Startups- Dr. Kanth Miriyala

Why is this happening today? The first exam is on April 20th, and that too of Data Mining. Haunting for a last few weeks, to both me and my mother, is the fact that I got 1.5 out-of 10 in Data Mining's mid-sem.
But I think its okay and on 18th April I attend this talk on "Startups" at Golden Seminar Hall, ECE Dept., IISc. 

Some lady professor from I don't know which dept. has invited her brother to be the speaker.
Sounds rubbish? Definitely yes.
But it turned out to be not at all rubbish.

Dr. Kanth Miriyala is a B. Tech from IIT Madras, M. Tech from IISc and Ph. D from Illinois. He has worked for 9 years with Accenture and has been an entrepreneur for last 15 years.

He is an impressive speaker. His talk had an overwhelming number of anecdotes and funny remarks which he paraphrased on the spot. The talk was lively and he was expressive enough using facial expressions and acting at times. He talked sense and I could gather a few take-aways although I doubt whether he has done anything significant in life. 

• On his very start, a phone rang in the first row....km: Is it Obama again? He always comes to know when I give a talk. 
• km: What of so many degrees? Even a thermometer has a lot of them
• A Ph. D student goes on knowing more and more about something, until he knows everything about nothing
• km: In my family, everyone did jobs. The only person I knew to start a business was my uncle. He was a Chartered Accountant and then he left everything and bought a dying silk industry. Everyone knew he was doing wrong. I was very young, but I knew he was doing wrong. 
• first the silk is already very slippery
• and chartered accountants don't wear silk sarees
• it was like catching a falling knife
• he owned a big house, and had to see the house sliding down....down on a silk saree

Kanth started by a call for show-of-hands of who already are working on a startup. He asked for reasons why to go for one. Back came answers-

        Freedom  /  Solving a problem  /  Create Employment  /  Making Money  /  getting to write your own paycheck

Then was a call for show-of-hands of who want to start it but haven't started yet. And the reasons gave were-

        Risk  /  Looking for the right problem  /  Not found the right team  /  Investment

Interestingly one of the old guys among the audience said he has been looking actively for a partner for the last 3 years. 

Now came the point, that if all those who have not started yet, were pointed a gun at their heads and they were to start in say a week- What practical thing they will do which can be to rolled out in 1 week?

A girl answered "mobile app" and I doubt whether she ever made one and could rather ever make one. The accepted answer was "a panipuri stall". As the example evolved, came some key learning points:

    1. Choosing a clear, workable thing to do

Kanth asked how will you start it?

and I am amazed by the unusual and a lot insightful reply a young man gave-

     2. I will putup a board- "You get Panipures here. " and see who all turn up and what they seek for. 

Well, this will be the very apt thing to do. Even before a prototype, mentally fantacizing, who the customers are and what they need --- picturing a product/process and a prototype come second. 

This smart way to begin reminds me of how amazon writes the press release as the first step of starting up a new project. 

Kanth then introduced another guy who accompanied him- Sishir Kolli, a much younger IIT IIM boy with about 3 years of experience of working as an investment banker in New York. Kanth and Sishir first started a universal payment system --- sms based #tag payment for any service. Sishir was finding it tough to put it in words what the thing was and how it performed. Kanth put it straight- "It failed". They have then started together Give-N-Take, a peer-to-peer renting platform. 

    3. Don't stick to an idea. Fail fast

This sounds to me similar to what the guiding-soles-man Anirudh Sharma told that day in his talk at IISc, "If you hold in your hand, the flower you like, for long it will die in your hand"

    4. Key question to ask after a failure is- If we were to do it again, how will we do it?

    5. Kanth said the two key ways by which humans, and any animal for that matter, learns is by failing and copying..........km: and these two are the very things universities don't allow !

    6. Just test the stupid idea first- Throw it out and just check if it is seriously a stupid idea. 

For Give-N-Take their "technology prototype" was a secret facebook group. Siblings and friends were added and asked to pretend for a week -- as givers and takers -- as if all were in the same building and go on listing the things they need which they may like to take on rent. Also list all what spare stuff like camera / books / hiking sticks / etc they find lying around in different corners of their homes which they can offer on rent. 

This way they judged the user expectations and behavior by a simple setup and with zero tech. 

    7. Don't make any tech first. Where is the prototype? Its there? Where? In the air !!

The only progress after the secret fb group is that Shisir now runs a closed fb group for Bangalore !

