India is one of the best and worst places to launch a tech startup these days, a contradiction epitomized in a recent survey (pdf) of 170 entrepreneurs across 15 industries. Sixty-five percent of those surveyed said India is in the midst of a tech bubble, even as 63% said they were struggling to find funding. <\/p>\n
For the past few years, India has been a hotbed of startup activity, even if a good portion of those ventures ultimately dont make it. Between June 2014 and July 2016, more than 2,280 Indian startups began operations; nearly 1,000 of them shuttered. While fail is less of a dirty word in tech than elsewhere, Indian entrepreneurs cite a range of factors in their struggle to find footing, including a lack of funding, lack of innovation, and an oversaturated marketplace. Most of the entrepreneurs surveyed by InnoVen Capital, an Asian venture-lending firm, said that finding cash was their biggest barrier to growth. <\/p>\n
[Sixty-three percent] of respondents who attempted to fundraise in 2016 did not have a favorable experience, reads the companys February 2017 Startup Outlook report. The average startup had to pitch to more than six investors before securing funding. <\/p>\n
(Only 18% of the companies whose leaders participated in the survey were backed by venture capital; a quarter were funded by angel investors and nearly half were self-funded.) <\/p>\n
Among other obstacles, e-commerce and healthcare startups rated revenue growth as a top business challenge, while enterprise startups cited customer acquisition and customer churn. Artificial-intelligence startups cited trouble discovering and hiring talent. Many of those surveyed also called for India itself to foster a more entrepreneurial environment by, for example, increasing investment in digital infrastructure, allowing for more foreign investments, creating stronger intellectual property laws and making updates to public education. <\/p>\n
The Indian government has made some strides on this front, including Startup India a plan to reduce taxes and bureaucracy, create incubators and sources of funding, and introduce patent reformsand Digital India, a campaign to improve online infrastructure and internet connectivity. <\/p>\n
In the InnoVen Capital survey, fintech CEOs noted their appreciation for policies promoting Digital Payment [and] the Unified Payments Interface, and entrepreneurs in the e-commerce, consumer, and logistics sectors rated the Goods and Services Taxit proposes to offers relief from Indias cascading tax system by subbing in a simplified tax structureas the most helpful government initiative of 2016. One in five entrepreneurs called for more tax-policy improvements this year. <\/p>\n
Crowding is a different beast. Although entrepreneurs listed having a robust business model as the most important facet of improving investor sentiment this year, more than 20% of them also said that more exits would help. Seventy percent said they were open to an exit, and nearly two-thirds rated an initial public offering as the most preferred route. <\/p>\n
While Indias entrepreneurs are finding inspiration from withindemonetization has done wonders for digital payments startup Paytmforeign tech majors like Google, Airbnb, Amazon, and Uber are still among [at least some] Indian entrepreneurs favorites. Tesla\/SpaceX CEO Elon Musk also has lots of fans in the country. <\/p>\n
Challenges or no, 94% of survey respondents said they would be looking to fundraise in 2017some $800 million between them. But theyll have to hurry: Nearly 20% believe that tech bubble is about to burst. <\/p>\n
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Even Indian technology entrepreneurs think they are living in a bubble - Quartz<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" India is one of the best and worst places to launch a tech startup these days, a contradiction epitomized in a recent survey (pdf) of 170 entrepreneurs across 15 industries. Sixty-five percent of those surveyed said India is in the midst of a tech bubble, even as 63% said they were struggling to find funding. For the past few years, India has been a hotbed of startup activity, even if a good portion of those ventures ultimately dont make it Continue reading