers in seven cities, BigBasketis not a marketplace and therefore has morecontrol over the entire supply chain. BigBasket has presence in four cities and has its own warehouses and delivery network.UrbanLadder,FabFurnishandPepperfry(Furniture): UrbanLadder is a curated online marketplace for furniture and home decor products, and currently operates in seven cities. FabFurnish too is shifting from an inventory-led model to a marketplace model, thus becoming more cost-effective and also covering more cities. Pepperfry is amanaged marketplace that switched focus from initially selling products across multiple lifestyle categories to only furnitureand home décor. It has the largest coverage,shipping to about 500 cities in India.FirstCry,HopScotchandBabyOye(Baby care products): FirstCry is the leader in the baby care products online retail segment, and has been around for 4 years now. HopScotch is a relatively new entrant and has a flash sales model (which offers smaller scale) as opposed to FirstCry’s inventory-based model. BabyOye follows both an inventory storage model and a just-in-time arrangement with its distribution partners. It had acquired its competitor Hoopos in late 2013. In return, BabyOye has been acquired by the Mahindragroup in February 2015. It appears that the niche baby care players have increasingly been edged out of the market by the large horizontal players such as Flipkart, SnapDeal and Amazon. As a result, out of the half a dozen baby care focused players that had sprung up about five years ago, only a couple of etailers, like FirstCry and Hopscotch, remain in the game.Jabong,ZoviandFashionAndYou(Lifestyle): The lifestyle categories consist of apparel, shoes, jewellery, accessories and home décor and accounts for a massive45% of the entire e-retail market. With the acquisition of Myntra, the prominent playersare Jabong, Zovi and FashionAndYou. They continue to face enormous competition from the horizontal players such as Flipkart, SnapDeal and Amazon that are focusing on fashion more and more. Jabong has been inexistence since 2012 and follows both an inventory model and a managed marketplace model. On the other hand, Zovi designs and manufactures privately labelledlifestyle apparel and accessory products that it sells exclusively online. Lastly, FashionAndYou is a marketplace that operates in a flash sales model, offering products from retailers at discounts for only a limited period.CaratLane,VoyllaandBlueStone: Bluestone has an end-to-end approach to selling jewellery online that involves designing and manufacturing themselves. It also has a just-in-time manufacturing model where the jewellery is manufactured within days ofan order being placed. Caratlane too designs and manufactures its jewellery in-house, but also has a marketplace model for solitaires sourced from vendors globally.While CaratLane and Bluestone sell precious jewellery, Voylla deals largely in imitation jewellery though an inventory-led model.Cbazaar,IndianRootsandCraftsvilla(Ethnic Lifestyle): An emerging trend is niche players dealing in ethnic lifestyle products that have a huge demand outside India in the international market. Three of the prominent players in the space, Cbazaar, IndianRoots and Craftsvilla, have over 50% of their sales of ethnic apparel, home furnishing, home décor, jewellery, bags, etc. originating from abroad. Notably all of them work in a zero-inventory marketplace model.LimeRoadandXarato(Social Shopping): Another recent trend is social shopping where shoppers’ friends become involved inthe shopping experience. There are two onlyplayers in India that have integrated social shopping into the online product discovery and purchasing experience: Limeroad and Xarato* andmany more. Both are lifestyle category marketplaces and differentiate themselves from the rest of the competition by providing value to customers through superior user experience. They have set the benchmark for the next generation of e-commerce sites with social baked in fromthe start.

Silicon Valley venture capitalists are getting more confident about the robust tech scene, their enthusiasm buoyed by the record level of IPOs last year, according to a report released Tuesday.

According to the quarterly Venture Capitalist Confidence Index survey by University of San Francisco professor Mark V. Cannice, VCs surveyed in the fourth quarter last year registered 3.93 on a 5-point scale of confidence. The confidence ranking notched up from the third-quarter reading of 3.89; 5 is the highest market of confidence. The recent confidence reading is also above the 3.72 average over the last 11 years. The increase indicates strong confidence in investment opportunities, the fundraising environment and more successful IPOs this year.

Cannice surveyed 28 Bay Area venture capitalists from different firms.

Cannice’s report attributes the confidence to the last year’s strong IPO market as well as the record level of investments and venture capital fundraising. Last year saw the largest number of
IPOs since 2007 and the most money raised since 2000, about $84 billion. Many valley VCs cashed out on successful deals, such as public debuts from Lending Club, which raised more than $865.5 million, and GoPro, which raised at least $491.3 million.

“We have had six IPOs in the last five quarters and as long as public markets remain open, the pipeline for liquidity is very robust,” Paul Holland, a VC with Foundation Capital, said in the report.

