Learnings: Startup Story Part I

It’s been a long hiatus from the blog because of various reasons. I have missed out on one hand but have become wiser as well. The last few months have taught me some important lessons. I thought to share it.
Around November 2007, my idea of starting a venture was taking some shape and I was getting ready for a March 2008 launch. I had couple of partners with me in this venture. It all started when I got in touch with two gentlemen during ideation phase. We started to brainstorm the idea and brought it to execution stage and that's when things took a turn for the worse and at the end of it, the idea was shelved. Well, I feel it was for a good reason that it did not work out else it would have given us more pains.

As our idea was taking shape, our interactions also increased and inspite of being in Mumbai and Bangalore, we made sure to meet up once in a month at a place. Otherwise we were always on Skype and emails. Once the idea got developed, we reached a stage where we started to invest in office space, business cards etc. Everybody sounded so upbeat. Suddenly one day, one of my partners said he is not interested. It was the shock of my life and took me some time to recover from it. I thought, ok, let us forget about it and move ahead. One of the partners, Mr Y, had couple of concepts and we started to work on that. Anyways, what happened next, was even more appalling for me. Mr. Y suddenly stopped responding to our calls and SMSs. There was absolutely no response. It took me at least two months to recover from it and start afresh. Interestingly, I came to know that Mr. Y has started his own venture during the same time meaning he was parallely working on the same. That's the part I of the story with sad ending.
Now if I look back, I think I made couple of mistakes:
· Associating idea of the venture with partners: An idea or a concept must be seen as an independent entity. When we carried out the feasibility, it looked good from the market size and state perspective. That’s the reason we decided to go ahead with it.
· Lack of confidence in myself: In the back of my mind, I always felt that I cannot do it on my own or cannot carry it forward if these people are not with me. That’s made me pull out as soon as one of the partners pulled out. I could have continued with the other but I could not. I just did not have the courage the do so.

Will write about part II of the story with a happy ending.
~Cheers