Then came a few general advice-

    8. Startups always underestimate the money they need. Kanth said just put "2 more zeros". The guy who says- given 2-3 lakhs rupees he can have the prototype ready actually needs $1 million. 

    9. The trick with investors is that if you want advice - ask for money and vice versa

This reminds me of what, that wifi-man, Marconi awardee. Prof. Arogya Swami Paulraj said when he was sharing his experiences on startups at the same Golden Seminar Hall in december last year. "When you need money - advice is all what you get"

    10. Next was to ask the investors "what should I show you first ?"

It depends on the idea, for some the investors will first want to see 15 customers -or- an year of sustenance in the market -or- so much of revenue for some other idea. You should know before hand what your investor will like to see and get it done before approaching the guy. 

    11. Every entrepreneur says "I know it will work" but even you can tell for yourself that "I have tested it" sounds so much better than "I know it will work"

    12. To the investors, show them first what (you knew) they will like to see first and then tell the plan ahead. And just ask for advice!, then at the tea there will be people coming "I wonder is you will like to raise money". And then should come your reply "1 million dollars" and it should come out very naturally. Better if you have practiced it at the mirror a number of time saying it- 1 million dollars

Next was a running case-analysis of Uber. 

For the riders --- press a button -- car comes to doorstep -- takes him to his destination

For the driver --- monetization of under utilized resources

    13. What does the user needs? (push it) (push it further) and now tell- What does the user needs?

What is his end goal? What the customer actually wants?

Like for Uber its that the rider wants to reach the destination and that he gets at a button click. 

For Give-N-Take, user's end goal might be say, he wants to go on a mountaineering trip. And with just a click, back should come a list of 15 things one generally needs for a mountain trip. He would then check say 12 of them which he already has and for the other 3 he should get the options with time-to-possession and charges specified. 

    14. Kanth laid enough stress on saving 2 hours a day by trimming off from your leisure time and also job time. Working from home saves time. But he strongly said never to cheat the employer as it is unethical. 

    15. Atleast the founder should have no doubt at all on whether the startup will work or not -- otherwise fail fast is the way to go. Only if the founder is sure enough, can he convince others. 

    16. Ruthlessly cutoff any friend who gives you negativity about your startup and hangout with other entrepreneurs -- and copy -- see how they think and take their perspectives. 

Q) What if the person giving negativity is your spouse?

km: I can't help if you have already made big wrong choices. Leave all thoughts and care your balls. That will give you more work in life. 

Reminds me of the Dhabda incident that that longing-entrepreneur 8 years Wipro employee shared in the panel discussion I mention just next below. 

    17. 2 years of savings before you jump-in. It gives peace of mind. 

The same figure- 2 years of savings was suggested by the 12 years investment banker Mrs. Vandana Suri who is now owning TaxShe. I heard her on April 9th, when she was among the panelists at the discussion on startups by EntIISc + Alumni Association at Faculty Hall, IISc. 

Next comes the best part. 

This is what I consider the most valuable of all the learning I got that day as it went totally opposite to what I used to think. It made a deep mark as it set straight a since-always wrong notion of mine. 

    18. When is the right time to raise money? Audience gave numerous answers-

        -> only-once prototype is ready

        -> when you want to expand

        -> when your personal funds can't support any further

He never got the answer he was looking for. He said he won't put even one single penny in any one of us. He said you should raise money only when you can guarantee an xx-return. 

Anytime before that is dishonest. 

km: It is someone else' money. He is investing where you are saying. Only when it is firm in your mind that it will get an xx-return should you ask for money. 

Otherwise it is cheating. Ask someone for money only when you can give it back. 

As soon as you realize you will make money - raise money. 

Before that is unethical. 

Contact info he shared is- kanth@miriyala.com WhatsApp: 001 630 8022 521

And he closed by giving Sishir Kolli a 1-minute commercial.

Sishir shared their Give-N-Take blr fb group and his phone number 7022 411 919

17:00 22nd April 2016

Panel Discussions on Startups

It is close to the end of first year. Exams are around the corner. And this second semester has turned out to be the toughest semester. Just started is the process of placement-coordinator selection and today (9th April) afternoon was the first placements related briefing by seniors of CSA. Today is something else too. It is the 3 hours panel discussion organized by EntIISc and Alumni Association at Faculty Hall, IISc. 

