Engineers in India venturing into valley-like start-up; BANGALORE TECHIES JUST BEGINNING TO CATCH THE ENTREPRENEURIAL BUG
San Jose Mercury News, Sunday, December 18, 2005

By John Boudreau

BANGALORE, India - Three Indian engineers are launched on a Bangalore dream they hope will end in Silicon Valley-style entrepreneurial success.

At a time when many talented engineers job hop in India's sizzling tech boom, three college friends -- Manish Agrawal, 26, Kartik Jain, 24, and Anuj Sharma, 25 -- recently quit their day work to launch a start-up.

Their new venture, PicSquare (www.picsquare.com), allows Indians living in the United States -- as well as locals -- to upload digital images, which are then printed in India and delivered to friends and family. Prints can be ordered over the Internet. The photos can also be used to create gifts, such as calendars, coffee mugs and T-shirts. The founders also hope to make the service into something of a social network for Indians.

Start-up fever has yet to sweep Bangalore, observed Sridhar Mitta, who heads the Bangalore chapter of The Indus Entrepreneurs, the Silicon Valley-based networking organization. The biggest hurdle is access to capital to fund new ideas, he said.

``Late-stage funding is in abundance,'' Mitta said. ``But to get seed, or angel-stage funding, is almost impossible.''

Agrawal, though, said his peers increasingly are thinking of building their own companies.

``The mood is changing,'' he said. ``TiE is playing a big role in encouraging entrepreneurs. Even the top executives of the company I worked for were very encouraging. They all offered help.''

Financially, though, Agrawal and his fellow co-founders are on their own. ``We are funding this from our own pockets,'' he said. They have received advice from TiE Bangalore and Sanjay Swamy, a former Silicon Valley tech executive who now oversees the Bangalore operations of Santa Clara-based Ketera Technologies.

Agrawal studied mechanical engineering at Purdue University, but passed on opportunities to work in the United States.

``I saw all the potential in India,'' he said. ``It's an emerging market.''