Opinion The new entrepreneurial cool

“Bangalore Rises”,says the tagline of the festival,in a city where entrepreneurship has been visibly on the climb recently. The festival organisers hope to add this event to the global roster of successful annual startup events such as South by Southwest in Austin,Texas,the Launch Festival in San Francisco and TechCrunch Disrupt in New York.

“When people want to make a life as an actor,they land in Mumbai. Similarly,anybody who wants to be an entrepreneur has to head to Bangalore,” said Shashi Kiran,associate director of The Indus Entrepreneurs’ (TiE) Bangalore chapter and a co-anchor for the festival. The festival’s goal is to take the startup culture to the streets. From an event where those dressed in suits hold day-long schmoozing sessions at a stuffy venue,the organisers transformed it into a “friendly neighbourhood gala”. Fittingly,entry into the event was by wearing the event T-shirt that cost Rs 899.

The schedule was eclectic. To the line-up of open mic-type pitch showcases,mentoring panels and networking events,the organisers added morning sessions of yoga and zumba,music concerts,interactive games,pub crawling and even a street-side art fair. “The idea is to convey that entrepreneurship is a lifestyle rather than a career,” said Vlad Dubovskiy,co-anchor of the festival. In keeping with the unconventional nature of things Dubovskiy,founder of the Colorado,Texas-based startup accelerator Unreasonable Institute,transported himself to Bangalore to co-found the festival.

The festival had over a 100 sessions spread across 60 venues with 100-plus speakers. A couple of thousand aspiring and new entrepreneurs and developers were in attendance. A dozen startups broke out of stealth mode to hog their two minutes of fame at the festival’s Launchpad events. Wannabes crawled through neighbourhoods to visit well-known startups where successful entrepreneurs showcased their work in the “day in the life” format. “It is not just another boring conference,” said Dubovskiy.

The organisers’ goal is to boost Bangalore’s entrepreneurial ecosystem and establish the city’s ranking on the list of map global cities. Infrastructure challenges make Bangalore,and India,tough environments for startups. Yet,the city has many things going for it. It offers a gateway to one of the world’s largest markets. It has a pool of smart,technically trained professionals. It is attracting startup entrepreneurs not just from India,but from Silicon Valley and other Western destinations as well. In its readiness to adopt disruptive businesses,the Bangalore ecosystem has started to mirror Silicon Valley. It has established its credentials by spawning successful startups like Flipkart and RedBus,which have amassed millions of users.

There is a sea change in the city’s entrepreneurial situation,said Startup Festival panellist Shashank N.D.,co-founder of Practo,a healthcare startup that received $4 million in funding last year. Back in 2006 when he was an aspiring entrepreneur in college,the only place to discuss startups was in a Google group called Open Coffee Club,he said. There were no events,no meetups and certainly no festivals. However,in the last two years,activity has revved up so much that Shashank’s week is packed with events and speaking invitations. “These days,[the audience is asking mature questions about sales models,metrics and A-team rather than lame ones like,how do I get a VC.”

There is something to be said about a crowd whose energies are so entirely focused on entrepreneurship that it is infectious. On opening day,a student identifying himself as Gautam Chawla asked a panel of successful entrepreneurs,“What is the right age to become an entrepreneur?” The answer came from Joydeep Sen Sharma,a well known former Facebook executive who moved to Bangalore to launch Qubole,which offers big data analysis tools as a service. “When I was at Facebook in my 30s,the guys who came in to do innovative stuff were people in the 20s and that made me feel like s*#@,” said Sharma. “Don’t waste time,get started early.”

saritha.rai@expressindia.com