Inspiring story of this kickass startup : A must Read
Here is story of one kickass startup that in the first place sounds very lucky (they have got all the cool partnerships and mentors in place) – But the real story is quite different and is a mix of extremism, courage and of course, fun! – These guys raised 200K USD when they were studying and are kicking everybody’s ass since then!
Well, I am talking about MobMe (profile) – Kerala based startup.
In the past, I have asked Sony and his team to share their story with pluGGd.in readers, but somehow we never got the thing going!
But, Prashant’s earlier post on ‘on ‘Can Indian Society produce Gates/Larry/Zuckerburg?” got an emotional (and quite a lengthy one!) reply from Sony and with his permission, I am sharing the mobme story here (as-is)
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Let me start by saying that we’ve had a very different experience altogether! Ashish had asked to write about our journey some time here on pluggd.in but never really got the time to do it. But this post makes me write a bit about it. Consider this as a trailer! 
Lack of forward thinking at early age
Prashant explains the lack of computers in educational institutions & opportunities for a teenager to fool around at an IT giant’s place.
I don’t disagree with the first part. You know what we did? We bunked college as much as possible! The entire team was academically above average/brilliant till 12th & after joining Btech realized that you could crack this in the last week of study hols for semester exams. So we had a lot of free time. 
We made a lot of money while in 4th sem in college by coming out with a special sim for college students in Kerala in association with the then BPL mobile. It was a pure viral marketing stuff with no advertising but we managed to make close to a million in under 3 months. That gave the much needed kick & a thought in our mind that bunking classes (not exams) is not that bad an idea.
We registered a company, got good tech hands (we were mostly marketing types & couldn’t even think of coding)
and then went back to BPL with a zillion ideas and finally put up voice servers in their Kerala circle to do outdiallers & in-diallers. Can you belive that? Bunch of teens hanging around in their data center trying to figure out what is SS7 & PRI and all. We finally cracked it on Asterisks (open source) cos we didn’t have the money to put the proprietary ones! Also we managed to do stuff on the lines of what a hungama & mauj does on content business. Still very much in our teens & before 6th semester we had tie-ups with Onmobile, Hungama, Nazara, Mauj, India Times almost all others in the content business. We had sealed the malayalam movie industry & held rights for ALL the major artists.
While all this happened, we had also registered in Technopark, Trivandrum as Kerala’s first student incubated company & had strong support from IIITM-K, STPI, Kerala Government & most importantly, the education department & our university. So our attendance shortages also stopped giving us bad dreams. Had a tough time with some teachers but pretty much we were extremely lucky nothing nothing tragic happened to our studies. We chose the start-up route & left the idea of getting high marks in college.
Our Aversion toward extremism
Contrary to this, we got some really brilliant tech guys who never wanted to waste their life working for high paying IT jobs but wanted to work with an exciting start-up. Again lucky on this front, but there are lots of people like that. Our lead tech person actually left us for a year to join Uzanto (slideshare.net) & came back after product release with tonnes of experience & excellent exposure. So now you know that extremism is the norm out here.
Our Approach Toward Money
This will drive you crazy. We raised a neat $200,000 while in 6th semester from Angel investors in Kerala. We knew that if wanted to make it big, leftovers of our college earnings wouldn’t help much. If could do this at 19, a lot many people can do much better. And as Ashish had posted once, we took in a second round of funding just after 8th semester – same amount but 10X valuation from more Angels. And trust me, these Angels are really ‘Angels’. They stand with us no matter what. In between we have had small investments for minority stake sell outs from people who saw the passion in us. We are lucky to have a lot of really good mentors/supporters. From hot shot CxO’s in the IT industry to movie superstars to really good finance guys to some amazing bureaucrats to conventional business biggies to silicon valley chiefs to top brass media people.
Our Approach Toward Exploration
We traveled the length & breadth of the country cos we felt that business never happens in India if you haven’t even met the person with whom you are trying to do business. We make it a point to meet everyone atleast once & then technology steps in to take things forward. Just out of college we went to Dubai on an absolute exploratory trip & in two weeks got some good inroads to a lot of business opportunities. Now we interact with them almost on a daily basis over emials/calls but the first trip really helped forge the relation.
Lack of Role Models
All of the people in that list plus a lot more of them are our inspiration. Internet helps a lot to keep track of what’s going on in the industry, especially with many high quality blogs like this in every part of the world. They give you a lot of insights & information & analysis, i feel there is not much lack of role models around. From ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad’ of Robert Kiyosaki to ‘Screw it, Lets Do it’ by Richard Branson to ‘IT happened in Inda’ by Kishore Biyani, there are so many wonderful inspiring stories around you.
