StartUp : StayZilla : How Stayzilla came in the top five online travel agents in the country

Background:
Yogendra Vasupal, a dropout student from college who has keen interest in books came to know about computers in 1999, started undertaking freelance projects and web based applications and e-commerce portals. After earning about Rs.1 lakh from his freelance work, he wanted to do something with books but in search of its value he and his two friends, Sachit Singhi and Rupal Surana became online travel agents.

Yogi (as his friends’ call him) wanted to launch an e-commerce portal of his own. After studying market he along with his both friends launched ‘Stayzilla’.
Chennai-based Stayzilla claims to be the largest in the alternate stays segment, which books in the budget and value-stay segment. It also claims to be one of the top five online travel agents in the country.

Fund raising:
Started in 2010, Stayzilla has more than 1,200 locations with over 20,000 properties in its platform. It has raised $20 million, series-B round of funding, from Nexus Capital and existing investors Matrix partners to fund its expansion plan. Unlike other entrepreneurs, funds were never a major issue for them as Yogendra was already earning enough to pitch in initially called Inasra.com, it was rebranded as Stayzilla in 2010.

Current Status:
Sachit Singhi is the director, partnership, at Stayzilla and takes care of daily operations. Rupal Surana is the chief operating officer at Stayzilla. He said that when there were no other opponents in the segments in internet was not so popular, they went to meet hotels owners in Tier-II Tier-III cities and convinced them to tie up.

Scale up:
Sachit Singhi said the company hopes to close the financial year with a gross booking value of Rs.70 crore as compared to Rs.12 crore in 2013-14.They are targeting Rs.500 crore gross booking value in 2015-16 as we are growing nerly 10 times year-on-year.

Snippets from the Start up World
OYO Rooms raises RS.150 crore
Oyo Rooms, a network of budget hotels, has raised Rs.150 crore from Lightspeed, Sequoia and Greenoals Capital. It claims it has 200 hotels in 10 cities and books 50,000 room nights a month. It plans to expand its network to 1,000 hotels in 25 cities by this end of this year.

Roposo.com raises $5 million
Roposo.com, a social network focussing on fashion, backed by flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal , has raised $5 million in a series-A investment led by the technology-venture investor Tiger Global, the company stated. Existing investors such as Indian Quotient and Bansal also participated in this round.

Teewe raises $1.7 million
Mango Man Consumer Electronics, owners of HDMI dongle Teewe, which allows users to stream video content from a smartphone and watch it on their smart television, has raised $1.7 million from venture capital funds Sequoia Capital and India Quotient, according to media reports. It plans to use the money to buid new devices focusing on music and audio.

Urjas Energy raises $100,000
Mumbai-based Urjas Energy Systems has raised $100.000 in angel funding for its expansions plans. The three year old clean technology company makes multi-fuel gasifiers that work with the variety of agro wastes, which can replace fossil fuels used for heating in industries. The company is currently being incubated by IIT-Bombay’s Society for innovation and entrepreneurship and began commercialising its product eight months ago.

Yogurt labs raises Rs.72 Lakh
Mobile video production firm yogurt labs has raised Rs.72 lakhs in convertible notes from a clutch of investors Nick Adams and Kiran Bhat, the author of No Holy Cows in Business. Convertible notes are an instrument used by seed investors who wish to delay establishing a valuation until a later round of funding. Yogurt has developed a do-it-yourself platform for videos.

Google to Offer 'Launchpad' to Digital Startups in India

After testing its startup mentor programme in Israel, search giant Google is now turning its focus on Indian startups. The company has picked India to kick-start its startup mentorship programme Launchpad this year, signalling its growing interest in Indian startups.

On Monday, it launched the first of four such week-long programmes, during which a set of mentors from Google and other companies will coach startups looking to grow. "This is one of our large scale new programme offering," said Sunil Rao, who heads the startup initiative for Google India. While Google has an interest in growing India's digital economy, the startup programme could also turn into a pipeline for Google's investment arm.

The company's venture capital arm had recently picked up a stake in real estate portal Commonfloor and Freshdesk, a Chennai-based customer support tool. In India, Google plans to mentor close to 100 companies through Launchpad, which was started on a small scale nearly three years ago in Israel. Last year, it was conducted in 20 different cities.oogle benefits from the growing digital economy, as companies spend on Google to acquire customers. In the year ended March 2014, Google's revenue crossed 3,000 crore, up 47% YoY, helped by increasing online advertising spend.

All the "bits and pieces" of Google's startup programmes will be consolidated under Launchpad. "It will be like one offering to the developer from a startup perspective," said Rao, country head, start-up ecosystem India, Google India.

"It will be like one offering to the developer from a startup perspective," said Rao, country head, startup ecosystem, Google India. The company plans to take Launchpad to 50 cities this year but in India, most of its activities will be focused in Bengaluru. Rao, who heads the developer relations team for Google in India, has grown the Google developer community to one of the biggest with 45 chapters.Google Developer Relations was set up in India about five years ago in Hyderabad.

The team now has four people and operates out of Bengaluru, the largest among such teams for Google. It mainly focuses on creating Google developer groups, focused around Google technologies such as the Android operating system.

