What is seed funding for startups and how can you get it? That you wont know in this blog. What you get is 5+ minutes of reading of an Entrepreneur's experience with incubators by Government and the charges involved. Also some sort of question that Interviewers/Sharks asks in a 10 minute pitch window.
Startup India Funding for Aspiring Entrepreneurs & a Broke CTO
'This technology was introduced 10 years back, you are too late to develop this thing!' - Said one of the Shark in the panel after i pitched and presented my deck. When you are a tech entrepreneur with a B.Tech & MBA in arsenal, you tend to research well before you get onto something. So i didn't directly jump to it. Pitch itself requires some research. 'Ideas don't come fully formed' - said a great mind in an event. I wasn't sure if this was a trick question asked by the Panel or have i been outdated even after working in the tech industry for over 14 years. I didn't know what to answer because on my previous answer they told to keep my answers short, and there was no way this question had a short answer. I chose to stay quiet.
I was expecting more questions on what, how and how long?
Anyway, one of the interviewer in the panel also asked 'why are you integrating whatsapp api from a third party when you can develop one?' to which another panel said 'Don't you know, you can get whatsapp api directly from facebook.'
Well there discussion made clear that they did not bother before the meeting to look at the pitch deck or the pitcher's profile who carried 14 years of experience in tech industry with 3 years as Aspiring Entrepreneur.
I tried explaning that they are right! 'you get whatsapp business from facebook but API enhancements are provided by third parties. And developing whatsapp API is not the focus, its there in the market already. Developing a FULL STACK AI MARKTECH (leadbug.io) is the goal which has whatsapp as one of the customer engagement feature.' A shortest answer i could come across in a 10 minute-multi panel-pitch round.
I was happy that atleast there are people with their Webcam ON and they are asking questions which clearly told they are not playing around and they have some great responsibilities. So far, in previous three rounds of elevator pitch of 3 minutes, i was only asked to keep my pitch & pitch deck short & clean (whether someone buys it or not but this is true. Brinc, Wadhwani Foundation-said the same thing).
This was my 4th pitch in last 5 months to ACIC IIT (ISM) FOUNDATION ( ACIC IIT ISM FOUNDATION , my idea was rejected thrice before by Indian Institute of Management Nagpur , Bloom Ventures and one more which was attended by my Co-Founder but that one went well. not sure what happened but i do remember they privately reached out to apply directly from their website and they have some options. Not sure if this was incubator or governement or the company itself to deny here and approve privately. From concept i started pitching-to prototype and to first phase Launch - i have proved myself and still pitching.
How was i able to reach these VCs? (Story of an Entrepreneur in India under our Hero Narendra Modi who seemed to be my 3rd connection and pretty sure he doesn't know me)
I have been offering website development & advertising services since 3 years but started it back in 2017 for some extra money and i am still offering because i lost my job due to a bangalore based Consultancy Glitch. I did work on many Automation & AI tools in my career, but management of multiple campaigns for multiple clients became complex and hard over time. Implemented Zapier + Zoho + Odoo + Hootsuite + Chat Gpt and many more. One day, i looked at my finance sheet and found i am loosing almost 19% of revenue to these disconnected platform's subscription. I should be able to use that budget for my own marketing or investment instead leaking them unknowingly. At this stage i wanted a platform (Full Stack AI MarkTech Platform) that had one single platform cost for all those features that above giants offered. That's where Leadbug OMT (One Marketing Tool) came in picture.
Sorry to take you off-way but it was important for you to understand an Entrepreneur and his legal jourey. I contacted Corporate Raasta Consulting LLP . Per discussion i required a commercial rent agreement with Owner's Aadhar Card & Property Paper. Without which GST was rejected for 3 months. I had to pay some extra money to GST officer to get that approved. Even after that because of 7k INR Corporate Raasts people are threatening that they will cancel my GST. I paid around 30K+ INR to form Leadbug Tech and Advertising Private Limited and formation took 5 Months.
From next day itself Banks somehow found Us Director's number and started emailing and messaging for new Current accounts because you will also have to pay 2.15% commission to payment gateways. Setting commision partners before earning sounds geat! Anyway, now I had the idea and a registered business to start hiring for development venture. But hey! i need funds to give them salary. It took me another week to go through the internet and learn about Fundraising. I bought subscriptions of Brinc and got into Y Combinator , also joined Wadhwani Foundation . Now my dream has been pushes away by 3 months course which will make me an Entrepreneur ready for pitching. Right! this still doesn't qualify for funds.
During next couple of weeks i attended some Startup events and i was told about some terms like Incubators, Accelerators and blah blah. 3 years back i met Egniol Services Private Limited in business event. So i contacted them. Per discussion, i figured i need a Startup Certificate which would cost 15k INR , and under startup scheme i can get upto 50 lakhs in debt if business is running and upto 20 lakhs collateral free if i am a startup and additional 7 lakhs funding if i have a women co-founder (you know women have some additional expenses, maybe for that. Because 7 lakhs would get you only 2 months of runway). But to apply for startup scheme there is huge documentation process for which additional 55k INR would be required. Great! i am all set. "idea" itself costed my 1 Lakh rupees so far. They are right, entrepeneur's idea is worth millions. Funding is important and so does development, i took some loans and started hiring because i see my idea has potential , also i had no job so no other option left (which you might not see it right now but you will see it one day. History says it all!)
Now it's been 8 months with a Team of 7 people, bootstrapped and hoping that someone would fund me soon. I am broke, my family has no money and no job. Because India has over 140 Crores of population, no jobs for Senior grades, super high inflation, and taxes on everything. I dont like corruption but without it this system seems unfair. Startup scheme says they give upto 20 lakhs which is lesser for an AI developer's yearly package though panel wants aspiring entrepreneurs to bring AI in market. Its okay! If indian wants that change, then i'll bring that change. I am that change. One day, Leadbug will create history. One day, i'll also say - I thank those who said no. One day, it will all happen. So what! if i am taking two steps back for now, compromise everything, putting family in front and rethinking to strategise, its only to comeback. This leap is only to take a jump. After going through a trauma of 5 failures at my 35th year, it is still alright! This is just the Day One of getting started.
Written By-
Anurag Tiwari , Cofounder & CTO, Leadbug
#entrepreneur #entrepreneurlife #startup #startupstory #leadbug #aimarketing
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