The placements briefing ended around 03:30 PM and the panel discussion was to begin at 04:00. and that in itself is an interesting succession of events since the notice for the panel discussion showed an image of a queue of humanoids standing on a conveyor and moving involuntarily towards companies and while a single odd-one among them has jumped out of the row. 

The moderator for the discussion was Prof. CS Murali, an IISc alumni who chairs of EntIISc and has 30 years experience in IT in companies like TCS, HP, IBM.

In the panel were following people who I am mention along with the key points I could grasp from them during the course of discussion.

Abhinay Choudhari, co-founder Big Basket, IIM passout with 10 years of industry experience. He started some stylecountry[dot]com in 1999 and claims it was as big a thing or maybe bigger then what Myntra/Jabong are today but it couldn't live through the dot com bubble burst.

About Big Basket- It has now been around for 7 years and is expanding in cities.  Big Basket will breakeven in Bangalore by the next month and by 2018 overall. There are around 10K employees 60% of which are groundsmen. 25 guys form the tech team and the entire tech is built inhouse. Abhinay told Big Basket looks closely into "detailing" of the process.

About Abhinay- From the answers he gave to various questions posed, I can tell he has a very rational and practical mindset. If I squeeze the zist of the views he presented, I get very simple results

Q) Do you support farmers by buying from them?

A) Will buy if it is profitable.

Q) When should one outsource building tech?

A) When it is profitable.

Q) Why don't you use existing infrastructure like raydiwallas/dabawallas for deliveries?

A) It is good to use existing infrastructure if it suits your needs and is profitable. We needed cold storage / guaranteed deliveries (and hygiene I suppose) which none of the existing services provided. So we built our own delivery network.

Shradha Sharma, a girl from Bihar who did her masters from St. Stephens, New Delhi. After 1.5 years of work with Times of India and 2 years with CNBC she started Your Story. If I remember correctly, she said her grandmother was a IAS officer in Bihar.

About Your Story- She said it well- "News go but stories are to stay". 8 years back she started Your Story without a business model and laughingly claims it more-or-less doesn't have one still. But factually, among those in the panel, hers was the only firm making profit. Some point out that Your Story takes money from entrepreneurs to write them articles. She said they do it but only for bigger firms (say Big Basket) and claimed not even a single small company can say that they took money for their article.

About Shradha- She was confident and expressive. She said girls have an advantage in startups that they don't have an image to maintain. 

It would have been interesting to listen to her more but she had to leave in middle of the event.

Pavan Sriram, founder of some ITTIGE Learning which provides on-demand coaching services for firms. I wonder why that stupid name. This was a young boy who had some relevant things to say. First he told how unseen challenges can some in way of startups like the one he faced, when his cofounder backedout while there were number of unfulfilled orders at hand and his wife was pregnant. He said- "The problem is that we think a lot". "Just go ahead and jump without thinking if there is a safety net". Whenever entrepreneurial ideas come we start thinking of what best can happen, but he said, one should start with the thinking that what worst can happen. Mostly being offtrack and jobless for a few years is the worse and in case it is okay with you, then you should go for it.

Vandana Suri, 12 years investment banker- A highly paying and highly demanding job as she puts it. I noteworthy aspect for her startup, TaxShe, a cab service with lady drivers is how the idea originated. She said it was when she heard on TV the Delhi Uber rape victim saying- "this wouldn't happen, had it been a girl who was driving". It is appreciable of Vandana that she was vigilant enough to take this up and attempt to solve the problem. Many entrepreneurs born this way, from an urge to solve a problem they see.

About TaxShe- They started with dropping school kids to schools as parents find it safer to send the kids with lady drivers and also this way the drivers themselves were safe. Started an year back and has around 25 lady drivers now. She admits they are still doing just the school kids.

About Vandana- She was vigilant as she grabbed the idea. And also bold enough to set her foot down and be the first lady driver in Bangalore thereby making it a case that cabs with lady drivers can happen.

Swami Manohar, is a great man. He was professor at IISc during 1995 - 2005 and is creator of Simputer and cofounder of multiple businesses including the famous Strand Life Sciences (famous for sure within IISc). I was totally awed to know about Simputer. Quoting from wikipedia- The Simputer is a self-contained, open hardware Linux-based handheld computer, first released in 2002.  The word Simputer is an acronym for "simple, inexpensive and multilingual people's computer". The device includes text-to-speech software, it has a stylus operated touch sensitive screen, and also has a simple handwriting recognition software.

