Secunderabad Chronicle

While the spurt of Unicorns creation in India has been an awesome development for the ecosystem, the question that begs answering is, are we, as an Ecosystem doing enough? With US and China galloping away with more number of Unicorns getting produced each year, the Indian Startup Ecosystem will have to either play the catch up game much better or perhaps do different things and also do things differently. KofounderzTeam launches The Great Unicorn Hunt which is here to help build a Think Tank and an Action Group for the Startup ecosystem. It seeks to identify and nurture innovative ways and means, to help create more unicorns, speedily and more efficiently. Clearly, what got us so far is not going to get us to where we want to be and perhaps not soon enough. The pain point that the Indian Ecosystem faces is that the capital infusion while on a upswing is still one-tenth the capital that the more advanced Startup ecosystems like the one in US receives and many deserving Startups and well-funded Startups end up fending for themselves without adequate tools to get noticed by multiple like-minded investors in a short span of time. More than 50% of the portfolio companies of most VCs are ripe for co-investing but methods to get them future rounds of investment are still heavily dependent on founder hustle and informal/formal networking. Having committed itself to build a multi stage platform supporting the Startup ecosystem with uniquely designed solutions, the KofounderzTeam has launched The Great Unicorn Hunt to further accelerate a more conducive discovery and conversation platform.

Keeping in mind the aim of helping startups acquire customers, capital, publicity, and scalability, Sachin Karnik, Founder and CEO of Kofounderz Team elaborated the context of The Great Unicorn Hunt. He said, “It is clear that there is a huge disparity in the way capital is getting distributed and even promising, well-funded Startups are not ending up on the right doorsteps. Any mechanism that could compress the discovery time of potential unicorns and make it easy for VCs and Investors to spot potential unicorns is going to be welcome, going by the reaction and welcome extended by some of the most prominent players of the Ecosystem.” No simple Solutions and no Short Cuts for the Startup ecosystem With India emerging as the third biggest Startup Ecosystem in the world, it is surprising that the number of Unicorns is still in two digits and other Ecosystems are racing ahead of us and the gap is widening. This issue is similar to the Olympic Medals tally that India aspires for. Can we accelerate the process of creating more Neeraj Chopras? Can we make Moores’ law apply to the Unicorns production in the Indian Startup Ecosystem. Who knows we may end up surprising Mr. Moore and ourselves in the process.

In keeping with the MVP or Minimum Viable Proposition approach that’s so common in the Startup Ecosystem, Kofounderz Team conducted not just a poll but also conducted four detailed, closed-door , by-invitation only symposiums and Round Tables to get an insight from the leading players of the Ecosystem who have been on the forefront in terms of identifying, investing and nurturing winning propositions before they got noticed by the world. The objectives of the Virtual Symposiums and Round Table sessions were very specific: 1. Are the painpoints plaguing the Ecosystem real, big enough and worth solving. 2. Can we as an Ecosystem attempt at doing different things or doing things differently to crank up the way we are spotting and nurturing Unicorns?

3. Can a central platform, well adopted by the Startup community serve the purpose of becoming a reservoir and a watering hole for the most promising Startups to attract scare capital and acumen?

The debates and discussions clearly pointed to such an initiative not only being much needed but also timely. The warm and concrete support that was extended during the symposiums and the Congratulatory messages from the super-senior group of participants seemed to indicate that (a) Kofounderz Team certainly has a finger on the pulse of the ecosytem and (b) leading VCs, investors, Family Offices, Incubators, Accelerators, Angel Investors, practitioners and players are extremely keen to evaluate and support mechanisms that could help them deploy capital even more closer to Bull’s eye zones compared to current proclivities. The icing on the cake that The Great Unicorn Hunt promises is in the form of Corporates participation. More corporates joining the Hunt will augur well not just for Startups but also for the Corporates keen to smartly explore how India’s famed Startup Ecosystem could turbo charge their toplines and shore up bottomlines.

Some of the prominent leaders that attended the First VC Symposium include: Sumit Keshan (Wipro Consumer Ventures), Annop N (Chiratae), Pankaj Karna (Maple Advisory), Bhavesh Jatania (IDFC First Bank), Sachin Tagra (JSW Ventures), Sanjay Mehta, (100x.VC), Rajesh Sehgal (Equanamity), Sarvesh Agrawal (Transparent Capital), Dhianu Das (Agility Ventures), Ameya Prabhu (Nafa Capital), Kishore Ganji (Astir Ventures), Rachana Bhusari (NSE), Ajay Thakur (BSE), Anil Joshi (Unicorn Ventures), Priyanka Thakkar (Unilever Ventures).

Angel Investor Round Table Attendees: Shashank Ranadev (100X.VC), Anubhav Tiwari (IIIT), Dr. Manish Diwan (BIRAC), Dr. Rupesh Ghyar (BETIC), Konark Rai (SASTRA), Kartheek (MiraiNxT), Mathew Mattam (CYDA India), Vikash(Runway Incubator).

Angel Investors who attended include: Rajeev Arora, Pranay Desai, Anand Shiralkar, Puru Modani, Ashish Agarwal, Vijay Hede, Sandhya Chaudhary, K.S.Raghunandan, Lalit Gupta, Neha Patil.

Corporate Conference Attendees include: Dr. Lopamudra Priyadarshini (Aditya Birla Group), GovindaRaj A (Vodafone Idea), Amarjeet Khanuja (Star Health Insurance), Bhavesh Jatania (IDFC First Bank), Dr.Dhirendra Kumar (Tata Steel), Smriti (Shell), Jaikrishan (Preferred Consumer), Vipul Mathur (Udaan), Parthiv Gandhi (HDFC Bank), Aditi Khurana (Softbank KK), Parimal Sheth (Kennis Global), Sudhir Madhugiri (Gartner) Some of the sentiments, observations and supporting and welcoming views expressed during the symposiums include, “much needed initiative”, ”this is like a script of a block buster!”

Keeping it simple:

(*) The portal is basically a free to register portal where each stakeholder could register, declare his or her role and participate in the Hunt. The VCs appear in the Hunters sections and the Angel Investors, Incubators, Accelerators, Mentors come in the Spotters section.

(*) The Startups that have been nominated by their investors could choose the Investor or VC and appear in the Nominated Startups section. Those who haven’t been nominated can appear in the Self Nominated Startups gallery.

(*) Hunters and Spotters could choose to convey their reactions via three emojis, Clapping, Thumbs up or Neutral face. Hunters and Spotters could ping Startups and vice versa.

Intentions are not enough if the rigor is missing:

Some of the best intentions can take a back seat in terms of execution if the rigorous is missing. The hunt cannot afford to lose steam mid journey. The drum beating, sound clanging, macchan building will be an ongoing part of the The Great Unicorn Hunt. However to ensure the rigour is visible in letter and spirit, KoFounderz Team has decided to support the Startup Day announced by The PM on 16th of Jan by taking it one step forward by celebrating the Startup day not just once a year but by celebrating it on 16th of every month. To add to the discipline of the rigor, Sachin Karnik, Founder and CEO, KoFounderzTeam even creates a Video letter to ‘report’ to the PM Modi and Industry Minster, Shri Piyush Goel about the progress made every month.

Media Contact
Company Name: Kofounderz Team Private Limited
Contact Person: Mr Sachin Karnik
Email: Send Email
Country: India
Website: https://thegreatunicornhunt.com/