The era of start-ups has been started in India with the recent years witnessing the conversion of ideas into firms propelled by the easily available funding. This development in the recent period has made many to analyse whether these firms will succeed or not. The outcome of these companies in the future years remain a puzzle for many people.
businesstoday cited CEO of Cvent Inc, Reggie Aggarwal, who says that he has a 'realistic view' regarding this race in the start-up arena. According to him, the 'gold rush' in India is similar to the situation that happened in America in the late 1990s.
Cvent, founded by Reggie Aggarwal, Dave Quattrone, Dwayne Sye and Chuck Ghoorah, is listed in NYSE and has a market capital of 1.06 billion US dollar. The journey of the company has seen many ups and downs in its history since it was formed in 1999.
Aggarwal, who was a lawyer, worked as an event organiser for Indian CEO Technology Council, during this period, he realised the agony in organising an event, so he quit the job to form Cvent Inc. The company started with 6 staffs and grew rapidly to 125. Slowly, Aggarwal was able to construct a 1.5 million US dollar revenue firm after spending the 17 million US dollar they had raised.
Cvent was on the edge of filing a bankruptcy and Aggarwal had to reduce 80% of the company's workforce, when he decided to skip his salary for over two years and his team members also did the same way of sacrificing their salary. However, it took nearly 16 years for them to construct the company and position them in a place where they are now.
According to Aggarwal, the start-ups in India are undergoing the similar struggle and that many will lose the race in the next 12 -24 months. However, many great companies will also arise from this process. The Indian market needs time to develop and that the start-ups have to wait to show up their performance. The CEO of Cvent advises young entrepreneur not to burn the entire capital within 18 months as their real aim is to win the customer base.
In an interview with DC Inno, Aggarwal said that it is always best to commence a business when the entrepreneur is young as it requires nearly 10 -15 years to construct a company with a robust financial background. The main reason for Cvent's struggle during its early period was that it sold an expensive product. The problem lead Aggarwal to adopt the 'old way' of constructing the company.
Currently, Cvent has grown up into a company that transforms events into experiences through technology. The company has nearly 850 Indian staffs but its main focus includes Hong Kong, Europe, Australia, Singapore and the US.
According to Aggarwal, the Indian market is slow and advices the start-up entrepreneurs to wait for more than a decade to build a firm with strong financial background. The growth of start-ups remain a puzzle for many Indian experts.
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