Start IT up

A recent law suit against Dell by the attorney general of New York, says a lot about how important customer service has become. Its interesting to observe that having a good product line alone does not guarantee company’s success, rather what makes a difference is how well you are serving your customers. Innovating on how to service your customers has become as important as innovating on technology and your product.

Innovating in any field is very challenging and when it comes to customer satisfaction it becomes even more difficult because of the diverse and dynamic nature of your customer base. One way of doing this is by involving your customers in the process. Co-create. Taking help of your customers in letting you innovate on your offering, let them tell you what they need and what they don’t. Make them feel as if they belong. This instills a strong sense of loyalty. This is the focus of our new product ValueJini.

I started my career with GE as a trainee & left the company after 9 months very clear about ‘what’ i have to do, the only question was ‘how’. In this world there are two things related to work. first is, ‘what’ work are you doing and second, ‘how’ you are doing it. With experience the concept of ‘how’ you do work fascinates me more than ‘what’. The ‘how’ part always keeps me in unrest & busy because you always have the answer to ‘what’. But still when you talk about success then i will say, if you do not have the answer to ‘why’ you are doing the work, then nobody can save you. I am sorry if its intimidating! Because to me “The only difference between success & failure is self-realization”. Once you know yourself you will see a strong link in all the events that happen around you. Then you become a part of God’s creation working in his created world. You are here just to implement the things which he wants you to do. Know God, know yourself, everything is in you & you can manifest at will.

When I came here for the first time, after entering the meeting room & looking at the seating arrangement. I could guess that there is some relation with Japan & of course i figured out later ‘why’. Being with Techjini has been exciting & incredible, i can never believe that i will be able to create a web application in a weeks time . Moreover it was more so because of Shyamal who is a geek , Amit who is a punt & Ved who always keeps me busy with his fascinating stories about spirituality and @$%#$&^*(&^. Presently we are working on another exciting project hoping to launch soon in the market and we hope to make it a big success. Being here has been a great learning experience for me. I am new here but still in the few days that i have been here, i feel that as a company we seem to be doing really well.

Few days ago I played an interesting quiz. You should try it when you have time. I enjoyed solving it. Once done, though I was feeling happy to have solved it, I was not satisfied. Why, because I was wondering as to who really solved it, me or the search engine?

In todays connected world that has so much information available on the internet, solving a quiz is no longer a feat. Instead of trying to ponder over adwork through the quiz questions, I was clicking happily on the results the search engine had spit out. And on the more difficult ones I was trying to analyze which search results are more relevant. So much for instant gratification. Had it been 6-8 years ago, it would have taken me a few hours to finish it, or maybe even more. But at the end of it, I would have felt satisfaction and real happiness. And in the process I would have probably remembered the answers to all questions for the rest of my life. But on the bright side, I am getting better at searching and finding relevant informaion faster on search engines

During the year and a half of TechJini’s existence, we have learnt several things about starting and running a company in Bangalore. I am putting together our experiences in this post so that it can be helpful to others.

Register the company

The World Bank has a very detailed and comprehensive list of things to be done when you want to start your company. It covers most of the statutory requirements of starting a company in Bangalore. Many of these services are available online, so it makes life simpler. For those that are not available online, it is advisable to go through a Chartered Accountant.

It is advisable to get your company registered before you commence operations. Else it can create problems when you receive payments and don’t yet have a bank account in the company’s name.

Open a bank account

We chose citibank as our company bankers after we spoke to several banks. They offered better personalized service, were easily accessible and had the necessary features we were looking for. Since current account have no interest, choose a bank that offers easy ways to park/withdraw your surplus funds into/from short term funds which are mostly risk free and earn a good interest rate of 6% p.a.

Accounting and statutory compliance

Since Tally is the most commonly used accounting software, I would recommend to buy a license and start using it from the beginning. This avoids any accounting nightmares when you try to create your balance sheets at the eleventh hour. If you are not from an accounting background, it is best to hire a part-time accountant who can visit your premises and update your accounts every week or every fortnight. You can find such a person by locating any Tally coaching institute in your locality. They charge anywhere between Rs 1500 to Rs 3000 based on the amount of work.

There are several statutory and back office requirements like payroll, filing PT returns, advance tax, TDS returns, ROC returns, VAT/CST returns etc that require knowledge, time and effort. I did this myself the first year, but found that it is better to hire a professional for these while I can focus on our core business. Thus we met few CAs and finally contracted one of them. For a monthly fee, they handle all things including accounting, payroll, TDS, ROC, IT , PT etc (except the audit). They charge upwards of Rs 10,000 per month based on the number of employees.

Liability of employee behaviour
Another aspect to remember is that the company should formulate and get every employee (including the founders) tosign a Term of Employment or Company Policy documents. These documents outline several things including (but not limited to)

• employee’s acceptable behavior
• state that if the employee indulges in any unlawfully activity, the company shall not be liable
• the employee shall not use any IP from this company or anywhere else unless authorized

This becomes even more critical for IT startups since cyber laws are still evolving and these documents go a long way in proving that the employer takes preventive measures to protect the law. You can contact any lawyer who specializes in Cyber Law and he can assist you with the drafting of a policy.

Premises and utilities

We chose an office that was close to both the founders’ residences. This greatly improves productivity since we do not waste time and energy commuting to the workplace. Since we are a startup, we chose an office that offered us the best value for the money. Also ensure that there are few eateries in vicinity. Make sure you verify other things like, water availability, parking space, capacity of electricity connection etc.

If you are an IT startup, get at least 2 internet connections. We have BSNL and Tata Indicom. We have had bad experience with both of them, but Airtel (which is the best in terms of uptime) is not available in our locality.

Resources

I am sharing the contacts/resources that may save you time. Feel free to let them know you heard about them from us.
Chartered Accountants

• Dilip Kumar (9341218974) - Apart from CA functions, provides accounting, payroll, statutory compliance services
• Krishnananda Nayak (26578391) - Also provides all CA and other services.
• L. Krishna Moorthy (26789535) - CA and tax consulting. We get our personal returns filed from him.
• Ashim Dey Bhowmick - Provides all functions of CA and also back office services

Lawyers

• Vipin Kumar Jain (9845050266)
• Sajan Poovayya of Poovayya & Co (41156800) http://www.poovayya.net

Please share any thing we missed via the comments.