August 7, World Friendship Day: They say that the best of form of any relationship is friendship because you don’t have to hide anything from your friends neither you have to go all the way to explain them anything. Perhaps this is the reason that people celebrate ever occasion with our friendship, people tend to stay along with their friends, they get married with their best friends so that we can continue with the spirit of friendship. Friends are the people with whom we not only share our success and joy but also pain and sorrows.With these phenomenon around, this Friendship Day, it would be appropriate to find how people feel when they become business partners of their friends. Is it easy to work together and the understanding between friends helps the venture to grow or what the experience like.
Aloke Bajpai and Rajnish, co-founders of ixigo
"Rajnish and I met during our graduation at IIT. We were wing mates with adjacent rooms and hit it off instantly! After grad school we ended up working for the same company, Amadeus SAS in Nice, France, where we went on to share an apartment. Post that I moved on to INSEAD for my MBA. After completing my studies I moved back to India, and we both then started working on the idea of ixigo.
The inspiration behind the inception of the brand comes from a personal story involving both of us. During our stay in France, we planned a trip around Europe, during which we faced a lot of difficulties getting around. From booking tickets and hotels at the right price, to simply figuring out the best places to visit and things to do, it all seemed like a challenge. The idea for ixigo was thus born.
We’ve been friends ever since college and it’s absolutely great to work alongside each other. We’ve worked together through the many highs and lows, and and hope to continue this in times to come as well."
Vishal Gupta and Prashant Shina, co-founders of Mycity4kids
Vishal Gupta & Prashant Sinha – the founders of mycity4kids, worked together in Aviva and gelled instantly. Both had an entrepreneurial streak & wanted to start their own venture. Being together at the same time at the same place with the same desire led them to join hands in equal partnership and thus, mycity4kids was founded.
Vishal: Prashant is my ‘Go to’ person. He has this ‘Do it’ attitude and I know I can trust and depend on him always. I know he always has my back!
Prashant: I & Vishal are totally opposite, and therefore we complement each other very well. He has an eye for detail and does the strategic thinking bit, while I am more of an execution person.’
‘We wanted to live life on our terms and more importantly enjoy what we are doing! And fortunately money has never been the end goal for us.’ – concur both Vishal & Prashant
Anil Nagar and Saurabh Bansal, co founders of Career Power Institute
Anil Nagar and Saurabh Bansal started Career Power Institute for the coaching of Bank PO, SSC and other government examinations in year 2010. Anil, an IIT alumni and Saurabh a DU Finance graduate met through a common friend and instantly felt a connection that eventually led them to realize their dream of revolutionizing Education Industry in India. And they have revolutionized it like none others. With more than 75 branches and approximately 1 Lakh students across India, Career Power is the fastest growing education company in India. According to Saurabh, their complementing skills are the biggest contributor in their success. “We like to work together and effectively divide our work areas but at the same time take advice from each other on all the important aspects of business.” said Anil. Saurabh brings in an interesting dimension to this discussion. According to him, more than 95% Start-Ups failed during the first three years of their operations. A major reason behind the failure of their business could be attributed to lack of trust, understanding and respect between founders.
Their hunger to serve maximum number of students who are not able to attend coaching because of locational and financial constraints prompt them to launch websites such as bankersadda.com and sscadda.com in year 2012. These websites are one of the most visited educational websites with more than 2.5 crores unique visitors per year. Their venture Adda 24*7 Android application is also a runaway success with 5 Lakhs users within a span of 4 months of its launch.
Both Anil and Saurabh replied that their focus on quality of faculty, study material, test-series and User Interface is a major reason behind their success. They can also be credited for bringing in new concepts and totally different methodology to reach out to the students in every nook and corner of India'