Ii surely was a cutting-edge technological pursuit and I am astonished but proud that it was designed and developed completely in India and that too within IISc, by seven Indian scientists and engineers led by Dr. Swami Manohar.

This was something which when it came was far-ahead-of-time and hence didn't get the required acceptance in market. But this was surely real work- bunch of IISc profs making a hand-held computing device by fabricating hardware and modifying linux themselves and that too back in 1990s. Swami Manohar said, in those days they were working on virtual reality with his lab funding being like $0.5 million. News says the project failed but he surely succeeded in proving that a complete device with all hardware fabricated inhouse and with use of technology form the frontier can very well be made within the universities of India.

During the discussion, Swami Manohar mentioned that in the list of top 25 startups he was looking at, he found just 2 to be tech startups while the rest were tech enabled startups.

He was concerned on the fact that India as of today leads the world in not even a single technology.

He has now joined a front line research group at Microsoft.

This combination of patriotic concerns and the joining Microsoft was something I couldn't digest together. I sent my confusion to stage posing it as straight personal attack pointed at Swami Manohar-

"Sir, you developed such ahead-of-time technology for India.

Also you show concerns about India not leading the world in any tech.

And then you join Microsoft research.

So are you disillusioned -or- its part of a plan?"

I am sad the moderator, Prof. CS Murali toned down the wording a bit but still it conveyed what I wanted. I am happy Swami Manohar chose to reply. With that he already won half of me back.

"It has been 12 years of tiresome running. I was running for all sorts of things like fundings to keep the salaries of my employees rolling. And now I feel like going back to my field of work, Virtual Reality, something I was working on long back. "

And btw he also mentions that the research group he is part of in Microsoft looks into how leading technologies can solve problems in society. So its like during a long battle you now plan a little rest and get Microsoft to back you while the pursuit is still as holy as it always was.

For me, that reply clears all my confusion and I am back to awe.

That is totally understandable. Only if you have real interest in your subject can you build wonders like he did. And when you have real interest in a subject it is totally understandable that it pulls you towards it.

All these knowledgeable entrepreneurs from diverse backgrounds formed a good enough panel and a good panel discussion was bound to follow. From the questions raised and arguments which followed, I could draw some key learnings:

1. "2 years of savings is a must, before you do anything. "    -Vandana

2. "Do not bring in your personal assets on the table. Let the company finances remain separate. You have already given much in the form of your time, and we may let alone that little money thats left in your account. And hence registering an LLP is preferable over a Pvt. Ltd "    -Vandana & Swami Manohar

3. "Show a solid and diverse team. Maybe call up your class 8 friends and check what they are doing. A single person team won't do. What of the investor and his money if something happens to you? "    -Prof. CS Murali

This resonates with Nelson Vasanth when he suggests that investors don't like at all a 16-hours-a-day-chap who single-handedly does everything. 

Another quality I found worth building is from Swami Manohar.

4. "I have never, for even a month, delayed the salary of his men. It is very important. It is their livelihood. There is a family, waiting, back at the home. It is, maybe your sport to start a company and ride through the bumpy way but for them its their daily bread. Its your passion but they are here because they trust you. "

So the take-away is to never every let your employee down. When you are the captain of the boat, ensure in every possible way that there salaries don't stop.

I wish TinyOwl's Saurabh Goel had this lesson and his employees would never have to take him hostage.

5. Someone quoted  Steve Jobs- "Whats the point of living, if you don't make a dent in the universe"

6. It was not just the case with Abhinay's Myntra but almost no urls of that time could live through the bubble burst. Thats why Cockroach startups are promising.

7. A person from the audience shared his life experience. He I guess is a prof at IISc.

In 1986/1987 he was working with Wipro. Was frustated with the job and wanted to start something. His senior Virender Gupta took him out on lunch. It was a roadside dhaba. After the lunch,

Virender paid the bill and asked- "Will your family ever come here to eat"

(our guy replies)- "No. Never"

Virender- "Then don't start anything"

18:00 09th April 2016

Startup India - Panel Discussion by IndianStartups

It was middle of the night, 01:05 AM Feb 06th and came on hangouts my AppyFest co-founder's message

> "fb/events/232534833748096"

It happens a lot of times and is always annoying. Ashish is so found of one word-messages which he will send out of the blue. And this was one of the tough cases, as he pinged this and disappeared.

