Proto.in trackback: Vembu, Novatium, Inasra

Last month, I embarked on a project to track down the many startups who have been showcased at Proto.in since its inception. I met with limited success. Many of the emails sent to people listed as ‘contacts’ on Proto.in’s website bounced back and some did not write back. Still, I managed to get a few responses and those were pretty good. Here’s goes the first batch:

iCreate Software

Founder (s): Anup Pai

HQ: Bangalore

Sector: Software

Since its showcase in January 2007, iCreate has added three new business intelligence solutions — BizScore, ADS, inCollect — and developed its own delivery platform. Pilot installations for BizScore and ADS have been completed. It has also added four new customers and its focus markets are West Asia, South Africa and South East Europe. Pai claims that the company has been profitable since October 2007. The company, which started up in 2006, was seed funded (amount undisclosed) from Pai’s personal savings. In 2009, iCreate hopes to emerge as a leading provider of business intelligence solutions and services to the banking industry.

Vembu Technologies

Founder (s): Sekar Vembu and Lakshmanan Narayan

HQ: Chennai

Sector: Software

StoreGrid is Vembu Technologies’ flagship product and is currently used by 1,000-odd clients such as internet service providers and other IT solution providers. It showcased in January 2007 after which the product has been enhanced to make its easier for service providers to start and manage their online backup services business. “We’ve made enhancements to support backup of Microsoft Exchange Server, Microsoft SQL and MySQL, etc. Another important strategy we announced recently is to provide our partners with the ability to deploy StoreGrid in an Amazon Cloud,” says Vembu. Read his blog to find out more about StoreGrid Cloud AMI. In the last six months, the company has also created a StoreGrid Business Edition for the small and medium enterprise segment in India. 2009, he says, presents a challenging business environment. The company will launch some new technologies in the first quarter and will concentrate this year on getting a world-class product in place to ride the post-downturn period.

Novatium Solutions

Founder (s): Ray Stata, Rajesh Jain, Ashok Jhunjhunwala

HQ: Chennai

Sector: Information Technology

Novatium showcased its $100 NetPC in January 2007. Since then it has completed trials with MNL, BSNL and other telecom companies in India and overseas, says CEO Alok Singh. “All our pilots put together, we have over 5,000 customers and the first quarter of 2009 will see this service rolled out to multiple cities and towns,” he says. The funding from New Enterprise Associates was used primarily for the pilots and roll-out with telecom companies.

Kallos Solutions

Founder (s): George Vettath

HQ: Chennai

Sector: Software

When Kallos showcased in January 2007, it had one product, called K-Serve. “We realized  soon after that the market was not ready for a single product. Multiple products work better,” says Vettath. The company broke its original product down to eight, which has now grown to 12. It is not yet profitable but has 50 clients, mostly in Chennai. It now needs additional funding to expand into other cities and put in place a senior management team, including a CXO and marketing head. It also has ambitious plan to go global in 3-5 countries. “This business has been built for global scale,” says Vettath, who adds that Kallos’ competitive edge is its pricing, which is one-third of larger players such as Salesforce.com and has the added advantage of having features that are locally relevant. Update: Vettath wrote in to clarify that Kallos grew revenues 115% in financial year 2007-2008 and is profitable.

Valued Epistemics

Founder (s): Anand Kannan and Yogish Lavanis

HQ: Chennai

Sector: Mobile

The company offers mobile learning solutions on a platform branded Wizdom. The solutions can also be accessed via any computing device connected to the Internet. The company is now focusing on scaling up its presence, but additional details are not available. According to Kannan, a third-party survey (did not specify by whom) found that 92 per cent of the students who used Wizdom were “happy to recommend us to other students”. He adds, that in terms of headcount, the company is now thrice the size it was at the time of the showcase and will double again in the next few months, but did not give specific numbers. After its showcase in January 2007, the GRE business has been separated from the Wizdom.in platform and relaunched as GREedge.

Inasra Technologies

Founder (s): Yogendra Vasupal

HQ: Chennai

Sector: Consumer Internet

Inasra showcased at the July 2007 Edition II of Proto.in. At the time the number of hotels in its network numbered 1,500. Now it is closer to 4,000. The company is seeing consistent month-on-month bookings and an average of 100 room nights per day, says Vasupal. The two-year old startup plans to expand room nights booked and partners significantly this year. It is also looking at more franchisees.

Startups from Edition I, held in Janaury 2007, who could not be contacted or were unable to respond to queries and therefore have not been featured: Unleash Networks, Sloka Telecom, Dhristi Software, ValueFirst, Aumega Networks, Nabh, Ixigo, Seraja, One-i, Picsquare, HelpDeskPilot, DesiCrew, DeepRootLinux, Wirkle, Spinaxis, Tracbac, Ciglobal Solutions, Tekriti Software, Authme, Altrion, Tolmolbol.

Image Courtesy: Proto.in