Sino Hero Foods Ltd

One of the biggest challenges in a start up business is fund raising. My experience has been that there are a lot fewer sources of funding even in good times for the small business start up than is generally hyped up in media and VC's who are always 'looking for good investments' and yet don't pull the trigger on anything but either the most fashionable or ' late stage' investment theme with an 'easy' and quick exit. My favourite example is a VC friend of mine I had introduced to a friend who had just started a Business process outsourcing ( BPO) venture in India. At every stage over the next 18 months, he kept inquiring about the progress ( which was very good) but never invested. Then suddenly, there was talk of a major investment group buying into my friends company and taking them public in NYSE and my VC mate couldnt help but call me everyday hoping somehow I could convince the now not so poor entrepreneur to let them 'invest' as a late stage investment opportunity. Guess everyone likes a sure thing !! Unfortunately most of us don't see a sure thing as an entitlement.

Angel investors.......Dream on ! By the time you would go on making and remaking your business plan you will be drained of any energy, confidence  and resources to actually conduct any business.

So in short and sweet terms, you are on your own.

I would suggest between begging, borrowing and stealing.. stealing looks like the best option ( As the masters of the investment universe have proven to us. But I guess we will have to let the Madoffs' and the Stanfords of the world stick to their expertise)

Watch your cash very very carefully as it will be a very long, lonely and ardous journey. Mirages will be many but genuine oasis's few and far inbetween so be prepared not to burn out while the ' big one' might be just around the corner.

Keep offices in  the cheapest place you can afford and  do not go on staffing binge in ' hopes' of business. You can always staff up when the business shows up. Keep expectation of staff low and do not promise them the sky. People, especially staff and customers are smart enough to accept reality and they CAN SEE reality ! So focus on building a good business and all will share the rewards. Pretend to build a farce of a business in a flash office with half a dozen secretaries and daily fresh flowers and soon you will be another footnote in the statistics of business failure that runs as high as 90 %

Posted by SAMIR_13 at 11:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBacks (0)

Why does one become an entrepreneur ? And why is so less understood about the trials and tribulation of going out on' one's own'?

Sometimes entrepreneurship is celebrated and romanticised to such an extent that we lose all sense of the harsh realities that lay in the path of the entrepreneur. Why are the success stories oft repeated while the many who perished by the wayside not even mentioned in the footnote of the history of capitalism?

All the more pertinent is this issue in todays economic crisis context. Is it a good time be an entrepreneur I get asked all the time by eager students and friends in the corporate world who do not feel secure any more in their once cushy jobs. Maybe it is also cyclical the highs and lows of entrepreneurship.

As one One learns in high school economics about the factors of production namely Land , Labour, Capital and Entrepreneur, these have their bull and bear markets too in my opinion.

During the internet bubble, Entrepreneurs were celebrated including may who pretended to be entrepreneurs and yet raised million in equity capital. It was also the bubble phase of capital as one could not ' invest fast enough !! This also created a bull market in labour i.e ' knowledge economy' wherein there was a shortage of ' good people' whatever that meant !!!

With the internet bubble bursting, we saw the property and financial bubble take its place where capital and land became the new highs and again labour entered a bull market with all talk of ' the world is flat' economics !! Entrepreneurs were 'out' as corporate high fliers and corporate fat cats dominated by the financial firms became the new 'masters of the universe' or as the Economist magazine put it ' the sultans of global capitalism'

Well all great parties do come to an end eventually and now we are faced with a huge slump in Land(property) capital ( none left) Labour ( everyone can be laid off especially ' good people). Last man standing ? The entrepreneurs....Will this be the golden age of entrepreneurship ???

Posted by SAMIR_13 at 02:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)