Oh what is it. Let me check.

Some fb event...Okay its a startup meet. 

< "Yes, Ashish you should definitely go "

< "for this funding event you guys can go as audience and lets try to learn what is the process"

< "its 500 per head for going as audience"

But there was no one on the other end. And I realized that it was another of those tough cases. 

Anyways this was something new. Startup events. Nice. I explored a bit more and found another one. This one by IndianStartups. Oh! it was in Bangalore. Nice. When? Okay Feb 6th. Oh! its today at 03:00PM. Seems doable although its 03:11 AM already

I booked a premier ticket which gave guaranteed seating. Did an Internet recharge. Woke a few hours later. And took a bus for the spot- 

Green Bubbles, L165, 1st Floor, Sri Gayathri Complex, HSR layout, Sector 6, Bangalore

Although it was just 16 km but I left 4 hours ahead of time fearing the Bangalore traffic. Google Maps made for me a bus plan. But after halfway, the next bus it was suggesting is, as per the people around, not plying any longer. Man. Confusion. Why am I taking these stupid buses? and not just a plain ola. I knew the answer and just retold myself- cabs are costly. One should adapt to his current monthly income. So I chose an alternate bus. Some different route. 

It was 03:10 and I was still in the bus remembering my friend- Sumit who discouraged me leaving 4 hours ahead of time. This stupid bus dropped me where it was still hundreds of metre away. 

Running through the streets and societies as guided by google maps, I finally reached around 03:40, panting. A nice girl at the desk welcomed me warmly. Even more warmly after knowing my name as it was in her list of guaranteed-seating. 

"Am I late?"

"No; You are exactly on time. "

A guy assisted me to my reserved seat in the second row. I was happy that all rows were occupied and there were people standing at the back. 

It was as soon as I sat and opened my complementary water-bottle that the proceedings started. 

In the panel were:

Anupam Mishra the Rajasthan boy, with 20+ years of managing experience in automobile industry working with leading firms like Tata Motors. An year ago he started Autotygr- an aggregator for vehicle servicing. Strangely enough, this is what I was brainstorming at and convincing my friends about in my final year of B. Tech. The idea was promising but 2 reasons that stopped me were lack of automobile experience and finance. And clearly these restrictions aren't applicable to Anupam. 

Lightning struck the same spot twice when he, as part of an answer,  suggested the audience in general to look beyond apps. He said, "Just look around. In Rajasthan there is so much of art. You can start selling the artworks online." Man. Either my ideas are too obvious or Mishra breathes what I exhale. Since selling Odisha artworks on amazon.com was what I brainstormed 6 months back. But I don't care much about uniqueness of ideas these days as I have seen enough examples of firms with overlapping/coincidental ideas to co-exist and thrive in the same market. It is important to "do". To do any of the decent ideas you have instead of wasting life in hunt of the perfect "new" idea. 

Senthil Kumar M, had 1.5 years experience as senior SDE in Samsung and 3 year at Qualcomm.  He is running a group- Mentoo Mentors which is giving technological mentorship to young students in India's tier2 and tier3 cities. In his hometown Madurai, Senthil is mentoring around 200 girls on weekends. 

The moderator was Nelson Vasanth, founder of Honey Technologies- which as far as I understand is a company providing support-services to other companies. This was a young and dynamic guy with a year experience at Yahoo and another year at Microsoft. He has done just recently things which I am thinking to do. Seemed somewhat like a-few-years-later version of mine. When still in Microsoft, he could create a group of 75 people working with him on Honey Technologies. 

Some take-aways I got from him are:

• Investors don't like to fund startups which are a one-man show. You may be proud of yourself working 16 hours a day and managing your job as well as startup simultaneously but that smells of an unstable equilibrium and this smell itself is enough to ward-off investors.
• Building good relations with people is important. He said his team of 75 is working on Honey Technologies, for a few months now each working without expectation of salaries. 

It was a good day for networking as I met a number of founders and came to know about their 'creations' (or should it be 'findings'!).

 Val from Animaker- DIY animated video creator, Chandrasekhar from Scientiamobile- a library for mobile apps which does some ls on the device and help collects some statistics. These two were sponsoring the event. 

