pluGGdin podcast

Kiruba needs no introduction and it won't be wrong to call him the 'grand old man of Indian podcasting scenario'. Here is presenting my podcast with Kiruba. The podcast is about understanding who Kiruba is? How did he stumbled upon the idea of podcasting (that too from India?) and the future of podcasting in India.

MingleBox is carving a niche in the Indian Social Networking scenario by focusing on the college crowd. Presenting our podcast with Kavita Iyer, MingleBox. In this podcast, I discussed following questions with Kavita: On MingleBox] * How do you plan to use the recently raised $7mn funding ? * Is it correct to say that Minglebox is aiming to be the Facebook of India? While targeting the college student, aren’t you losing out on the professional crowd? Or is it the long-prone strategy to ‘catch them young”? * Facebook is gaining traction in the Indian market - what would be your plan to compete with Facebook’s brand + open APIs. * Quite lately, India Internet has witnessed the rise of ‘hate communities’. How do you guys manage such communities? Do you moderate communities/discussions, if needed? * Please share few of your insights on social networks - what do you think makes Indian community different from any other geography? * On FishEye deal - Could you give a sneak preview of what kind of promotion MingleBox will go for? * On the rising social nets in India - Everyone is doing it. How do you plan to differentiate MingleBox from others? [On Entrepreneurship] * What’s your take on the rising salary levels in the Indian market? Companies like Riya have shut their office and others too are facing the heat. * Your tips to entrepreneurs

RouteGuru has done an out of box thinking by defining the driving directions using landmarks. Impressed by this, I did a podcast with Avinash Agrawal, founder of RouteGuru. In this podcast, Avinash & I talk about founder's background, journey of RouteGuru (after winning the techtribe contest), their future plans etc. Do give the podcast a listen and share your comments.

Anand Morzaria is the founder of Pennywise solutions, the company behind tolmolbol. In my earlier email interview, Anand talked about his entrepreneurial experience, why he started up on his own. In this podcast, Anand talks about tolmolbol, how the founding team filtered 17 ideas and decided on going ahead with 1 (i.e. tolmolbol) and his tips to entrepereneurs. Anand has some real interesting/practical tips for budding entrepreneurs - for e.g. he & his team strongly believe in selling the idea, something which geeks shy away from! Anand (and his team) pretty much represents the rising entrepreneurial culture in Indian . If you are a wanna entrepreneur and still thinking of whether to startup or not, I strongly suggest you to give this podcast a listen.

Kalyan is one of the co-founders of IndyaRocks. In this podcast with <a href= "www.pluggd.in">pluGGd.in, I asked very candid questions to Kalyan on why another social net? what's the big deal about IndyaRocks etc. Listen to the podcast to know answer to all these questions!!

The summer edition of Proto is slated for 21st & 22nd July @ IIT Chennai. There are big ticket VCs like Sequoia Capital, Canaan Partners, Footprint Ventures, Silicon Valley Bank, Ventureast, NEA-IndoUS Ventures, Plus Ventures, Reliance Capital, Intel Capital, Nadathur Holdings,Band of Angels, iLab Ventures, Matrix Partners, SeedFund, Passion Fund, Mentor Partners, [and many more..]. If you are a startup, you know the stakes. It just can't get bigger than this. And by the way, pluGGd.in is one of the official podcasters of this event.!

In the first episode, Ajay talks about Ziva, Zook, the strategy behind these products and most importantly, how are they trying to leverage the mobile search platform, and build a mobile social network [and how is this social network different from the regular ones] And presenting to you the second part, where Ajay talks about entrepreneurship, walks us thru' his journey from enterprise software to a startup. And on the lighter side, Ajay also talks about his transition from an AC office to a fan office! Give it a listen and do share your comments.

Ajay Sethi is the founder of Ziva software, the mobile search company. In this podcast with pluGGd.in, Ajay talks about Ziva's strategy [especially the social networking dimension!] and shares his insights on entrepreneurship. We have split the podcast in 2 parts - the first part will focus on Ziva, and in the second part Ajay talks about his entrepreneurial journey and has some real good tips for geeks who wanna startup on their own! Give it a listen!

In this podcast with pluGGd.in, Deap talks about Burrp’s future plans, what lies ahead and he shares his insights on entrepreneurship. Deap reveals few of the cool stuff coming out of the Burrp factory [Mobile coupons, Deal2Phone and TV Listing service!] and how Burrp is moving away from being a local listing service to the big big listing service! Given that Burrp is synonymous with foodies, does the new positioning calls for a change in the brand name? Deap shares his insights. Since Burrp is operational only in few cities, how is it relevant to other parts of India? Isn't it too risky to target niche segment [lifestyle] in niche cities? As Deap comes from M&A/private equity background and has been on the other side of the *funding* table, we wanted to know his insights/experiences with VCs - what works? what sucks? And I am glad to say that he has some damn good stuff to share. He talks about the homework that every entrepreneur should do before approaching VCs [talks about VentureHacks, how to build protection in the term sheet, sign deferred compensation deal with legal teams and in short, get smart about the whole investing process]. Deap also shares his observations with recruiting talented engineers in India…and he is pretty candid about what he says! Most importantly, he shares his insights on how entrepreneurs need to be capital efficient, be more resilient and earn respect from the community, ‘coz the testing times are right ahead! Don't miss this podcast. Deap is way too cool guy!!