In addition, last year VC firms raised $29.8 billion, a 69 percent increase over the previous year and the largest gain, in both dollar amount and percentage growth, in at least nine years, according to data from Thomson Reuters and the National Venture Capital Association. And VCs invested $23.4 billion into tech last year, the most since 2000.

But along with this surplus of money and confidence has come huge funding rounds — more than $1 billion in some cases — that have driven the market values of some companies through the roof.

“My concern is the recent astronomically overvalued pre-IPO prices awarded to Uber, a staggering $40 billion valuation,” said Igor Sill of Geneva Venture Management. He said he is also skeptical that Snapchat, Dropbox and Airbnb are each worthy of their $10 billion valuation.

“The environment is very good with enough capital for both early- and late-stage deals,” one venture capitalist said in the report. “The problem is that the valuations are unrealistic and the number of companies in each segment is way too many without much to differentiate them.” Nino

Source: siliconbeat

While Steven Hsiao and Anson Tsui were in their senior year of college at the University of California, Berkeley, in 2009, they decided to start a delivery service for Vietnamese and Mexican food. They sourced fresh ingredients, prepared the meals and delivered it themselves to other students.

Neither Hsiao nor Tsui had much of a food background; they studied sociology and bioengineering, respectively. But looking at their peers in school, they saw an opportunity for a late-night delivery service.

"It was through that experience that we really understood how inefficient traditional delivery services are," Hsiao told Mashable. With that in mind, they decided to start a different kind of food business after college, one that would provide healthy meals to customers with virtually no wait time.

The startup, called SpoonRocket, launched in part of San Francisco just under a year ago, promising to deliver locally sourced lunch meals to customers in 10 minutes or less for $8, with no delivery fee tacked on. The catch is that SpoonRocket only offers two meal choices at a time — one vegetarian and one not.

On Thursday, SpoonRocket announced that it had raising an $11 million Series A round led by Foundation Capital, bringing the startup's total to more than $13 million. It is also expanding into all of the San Francisco area and is planning to introduce dinner options soon.

The plan is to use the additional funding to bring on more staff and chefs — doubling the number of employees to more than 100 by the end of this year — and expand into Los Angeles or Seattle in the coming months.

The founders had initially set out to raise $8 million to $10 million, but the funding round comes at a time when investor interest in the food space is running high.

Munchery, a startup that offers same-day delivery for meals, recently raised $28 million. Blue Apron, a service that provides recipes and fresh ingredients for meals, recently raised $50 million. And Sprig, a similar service to SpoonRocket, recently raised $10 million.

One investor in the food startup space previously told Mashable that the optimism here is based on the belief that food is inherently social and these startups enjoy a growth curve similar to that of Uber. Hsiao also alluded to Uber during the course of our interview.

"Uber is the taxi button on your phone," he said. "We are the food button on your phone." "Uber is the taxi button on your phone," he said. "We are the food button on your phone."

Of course, all the funding being pumped into the space means SpoonRocket has plenty of competition to achieve that goal. For now, the startup is betting that speed and price can help it stand out, though it's unclear if either or both will be sustainable as it expands into new cities.

Source: Mashable

Rahima Enterprise




Rahima enterprise is founded by Mr. Sujan who is now a millionaire . Before starting this venture, he sold mobile card from one place to another place by bicycle. In 2013, his turnover was 32 crore. He is very hard worker. He is the agent of several mobile companies like Bicash, Ucash, OK of one bank. He has seven or more employees who collect money by motor cycle. Do you imagine , from where he is? He lives in Noakhali. It is difficult to be a business man by selling mobile cards to customer. He could not finish his graduation. But he still is an enterpreneure. He started his venture at the very begging of his life. His age is  now around thirty. He is developing more ventures. He is exporting garments products in South Africa. His another venture is consumer product agents like Teer soyabin oil, Partex Beverage, Hoque Biscuits and so one. I am encouriging those who want start a business with low cost. I think agency business requires low investment. You can star with five lac or less capital. Some of readers of this blog sent email to me that how can i start i business with less capital. I suggest them to start this type of business. This business has some advantages. You can sell you product on cash. You need not advertisement cost. Because you are not selling your own product. The consumer is concerned about your agency's  product. At first, you have to select less branded product. Because you requires little money for security purpose. You have to go agent head office for agreement. I think for starting level, it is better choice. After developing you foundation, you can set up your portfolio. You have to be successful business man. You have no time to waste. So be careful for selecting your business field. It should be practical and reasonable business, not emotional basis. So best of luck.  