I met Krishna an aged fellow who started his conversation with me by guessing (and guessing rightly) my home state. He said he studied some linguistics and can tell by how I speak English. He was running a financial evaluations firm. Wow, I never knew such things exist. He could value anything from buildings to websites. His son started a custom tshirt printing company- Teecultr which Krishna was here to promote. At the end of the event, he was so kind to drop me in his car. He was knowledgeable and was willing to converse on any and every topic. I tried varying the topic of discussion from Google Maps to American lifestyle to Baba Ramdev and Rajiv Dixit's death. And he always had something to say. 

Another useful info I got was that Green Bubbles is something which provides office space solutions for startups. 

Also it was nice to meet Arjun, the guy from IndianStartups. They projected IndianStartups as a non-profit volunteering thing, but I will like to double check as I came paying for my reserved seat !

Another interesting person to meet was Krish. It was Shwetha Krish. A lady who after being an HR with TCS for 3 years, is now a freelancing social media content writer. She came with Nelson, her client, who found her on LinkedIn. I will definitely need such expertise for AppyFest. 

The day was productive in the sense that I got to know these many diverse people and collected a few visiting cards and made a few LinkedIn connections. 

Other then networking the key content that came out was about Modi's Startup India Initiative. 

• There is some gov app in which one may register his company
• Paperwork is expected to get simplified starting April
• Registered company need to get along with some incubator
• Usually you get 3 lakhs + 3 months to make an MVP
• And 60 lakh seed funding is normal to expect

This is NOT about what government is giving as part of Startup India Initiative.

The primary support from govt is that they won't complicate the processes or hamper the development (and even that is a great support infact). Govt. gives none of the fundings and its just that you register there and get to recognize yourself as a startup which can facilitate in you getting an incubator/accelerator and rest all is per the forces of market. 

And the day was done. 

Not exactly, as I realized, seeing the map that this HSR layout is pretty close to Baby Mona School. Its where my friend Mohit Jindal lives (who when I wrote about last was with Grab House but is now at 25LPA in Microsoft). Courtesy Krishna that he drove me towards Mona. 

It is so nice to stop by at an old friend. So easing it is to repeat the same old talks in the same old style. The same old jokes and the same old arguments. He gave me a nice dinner and a super nice frozen-yogurt treat.

At around 11:00PM I took the bus back to home. I dropped off half-kilometer away from my hostel (intentionally this time) and started slowly waking my way to PD while revisiting the day in thoughts.

22:00 10th February 2016

APJ and Anirudh Sharma

Intelligent Systems is what I will be going ahead with. Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Data Mining.

It is extremely empowering for an assembly of processor, memory, hard disk, I/O devices to now have 'thoughts' and to understand and act on its own. You doing it makes you play the Creator.

APJ's demise came to me as a message on a WhatsApp group absurdly just below the least important thing I was saying about that girl.

I was shocked. Read it twice or thrice. Called home to confirm that with TV news channels. And then almost immediately left what I was doing (if at all) and left the room going most likely to some place I could see the news to know the details.

Very strangely, last clicked photo in my phone is

 which I clicked just yesterday. And I was very sad. Was I?

I am not sure should I be ashamed of it but I wasn't feeling that sad.

Maybe I shouldn't. That Prof. said the other day in this universe of millions of galaxies having millions of stars whether you live or die it doesn't matter.

I am fortunate I saw APJ in March this year at NIT Kurukshetra. He awarded us degrees in the convocation. He was very motivating and charismatic. He said next big things to go for are- Internet of Things, Nanoscience and Biotechnology. And then he also conducted an oath for all of us. I took the oath and now don't remember even a word. I am certainly ashamed of that.

I was out of my room going probably to some TV room but spent next 3 hours playing TT and then came back and still thinking about APJ's death I slept.

Today morning again and I am ashamed of myself.

To make an AI thing would be great. Call it 'Jarvis'. To have the Cray 40 analysing deeply the sample data I give, the way I say would be great.

Exhausting departmental orientation talks ended-up to an exhausted evening. Half the time I was half-slept and the other half the time parallel upgrading my phone to Android 5.1. But at 5 PM was scheduled a talk by Mr. Anirudh Sharma, an entrepreneur who made smart shoe soles to help blind people.

The speaker was late by more then 30 minutes. He came but was evidently totally unprepared not even knowing how long he is expected to present. Still it turned out very worthwhile for me to attend the talk. The guy talked plain and simple and had a real and strong story to tell.