India is one of the largest Google developer ecosystems, with a large number of Android developers.

Increasingly, India has become core to Google's vision of getting 7 billion people or the world's population to use the Internet.

Many top executives of the $60 billion search company have been visiting India over the last few months, signalling its increasing interest in India's growing Internet economy. Last September, Google launched its Android One programme to make smartphones affordable in India and other Southeast Asian countries.
ref. - http://tech.economictimes.indiatimes.com

Where's the Best Place to Launch Your Startup?

SaaS and app startups can literally be anywhere in the world. With the cloud, both sales and support functions are virtual — a top-notch software company no longer needs a large local sales force to sell its product via tons of in-person meetings. This opens up the possibility of launching your startup anywhere from Bozeman, Mont., to Tampa, Fla.
To find the best entrepreneurial hotspot these days, you might look at the top locations for venture capital investments or where the cost of living is lowest. But where’s the best place for you to launch your startup?

You aren't necessarily going to depend on a list. You’ll probably factor in where you’re already living, where your current support network is and other personal matters. Maybe you prioritize cost of living, specifically the affordability of owning a home.
If you’re thinking about launching a new startup and aren’t sure where you want to land, here are a few factors to consider:

1. Your Personal Support Network

Lists of the top startup hotspots aren’t going to take into account your personal situation: where your friends and family are, what your interests are, etc. Building a business involves hard, often stress-inducing work. You may want an established support system of friends and family nearby.
Likewise, if there’s a particular climate or activity you’re drawn to (like skiing, museums or kayaking), make that a factor in choosing a location. Your goal is to build a happy, well-rounded life that includes being an entrepreneur — don’t sacrifice personal happiness to focus solely on a startup.

2. Cost of Living

Popular spots such as San Francisco, Menlo Park and New York City come with a price tag.For instance, the median rent in New York City tops $3,000 per month, compared to the national average of about $1,000 per month.

There’s no question that monthly expenses can make a big impact in a young entrepreneur’s ability to bootstrap his or her business. NerdWallet offers a cost of living calculator with which you can compare salary needs, housing, transportation and food costs between two cities. However, you shouldn’t necessarily make a decision based solely on where things will be the cheapest; expensive areas such as Silicon Valley have more to offer in terms of mentors, talent, meetups and other resources.

3. Access to VC Funding

If you’re looking for angels or venture capitalists to fund your startup, then geography does matter. The top five cities for VC investments are San Francisco, San Jose, New York City, Boston and Los Angeles (see the full list of fifteen here).
Investors tend to be attracted to locally based startups, as it enables them to be more involved and draw from their local network of resources. Of course, few startups will actually get their seed funding or Series A, so it’s important to consider other options for capital, such as a business loan, grant or self-funding.

4. Healthy Startup Ecosystem

By basing your startup in an established area like Silicon Valley, Boston or New York, you can more easily tap into an exciting ecosystem of peers, mentors and visionaries. You’ll find weekly meetups and co-located offices serving as the staging ground for startups. You can learn from others who have succeeded or failed, as well as find unique opportunities to collaborate with other startups.
Keep in mind that you can find pockets of startup activity outside of Silicon Valley and New York, including Reston, Va., Vancouver, B.C., and Austin, Texas — to name just a few.

5. Local Talent Pool

In the very early stages, you may not be thinking about hiring and expansion, but in order to grow a successful business, you’ll need employees, and strong employees at that. By being close to other startups and established companies, you can tap into talent, and won’t have to pay for relocation costs.
In addition, you can benefit from being nearby a strong academic center, as you’ll have a pool of young graduates to pull from; they’ll be more likely to take a risk on a new startup than those who are further along in their careers.

6. The Legal Perspective: Where to Incorporate

Beyond the question of where to physically set up shop, you’ll need to decide where you’d like to establish your business from a legal perspective. In other words, you need to pick the state where you’ll incorporate or form an LLC (limited liability company) for the business.
You often hear of companies incorporating in Delaware, Wyoming or Nevada.That’s because Delaware offers flexible, pro-business statutes, while Wyoming and Nevada offer low filing fees, in addition to no state corporate income, franchise and personal income taxes. But this doesn’t necessarily mean that these three states are right for your situation.
The general rule of thumb is that if your business will have five shareholders or less, you should incorporate in the state where you actually live or have a physical office. That’s because whenever you incorporate in a different state than where you're located, you’re considered operating out of state and will have added fees and paperwork. And the benefits of incorporating in Delaware, Nevada or Wyoming won’t be as strong for a small company to counterbalance the added fees and hassle.
Let’s say you’re physically located in California, but decide to incorporate in Nevada. You’ll still have to pay state taxes to California because you do business there, in addition to forking over extra fees for being out of state (because California will see you as a Nevada company doing business in the state).
But, if you will have more than five shareholders, then it makes sense to speak with a lawyer or tax expert to determine if incorporating in Delaware or another state will be advantageous.

The Bottom Line

No article or top-ranked list can tell you what specific location makes the most sense for your business and personal situation. If you’re thinking of moving across the country to set up shop, it’s wise to take a few trips out there first.
Attend several meetups. Talk to some entrepreneurs and investors who make up the local community there. Weigh all the factors carefully and decide what’s most important to you.