Beginning a Successful Entrepreneurial Journey: Ashok Soota


Bangalore: “Nice to be around the entrepreneurial energy,” said Ashok Soota, Founder & Executive Chairman of Happiest Minds while speaking at the SiliconIndia Startup City event held in Bangalore on June 2, 2012. Ashok says that Bangalore has become one among the top 10 spots in the world for startups.

Ashok Soota is widely recognized as one of the pioneering leaders of the Indian IT industry. Prior to founding Happiest Minds, Ashok co-founded MindTree in August 1999. Ashok is an industry leader. For his contribution to the Indian IT Industry, he was recognized as "IT Man of the Year" twice and as "Electronics Man of the Year".

He spoke about: How to begin a successful entrepreneurial journey? Ashok said “There are certain challenges which have to be overcome when you start. Most businesses are found from an idea, it could be new product, service model, capitalizing new technologies such as cloud, mobility, social media, analytics , as in the case of Happiest Minds.” He further said in terms of technology, it has to be something new.

Ashok further quoted David Thomson's book “Blueprint to a Billion” which says that probability of an idea being converted into a business which reaches $ 1 billion is one in 20,000 for global companies. 

He spoke about the 5 important factors for success. He says:

1.Soundness of the entry strategy - Ashok said " there should be an ability to avoid head-on clash with larger incumbents or while doing so to exploit their weaknesses and be clear that even the largest players have weaknesses. There is a need for Ecosystem/partners to multiply your strength."

2. Organization building- He says “it includes building a team, sharing wealth, creating an organization which is bound by vision and values.” He further added that “In our case we focus on happiness of a team.” He quotes Aristotle -“Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.”

3. Experience – “Focus on cash flow rather than profitability,” he says.

4. Identify your weakest links –  Ashok said “we are too focused on our areas of strengths”, and that “any one area which is not functioning well comes in the way to your path to success.”

5. Timing being the key- Ashok said that “CEO is like a conductor of a symphony. Many companies crash because timing wise they thought the boom would last forever. Starting at a time of slow-down and in an uncertain economy like the global economy today is not such a bad idea.”