He described and demoed couple of things-

• guiding soles for the blind. Vibrator motors (the ones we have in phones) embedded within shoe soles and integrated to GPS; the corresponding foot gives a haptic feedback telling you to take a turn. 

Very innovative and impressive. Also it was very connecting to know he came across this idea while in Koramangla Bangalore where he would see many blind people on streets seeking help with directions.

• Next was printing ink made from pollutants. He showed how unburnt soot collected on a burning flame (which otherwise is used as kajal) when mixed with some oil acts as a good ink and can be fed into inkjet cartridges.

He showed getting ideas is very easy. "Just look around and think how the thing would be in future". "Knowing the latest technologies, look for simple objects where that can be integrated". "Look for problems to solve. Luckily India has many of them".

He doesn't use WhatsApp.

I am myself considering to follow him on that.

OK done.

31st July being the cut-off I will get rid of this WhatsApp. DEAL.

• Next was a ruler which sees the drawings it drew and can display physics simulations on a transparent display (the scale itself) augmented with your line drawing. Amazing. 

• A small magnifying glass. You point it to a fruit and it gives its biological name. Reminds me of the pocket device Ash Ketchum used to have in which you pose a pokemon and it would pull out characteristic details of that.

He said don't think too much. Think and then make a prototype, show it to people and collect opinions.

A good team is very beneficial.

And don't hold-on to your ideas for too long. If you hold in your hand, the flower you like, for long it will die in your hand.

• Next was the coin size circuit chip with embedded sensors. It goes into the audio jack of your phone and your phone can now measure pH, test soil, check blood pressure and a lot more. 

This guy dropped out of his B. Tech at some local college in Bikaner and went around making smart displays and interfaces- the ones like we have in "Minority Reports". Then he luckily got employed (despite being unqualified) to HP Labs in Bangalore. From there he worked on those smart soles, gave it a good shape and then went to MIT Media Labs. He is now back and has setup a workplace in Indiranagar Bangalore.

- A good one to chase.

After the talk, I participated in a gathering and we paid homage and lit candles in memory of APJ at the Faculty Hall, IISc.

Next, I will get some food now and then TT and then grab a newspaper to know whats up with Yakub Memon.

20:00 28th July 2015

First 2 weeks

10th July was my last day at amazon Hyderabad. And was also for 2 two-months interns in my team.  They were kids with a lot of unfinished task so I stayed back at office and helped them finish stuff, working through the night between 9th and 10th. On my last day, I was walking stead-fast here and there completing formalities. Then the HR told relieving letter cannot be given the same day but in a week. I was almost in tears worried because it might be a requirement to show it on Monday 13th July at document verification in IISc. I was that late completing formalities, biding good byes and releasing  my laptop and stuff that I had to call my friend who rushed me to my flat and in 13  minutes I put a few clothes and my original DMCs in a bag and boarded the train to Bangalore.

I am finding IISc very nice. It’s very green and calm. The buildings and pathways seem to sprout-out amid a thick cover made of old 'real' trees (I a bit dislike the genetically-mutated nursery-made plants we find everywhere else). Insects, birds and bats are everywhere and there are also some squirrels and monkeys. Every evening it rains.

On 11th I reached Bangalore railway station at 7 AM and found an IISc van waiting there to receive the new admits. It took me to 'New Mens Hostel' within the campus where I parked my luggage. In NIT there used to be boys' hostel. So it was a promotion. The foundation stone of this  hostel proudly proclaimed "inaugurated by APJ". I wished if I could get to stay there. Also on the same day was hostel allocation-  in which I picked for myself, from a bucket of folded chits, a room in the most  undesirable of all hostels. Undesirable because it is at the  other end of the 400 acres campus while the dept and mess are on this side, so a stay here demands multiple long walks every day. If I go from CSA (Computer Science and Automation) dept to this PD Hostel (Post-Doctrate's Block) I symbolically cross a number of  villages, some dense forests, a highway and then an open field.

It was reheartening to see that this hostel was inaugurated by my-very-own Prof. Yash Pal  (He is a scientist who had a weekly Q&A science column in The Tribune which I never missed during  my childhood). At the very entrance is a Jamun tree. Crossing it every time I pick a few Jamuns fallen there half-eaten by crows, maybe bats. My room is half-way underground.  That plus the thick gray concrete-stone walls and iron bed and iron door makes me call it a bunker not a room. Pakistan can do any amount of shellings or bombarding on our hostel but it is meant to safeguard every single post-doctoral guy.