 Today I am telling a new business ideas for you who want to start a new venture and wanna become an entrepreneur in Bangladesh. Dial a taxicab or auto rickshaw to your doorstep via mobile is a big opportunity in bangladesh. Every day taxi cab seeker waste a lot of time for hiring a taxi cab or auto rickshaw. The taxi cab walla may be waste to capture his suitable customer. So both of the parties can not reach at the proper time . A third party can solve this problem or match between two parties. I think there is a huge opportunity for this business in bangladesh. The customer hire their taxi cab or autho rickshaw before one hour time so that he can travel timely. Sometimes the auto rick shaw can be used for school going students. If any one interested to star this venture and want to know more then contaact with me.

Alviras fashion is one of the leading garments buying agency for quality knitted garments from Bangladesh. We, alviras fashion have well and very strong grass root contacts with vendors (Manufacturers & Exporters) in Bangladesh, providing a various range of products. The foundation of our policy is to approve the vendors after a very detailed and careful assessment and evaluation of the manufacturer.

Business Philosophy

We are driven by the maxim of achieving the desired quality at most competitive prices, by leveraging on all available resources, controlling wastage, improving efficiencies and target oriented objective approach to the whole business.

Our major objective is to make business out of Bangladesh a pleasurable and profitable experience and enterprise for all - the Buyer, the Supplier and Alviras Fashion. The whole concept is to provide the overseas buyer a one-stop Buying Office in Bangladesh.

We value our relationships with our Buyers and Vendors as a high point of our business practices.

We are sure to meet all your expectations, and give you a great experience in doing business with Bangladesh.

Yes, we are your Buying agent in Bangladesh you can trust. Please visit our site for detail information: http://www.alvirasfashion.com

easily you can be owner a college in Dhaka city with investing just tk 100000. we need more than 50 inverters to set up a college. a collective people is the power of this institute. the people who are employee of bank, school, college and other professions can participate. we just need to find out the same minded people. low income people can not do such this type of work. They should save money for a long time. but with the group u can easily  be owner this institute. if you think that i am right then please contact with me.

I am seeking any interested partners who want to do something with me. In india, if anyone do something regarding business then the media help to market their product. The media is playing a vital role for popularizing any product. The indian are so lucky since they are getting this type of benefit in tern of no cost. But in bangldesh, there is opposite scenario in this sector. We do not get any help from media group. Our media group are busy only singer, model, bad news presentation. But if they use their on column for any entrepreneur, then a new business will be created as well as new job opportunity created. There is no one in our country to introduce new entrepreneur.  We can not see any TV show which is doing this type of job . TV media do not arrange any talk show for new entrepreneur.So they should change their role for the benefit of our country. Otherwise we will not go forward.

Now i am showing some new business which have been proven in india. and in the india market they are accepted. So i am inviting indian to do these business with me as a partner. I think we will do better. Because our market and indian market are likely same.

Name of the new business:
1. online book selling. in india, flipkart is doing better. there is no strong brand in our country. so we can do this business.
2. On line rent a car business. It is the big opportunity in bangladesh. in india there are many companies doing this business like youcabs, taxiguide etc.


Finally i want to say that if anyone want to do these business then please contact with me. Indian are more preferable for me.

The farm equipment market in India is now growing at a fast pace after a brief period of decline between 1999 and 2002.

What is a combine harvester?
Combine harvester is a farm equipment that can do multiple tasks such as harvesting multiple crops, threshing, winnowing, and collection of grains. The market for combine harvesters is still in its nascent stage but it is growing fast. Farmers in Western and Southern states of the country are looking to buy this equipment.

The manufacturing of combine harvesters started around 1970 when Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana (PAU) helped locals to manufacture farm machinery. But It was around 9-10 years back when the demand for combine harvesters increased at a fast pace.

The market
There are two main models for combine harvesters based on their working principles: self-propelled and tractor mounted. Tractor mounted combine harvesters are cheaper as compared to self-propelled combines and are often preferred by farmers who have smaller holdings of lands.

The demand of tractor mounted combines is estimated at around 3,500  and for self-propelled combines is around 1,500. The heartening factor for this segment is that only 10-15% farms use these machines for harvesting. The growth rate for the demand of combines is expected to be around 12% annually. This is where opportunity lies.

Export opportunities are also increasing and lots of countries in Africa like Burkina Faso, Zambia, Madagascar, and in Europe like Germany are opening their market for Indian players. Pakistan is also becoming a considerable importer of these machines.

