Winding up — 99 LEAP
The deep rooted people in eco-system — Amit Mishra (The Guru), Raghu Raaj (Our own Roadies) and Sushant Bharti (The Silent Speaker) and I last year identified a need for “doing actual things” in small packets for making the “Startup India” kind of scheme successful. We have been living across India and some part of South East Asia and Middle East since last year. Wearing a 99 LEAP hat was very interesting one.
At @99leap, our ideas and objectives were super simple. While we help #Startup traverse many ladders; most importantly we let them reach 100 giving snake at 99 amiss. This is something which at the Start of game we all fear.
Like every other business, we started small. We started with simple objective and faith of empowerment of youth with right kind of startup. Mentor entrepreneurs to the path of collective success. Help them getting funded (of course we making money too). Above all, we wanted to be that team who could hand hold startups where they need you most.
We did some rock shows, some actual impacts, some funding, incubated few, committed maker’s space and almost followed all winning combination of recipes one would need to blend a perfect mocktail. In short span of time, we did what we could — Organized Hackathons, Pitches to Actual Investors, Contributed to policy making and deployment and of course numerous talks to colleges, chambers and more.
When we look back in what we could do with time and resources we had — we feel very happy and privileged. An ecosystem to “Learn. Earn. Aspire. Perspire” is what 99 Leap is all about. It’s as much about being that 1 percent inspiration that makes a genius out of 99 percent perspiration to being a source for 99 perspiration to your 1 percent inspiration. So, What happened?
There’s another secret story for starting 99 LEAP. We have been working to build and grow Jharkhand eco-system for long. In fact, when I moved back to Jharkhand in 2012, when I said we should help create an environment for Startups and new age business — I was technically “lol”ed. The Crime Partners here have been the partners before in many things together with an intent to contribute to youth startup “activism”. Rush to Momentum Jharkhand event. It was quite a successful one. But, few incubators — who technically had no understanding of the needs and requirements of youths and startup in Jharkhand started to make a media-shout ( a term used to convey cutting the ribbon but no substantial on-ground action). They did good. Marketing works in weird ways.
In one of the event, where these media-shout incubators were engaging youth about Entrepreneurship and Startup; I was invited there as Enthusiast. As Startup Guy, I couldn’t event remotely connect to the Gentlemen and team. This is where we wanted to become an alternative to value driven startup incubator. By making sure that needs of youth and Entrepreneurship should be met.
In short, we took a leap ourselves. Our Leap of Faith was to enable and help Government of Jharkhand too. Give them an option, where they can connect to community, connect to right folks, connect to investors and help build one of the best startup eco-system of country at Jharkhand. We being one of the late starters in Startup Arena; Orissa, West Bengal and Bihar getting better with their efforts — there’s clearly a need to leap frog the momentum. And, it could be done. Our citizens, people and youth are one of the best. They have reached places and have done crazy awesome stuff at all levels. There was just a need to catch the momentum of reverse brain drain and get this talent back for some real grass-roots results. 99 LEAP was created to fix it all.
Yes, the support from Government of Jharkhand was assumed to be one of the fundamental for making a vision reality. Our engagement with Government was a topsy-turvy ride. We went beyond business getting committed to the cause of Startups and Entrepreneurship to offer best we could. Eventually, our dwindling support was taken as criticism. In fact, hired consultants of Government looked at us as someone who doesn’t want Jharkhand to prosper. (after all we always had some ingenious ways of creating more value to Public Money) In a way, they were correct. Because, we never wanted to be a media-shout incubator looking for pictures with Who’s Who of Jharkhand but we were in a kind of state duty. We were committed and focused to solve one of very important issues of our times — Employment via sustainable startup eco-system.
When our feedback started to become a criticism; it was enough an indicator to part ways from Government. Rationally, the Startup policy is launched in September 2016 and total startups funded as of today is ZERO. Jharkhand Innovation Lab (created in partnership with IIM A) seemingly well funded already by Government and there has been no action. (Yes, media-shout Consultants empowering these text filled PPT and reports will have different version of story). We were happy to contribute to our own government. In fact, the program Y4BIZ — which government made a propaganda about is nothing but amazing. We are fine — as long as our youths, our Startups get what they should get. So, why did not we fix it?
Look at the Niti Aayog 38-Question Survey report for Startup — You would have your answer. I hope Government does Ease-of-doing-Startups as they did Rank-3 “Ease of Doing Business” promotion forever.
People in Jharkhand are awesome. I know with facts and evidence where people had put money and time from their pockets to make things happen for startup in Government. (Yes, Government). So, when it’s people keep their business interests aside and support initiatives from whole heart — you expect a basic action. The half baked, non result oriented, zero accountability approach is has done more harm than good. For us Entrepreneurs, Time is the most precious asset. In the love of its people and state, we have let our other businesses suffer. Not anymore.
Our attempt to build a bridge between Government and Startup Ecosystem did not work 99 LEAP way, however, we sincerely wish a very warm and positive sunrise to the teams working hard at government to start driving the promises. They can easily be done.
To start with:
- Don’t invest time in portals, single window system, changing office location from one building to another building but do the actual stuff. Make yourself selflessly available (not visible).
- There are at 7 things in Startup Policy which can be done in next 45 days. These are your low hanging fruits. You don’t need those files, PPTs, meetings etc to get these moving. You just need a right intent. (that is to help the youth and people of Jharkhand)
- JIL, EY, State Government, Central Government — They will have to work in mission mode. You don’t need CEOs, MDs, Chairman’s to do it. You need Entrepreneurs to do things for themselves.
- Don’t fall for vanity numbers to look good in front of our Hon’ble PM. Do stuff which helps common college going guy. This guy, say Nishant, is actually living a tough life. While he goes to a college he is constantly looking to find ways to get employed. If he can add another 10k to his Dad’s income each month; they can go to their first vacation. Do something for Nishant. Let him do his Startup. You have promised such stuff while building policies. This will help him to aspire and dream big.
- Startup is all about Uncertainties; Government is almost everything about Certainties (in 5 year block) — Marriage is difficult but not impossible. Find ways to make this marriage work.
We are winding up. Our teams at 99 LEAP are moved to other projects and engagements within our businesses. We don’t wish or want to make any more Starving Entrepreneurs like ourselves (in Jharkhand). We would rather want to focus on building a global enterprise closer to where opportunity lies.
Even after the legal closure of business; we are committed to the cause of Startups. You would find us active in our social channels. As team — Amit, Sushant, Raghu and I stand more stronger than ever before. When all of team could take difficult decisions, it says all about leadership.
Startup Ecosystem is broken; Fix It while you have time
We still remain committed to Startups by becoming actual support than fictional one. JOCC & RSBC is where we would remain most active and committed.
Our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/99leap/ would remain active forever. You can reach out to us for advise, gyan, help anytime.
