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Overview of Seventymm |
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Seventymm is India's first online DVD rental service operating in Delhi and
Bangalore. We intend to make watching movies a hassle-free experience. All you
need to do is log in to the site, register and specify your office or home address,
where you want the DVDs to be delivered and it will be done in 24 hours. |
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Idea to start this venture |
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I came to India in March 2005 on a vacation. After a month I got bored and I
wanted to do something new in India. The booming entertainment industry was an
eye opener. I was amazed to see that PVR Cinemas charged Rs 500 for a gold class
ticket. I grew up in a small town called Dharwad where we had to pay just Rs 2.50
to see a movie!
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Here families are ready to spend even Rs 1,000 for a film! It's a completely
different India from the one that I grew up in. Consumer is the king here and
people have money in their pockets. Besides, DVD prices have crashed to below
Rs 3000. So I thought about a product, which people could use throughout the
year.
India has supply of 900 movies a year. There is a lot of content here. I also
looked at how people watch movies and I found the market completely fragmented |
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Birth of Seventymm |
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The company was founded in August 2005 and we launched the service in
March this year in Bangalore. We received $2 million from DFJ in November last
year. We received another round of funding of $7 million with Matrix Partners
recently. Today, we have raised a total $10 million. |
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Competition |
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If you want to rent a movie on Friday you have to drive to the nearest outlet.
Suppose you want Spiderman, it is not available and the local shop gives you
Batman. You may get it cheap but when you take it home you find it is not clear
and realize it is a pirated copy.
So consumer expectations are not satisfied. Home delivery in India has taken
off unlike food delivery business which has become big business in India.
Convenience is what people looking at along with the choice of content and
variety of languages. You can also check how others have rated the film on the site
and refer it to friends.
This is a disorganized sector and consolidation is happening in various
sectors of retail, we being an organized player would like to make the best use of
the opportunity. |
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Start-Ups & Experience |
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I started three companies in six years. I started a company called Rendition
Networks before this. It was a software technology firm with an elite clientele. Last
year, Opsware acquired it for $40 million. Prior to that, I founded iMandi, an
Internet market place to serve households in the United States.
Suppose if you want to get your house cleaned, or want a lawn moving
service, you could get it done with our service. It's like the next version of yellow
pages. We had over 300 categories in house cleaning and tied up with 200,000
merchants in the US and had about 1 million users. It was a great experience. |
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Working experience at Microsoft |
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It is very exciting. Microsoft was a great experience. When I joined Microsoft there were only 6,000 people. I spend 8 years in Microsoft, when I left MS it had 30,000 people and it had become bureaucratic. |
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I loved working at Microsoft, it's an awesome company but as more people
joined, it was a totally different feeling. I left Microsoft in 1998. MS was one of
the hottest companies to work with. The last two years I was in the finance group. |
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I was part of the Hotmail acquisition; I used to interact with him (Microsoft
boss Bill Gates) on a project basis. He is a shrewd businessman and you have to
prepare really well before you go for a meeting with him. You have to back up
what you are saying. |
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The best thing about MS is they have hired very smart people. They have
done an exemplary job in hiring the right talent. People are very passionate about
their ideas, and even get confrontational! But the best way is to win and do well. |
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Importance of education for an entrepreneur |
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Education is important for an entrepreneur. In my case, the masters in
mechanical engineering did not help. A bachelor's degree in engineering helps as it
gives a good base, but if I can redo my education, I will not opt for MTech. A
degree in computer science has been very helpful, I can understand technology
very well. |
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The business school taught me a structured way of thinking and analyze
market opportunities. My family also had a business in Karnataka but my father
can't think of big deals and diversifying business. He cannot think about evaluating
risks. they only think about what coming in and what is going out than about the
large picture of business and how you can grow further. |
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A B-school teaches you to understand opportunities and risks. It also teaches
you to grow big, create customer value and think about the competition. |
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Advice to budding entrepreneurs in India |
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Go after your passion, if you have a passion for anything you will be
very successful, I tell my kids also if you want a be a rock star, pursue
it! |
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There are huge opportunities in India. All you need to do is prioritise
your ideas and work hard. |
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Don't be afraid to make any mistakes because you are bound to make
mistakes. |
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If one start-up fails, it doesn't mean that you will also lose, it is a great
learning experience. |
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Success mantra |
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The drive to succeed is very important. Clarity of thought and ability to
focus on the right things have helped me. I have been able to focus on making
changes and have the ability to solve unstructured problems.I also believe
prioritising and execution. I believe that strategy is 20 per cent and execution is 80
per cent. |
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Challenges faced in India |
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The biggest challenge in India is hiring. I spend 90 per cent of my time on
hiring people. Attrition rate and salaries are very high. And when people come for
interviews, they are not keen on finding out how challenging and interesting their
job would be, they straightway ask, "What's my package?"
Indians historically are very conservative and don't want to work with a
start-up. It's because we did not grow up in a society with many start-ups. In
Bangalore, people want to work only for IT companies or BPOs (business process
outsourcing units).
We have solid team in place. We have a staff of 70 in our Bangalore office
and will hire about 50 in Delhi. |
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Future plans |
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We plan to launch operations in Mumbai by the end of this year. We will
also be launching in Chennai, Hyderabad and Kolkata by the first quarter of next
year. We plan to have 1 million users in 5 years generating revenue of $100
million. Every month about 1 million DVD players and 1 million VCD players are
sold.
So 24 million players will be sold every year. In 5 years, this will grow to
60-80 million. When you have 80 million players what good is it if you can't watch
your favorite movies? So rental schemes will do very well! |
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Awards & Honors |
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pc world award 2008 for the best web site in the movie rentals in the categoty |
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