Constraints for the market
The major constrain for the market of combine harvester is its price. The rate varies between Rs 5 lakh to Rs 22 lakh depending upon the models and functionality. Fragmented land holding, poor rural transport facilities, inaccessible farms and lack of local manufacturers and repairing facilities are some of the factors that have kept this industry mainly focused in North India especially in Punjab. Lack of proper knowledge about farm equipments and shortage of diesel in the country are some of peripheral constraints.

Commercial banks and institutions like NABARD are opening up financing facilities to farmers and the segment is seeing some sort of incremental demand.

The cost of combine harvesting of wheat and paddy is around Rs. 3000-4000/- per ha. If done manually, it takes around 20 laborers to harvest one hectare charging around Rs. 150/- per day (this could vary state-wise). Apart from that, there is a cost of Rs. 1000/- per ha for threshing also. The total cost of harvesting comes almost equal in both the cases but the time saved and labor-shortage-issues are solved quite nicely by opting for combine harvesting.


The Way Out
The panacea for this constraint of cost is custom hiring of farm equipments and it fits quite interestingly for combine harvesters. Tractor mounted combines could cost 20-30% less than self-propelled combines, and self-propelled combines are owned by contractors or farmers holding big fields. During the harvesting seasons, these machines are sent to different states and areas for custom hiring. Farmers having small holdings hire these machines on contract basis and let them harvest the crop for them. Contractors or owners of these machines send their groups in different states for harvesting season that could go on for around 2 months.

In last 2-3 years, Punjab has faced acute shortage of labor coming from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. The situation was so drastic that farmers used to sit at railway stations at Ambala and Rajpura and wait for laborers to alight so that they could be picked right from there. However, due to industrial initiatives by Bihar government, lots of laborers prefer to work in those units avoiding traveling and costs of living in different state. This is where farm equipments especially like combine harvesters that have multitasking functionality come to the aid of agriculture sector. Other states are also facing labor shortage and state governments are encouraging R&D and innovations in farm equipments.

Harvesting of fruits is one more area where these machines can be extended for functioning but it requires a lot of design modification and quality enhancement measures.

One major concern of improvement is the usage of combine harvesters during off-season. Capital investment in purchasing combine harvesters is huge, and there is great need of developing some jobs where these machines can be used during non-harvesting season.

Scope and opportunities
The scope of this segment of farm mechanization is huge. Interestingly, till now, Punjab is the only state where almost all the manufacturers of combine harvesters are clustered. Manufacturers like Swaraj, Preet Combines, Kartar Combines, Standard Combines, and Deshmesh Combines are all from Punjab. There are number of smaller players in Punjab that manufacture low-cost combines that are suitable for farmers having small land holdings.

States like Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Uttar Pradesh often seek supply of these combine harvesters from Punjab. Therefore, there are great opportunities for new start-ups in different parts of the country.

For new start-ups, there is no big challenge in terms of market. Intelligent selection of material, improvements in design, and offering quality post-sales repair services could be the factors that could help them stamp their presence in the marke.

Did you know that around 50% of a person’s ability to learn is developed in the first four years of their lives? Lina Ashar, founder of Brainworks and Kangaroo Kids Education, elaborates,

Several preschool chains have already opened up in the past few years to cater to the requirement. But with around 126 million children expected to be in the age group of 0 to 4 by the year 2010, according to the United Nations Population Division, the demand for preschools in the organized segment could be on the rise like never before.Lina Ashar
Founder, BrainworksJayesh Nair
Head, Trishna PreschoolsStarting your own schools is capital intensive, as opposed to franchising, since property refurbishment, toys and other equipment costs are high. One school would cost you around Rs 15 to 20 lacs, excluding brand building costsIn franchising model, the quality of teachers often suffer. Hence, we only appoint qualified teachers who are well-experienced in dealing with children. We have a separate team that train them with teaching techniques, throughout the year.

A Rs 4,004 Crore IndustryAccording to reports by brokerage firm CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets, the preschool industry in the country is currently estimated to gross about Rs 4,004 crore ($985 million). The report also indicated that the largest chain of preschools in India comprises of just 550 schools, less than 4% of the total market potential of 15,000 preschools.

According to Sarita Sayal, Director of Mother’s Pride, which enrolls around 10,000 children annually, “Driving this growth are several social factors, like the increasing number of double income nuclear families who desire to enroll their kids in the best of schools and fear losing out on the rat race.”This is primarily because most preschools in India fall in the unorganized sector. Says Lina, “The business of running preschools has tremendous potential in India as it is still highly unorganized and often lacks a standardized curriculum, infrastructure and quality. Given that it is lucrative, and there is still a quality gap, there is scope for several organized players to get into this business.”

So can we start this business in Bangladesh? There is a huge potentiality in our country.