Luck factor – I’m adding this one
I’ve started believing that fortune favors the brave! The BPL we started out with became Hutch & then Vodafone. Now we do stuff nationally cos they know us since ages. Many decisions you make are subject to a lot of luck. We were lucky to avoid all the 5 points (ref. to prashant’s post) above. We got investment at the right time. Met people at the right time. Media people loved us so much that the attention that we got in regional media was amazing. Maybe its because there weren’t much business stuff happening in Kerala after all the ‘hartals’ (strikes)! So much attention that we ended up even meeting the president (Dr Kalam) at his office - a 45 minute chat that inspires you to achieve the unachievable.
Now we personally know/mentor a dozen such start-ups from Kerala who are working hard to do tread the same path. Its such a joy when you receive a call from a new teenage ceo in the middle of the night saying he enrolled with Technopark as a Student start-up. You can feel & see what in his mind & what lies ahead for him. We are happy & thankful to all those people who supported us.
At 22, journey so far has been really exciting. Its been a thriller all the way. Lets wait n watch what more is in the pipe.
BTW: Being a trailer, the most of the ‘most exciting stuff’ have been carefully kept aside for the big one 
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Mind blowing.
Really awesome.
Good – we need more of this to show what one can do if we have the right capabilities and proof of concepts.
Dude, i got stuck in this big company swimming through this SDLC Doc’s with not even a bit of tech stuff…help me..help me….
Good post ..
I hope pluggd.in can serve as a platform for publishing a lot more “undiscovered success stories”
That could help address : “lack of role models”
Thanks for posting.
Awesome ,inspiring & encouraging story line for many budding entrepreneur’s like me.
Kudo’s to u guys for such a remarkable journey,wish u many more ahead.
good one!
Thank you all you guys for your support, motivation & appreciation > Every start up badly needs all of these to sustain the momentum. People usually scare the hell out of wannabe entrepreneurs!! Forums like this would be a relief & reason as to why they should continue to believe in their dreams & chase it by all means…
This is the story that we had wanted in pluggd.in,
mobMe was really the one which changed our life and shown us a path about something which we dream of.
And sony really recalled that in the later part of the post(teenage CEO)..;)
not only tat mobme had given us the inspiration,but really helped us to get to know how to take it cool,nd lead the struggle phase of mixing business with college life,as ease.
Sony,it would be gr8 to have Sanjay’s post on his dream of Silicon Cost,which wil surely come up soon @ kerala…;)
Kudos to mobME!move ON!\m/
Its thrilling story. I always believed on hard work and commitment and you guys has proved that.
I think new generation Indian youth will follow you.
I like the fact that of all the places in India, this kind of success story came out from Trivandrum, kerala. This makes the story even more compelling.
compteley resonate with you – even though places like blr/mum/del are known for all ‘great’ talents, the real story comes frm kerala.
speaks of the fact that there is no correlation between entrepreneurship and location!!
-anish
Awesome story! Can’t wait for the big story!
Amazing story!
I’m trying to emulate the same thing for the past one year… but have not yet figured out the way:-)
interesting ! So larry, bill can be here also !
gr8 ashish and team @ mobme.
@Deepak – The Silicon Coast Dream or more the vision stems from the realization that the Valley started when a lot of 20 somethings did 2/3 member startups which went on years down the line to become fortune 500 companies.
Once we cracked Google SMS and Open Source IVR’s for Vodafone ( both while in college – google responded by asking us to drop in to their Indian Offices ) – we knew technology can be cracked and the young age allows for a lot of innovative / out of the box thinking.
But like Sony mentioned – if we can do this, so can a bunch of other startups as well – the only perquisite being guts in the ass and fire in the heart. (Trust me, both are highly required as the number of times a startup bombs/fire fights and faces setbacks is so amazing that you require an unquenched thirst for success and unwavering passion + optimism with a highly positive attitude to keep on going and climbing the mountains.)
And that vision collectively will lead to many more campus startups which would lead to a day when the sun sets at dusk in the valley, it would rise to see the Dawn of a Silicon Coast in India.
Well,
Can you belive that? Bunch of teens hanging around in their data center trying to figure out what is SS7 & PRI and all. We finally cracked it on Asterisks (open source) cos we didn’t have the money to put the proprietary ones!
You have to give enough credits to everyone who helped you do so.
The above statement is not entirely true, since I was THAT GEEK who helped you figure out how to run the entire setup on SS7 trunk !!
Till the last date you couldnt figure out if it was SS7, MFCR2 or A PRI Link ….
So guys, start giving credits to every one that helped you do what u claim to do ALL BY YOURSELF !!
Regards,
Mitul Limbani,
Founder & CEO,
Enterux Solutions,
The Enterprise Linux Company (R),
http://www.enterux.com/
[...] Ashish Sinha | Nov 03 2008 | mobile | Email This Post Kerala based startup, Mobme (read their inspiring story) has partnered with Malayalam Daily, Mathrubhumi and is powering its Mobile Channel for sending [...]
[...] This was originally posted on Pluggd.in, a blog covering Digital Media, on Aug 1st 2008. The intro part is written by Ashish Sinha of Pluggd In & you can find the original copy here. [...]