Mohit Jindal works in Grabhouse a startup in Bangalore, he and Ashish and Gaurav  (both Bluestacks Gurgaon) were here during this time and we had a whole trip planned. Amrinder amazon Bangalore also joined in. On 12th we went to a water park and 13th was sunrise at Nandi hills. Mists at Nandi hills feel almost like the top compartment of a frost-free refrigerator. UNO and bluff at my hostel room took the most part of the following night. 

13th I got the documents verified and a temporary Id card issued and off we went for Coorg.

250 km of drive and we were there. Serene beauty. Nice rooms (at Hotel Caveri) were already booked by me with my goCash maneuvers. Hotel wifi gave breath, as IISc hostels have no internet. No Internet in IISc hostels, thats right. Even telephone network disappears when you go half-underground. The wifi password was aptly abbifalls. Abby falls is what we went next day- 5 km uphill and then a nice waterfall on river Kaveri. Driving back we clicked numerous happy photos. Gaurav and Ashish taking turns for driving and each of the two busy pointing out faults in the way the other one drives and Jindal competing with everyone else for the co-pilot's seat. Google Maps took us by the hard path which for sure wasn't the Mysore highway we wanted. We reached back to the raining Bangalore's traffic, overshooting the plan by an hour. Amrinder was dropped. Zoomcar returned and we four were pushing an Ola to overspeed so as to catch Rajdhani.

17th early morning we reached Hyderabad. Reaching my flat was homecoming with a chorus of notification bells even before I opened the door, as my phone auto-connects to its familiar home wifi. Swimming pool, TT and my cook's food saved the day as roaming in Hyderabad was turning a bit uncomfortable without a zoomcar. Still we managed via Uber/Ola to go for laser-tag and a mall and a park. But finally rented a car for 19th morning and went for Palm-exotica, an adventures resort 35km out of the city. ValleyCrossing, GoKart,  DirtBiking and Human catapult sling-shot. 19th evening was return flight to Delhi for Gaurav and Ashish and the trip was to end with every day precisely documented on SplitWise. I swept the flat clean of all my belonging and force packed most of them in fat bags. There was enormous amount of things to be packed in a bound space-and-time. As Border shows that at time of war even the army cook picked up a rifle. Seeing the pressing need of the moment my laundry bag took the charge of a luggage bag. Yes, He got badly severed in the brave attempt. This shattered yet resistant laundry bag, together with all the other bag comrades and with Mohit and me boarded a Red-bus for Bangalore. The relieving letter among other super important stuff lying safe in there somewhere.

20th I was now back at IISc and Mohit continued his way to office.

This whole week were orientation presentations. 2.5 hours before lunch and 2.5 hours  after lunch.

They told how Swami Vivekanand motivated J N Tata to make this institute and the King of Mysore sets aside this land for them.

They introduced India’s fastest super computer :) Cray 40 that is housed in IISc. btw 79th  fastest in the world :(

They described the hostel facilities Old New Men's hostel and the New New Men's Hostel (which came up 10 years back)

They listed the Gymkhana and HealthCentre facilities almost all of which are for free.

They told how Govt. of India came to IISc when they wanted to establish IITs, for DRDO,  when they wanted to have a Nuclear program and also when they wanted to have the  space program.

They said grades don't matter.

They said IISc students need not be serious about the future (being sincere suffices).

They said whats expected from us is contribution to Science.

They told how people fall in love with the campus and deny to submit their thesis fearing the consequences of getting the degree awarded.

Director's wife told she was bitten by a dog in the campus. She asked Physics dept to make some gadgets which emits ultrasound waves annoying away all the dogs but then the ecological dept came in and thrashed their plans.

One presenter showed a photo of a space with millions of galaxies having millions of stars and told that whether you live or die it doesn't matter.

Another presenter was a very old prof from Ecological dept. He gave a phone number to call in case you encounter a snake. Ecology guys will jump-in and catch the snake (and leave it at some other part of the campus).

All of them are very nice people. Profound and Content.

Next week I would go to the CSA department. Dept level orientations next. Classes to begin in August.

Plan for weekend is to read "A Brief History of Time" by Stephen Hawkings on my Kindle in the bunker sitting peacefully beside my valiant laundry bag.

15:00 25th July 2015