High Pitched

Pune-based Shirish Bhatt will be at loggerheads with entrepreneurs from across India in the final rounds of the Indian adaptation of the television series,The Pitch

After passing out from Pune Vidyarthi Griha College of Engineering and Technology in 2007,Shirish Bhatt did not want to be a part of the placement process. He was certain of his ambition to become an entrepreneur and not join the service sector like his batchmates. Sharing his vision was another classmate,Amit Savargaonkar. Together,they came up with the concept for a website,which would help connect students from colleges in Tier II and III cities,as well as those from lesser-known but equally credible colleges in major cities. The duo soon roped in third partner,Himanshu Jain,another batchmate and the trio put the concept into action.

Their idea made it to the final rounds of the third season of the Indian adaptation of the popular television series,titled The Pitch,aired on Bloomberg TV. The jury,comprising successful entrepreneurs Mahesh Murthy,Vishal Gondal and Neeraj Roy,have selected Bhatt to represent their business venture in a competition to win a sum of Rs 5 crore as prize money. We had sent our entry for the show. Before long our application was accepted,we had an interview and I was representing my company on the show. The judges have said that they found our concept very innovative, says the 28-year-old.

His venture is titled Camplace and was set up in late 2012. The company is run by the three members and responsibilities are divided amongst them. While Bhatt is involved in the revenue-generation and and data management process,Jain designs and develops the user interface,and Savargaonkar focuses on the development of the venture in its entirety.

The trip to the studios in Mumbai was a great learning experience,says Bhatt. I got to learn a lot from other participants; they were so clear in their business strategies and detailed in their plans, he says. He was surprised to come across some business ideas pursued by other participants which were very simple and essential,yet never thought of being implemented as a business plan before. But the judges unanimously agreed that even his business model was one such plan. The judges were happy that we are addressing the issue of the day unemployment. Through our online portal,we save the candidates time and the trouble of travelling across India to give interviews. Employers can take interviews on the website, says Bhatt,adding that the team has worked on plans to improve the portal and add more features to it if they win the prize money. They will also use the money to fund advertisement campaigns to spread awareness about the portal so that they can reach out to more employers and candidates.

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