The Unbearable Heaviness of Being: On the Passing of Naren Gupta (Part 4)

In the Spring of 2020, as we were each trying to understand the pandemic, the six of us started doing Zoom calls regularly. In addition, we were sharing a lot of notes that each of us  unearthed. Science. Politics. History. Anthropology. We looked everywhere for clues.

Politics, in particular, was a highly contentious subject. Dominique, Vinita and I are centrists. Naren and Pierluigi are conservatives. Our ideas clashed. Especially around the caricature figure of Donald Trump, against the backdrop of post-truth America, conservatives have had a difficult case to defend. The Republican party has become a poodle on leash, led astray by an aspiring fascist.

At first, Dominique and I resisted getting drawn into political discussions. Naren wanted to discuss politics. Enrica wanted to discuss politics. Naren refused no for an answer.

>>>

Featured Videos

The Unbearable Heaviness of Being: On the Passing of Naren Gupta (Part 3)

Yesterday, as I cried in Dominique’s arms, he said, gently, Naren was a father figure for you.

Naren was a father figure for a lot of people in the industry.

What he was to me was more than that.

Naren was my friend.

>>>

The Unbearable Heaviness of Being: On the Passing of Naren Gupta (Part 2)

Naren and I met in 2010. My Vision India 2020 book had just come out. We were invited to be on a panel together at Stanford. The Indian startup story was just starting to find some traction in Silicon Valley.

The Indian startup story, by the way, is different from the Indian entrepreneur story. Indian entrepreneurs, by this time, had already found acceptance in Silicon Valley. TiE played a major role in legitimizing us. Naren played an active role in that effort. Naren and Vinita each founded a technology company, took it public, and were flag bearers of a talented, highly entrepreneurial diaspora that would go on to change the technology industry for good. Shantanu Narayen, Sundar Pichai, Satya Nadella, Parag Agarwal are each milestones in that continuum of success.

>>>

Video FAQs

The Unbearable Heaviness of Being: On the Passing of Naren Gupta (Part 1)

Naren died.

Suddenly.

My pear tree

still has some golden leaves.

Rain drips disbelief.

It can’t be.

It is.

These are the only lines I could come up with on Sunday afternoon.

>>>

Best of Bootstrapping: Founder Builds Multiple Bootstrapped Education Software Companies

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. 

Lane Rankin, Founder at Illuminate Education, was first a teacher, then a school and school district administrator. His background is not of a typical tech entrepreneur. However, his deep domain knowledge and relationships in the education field have propelled him to become a very successful EdTech entrepreneur. Great story!

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your entrepreneurial journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Lane Rankin: I’m currently in California. I was born in Seattle, Washington. I have a Bachelors degree in Applied Mathematics and went on to get a Masters in Leadership. I started my first company back in 1999.

>>>

Solo Entrepreneur Focused on Autonomy as Key Success Driver: Hank Luhring, Founder of IssueTrak (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: How much were you pricing?

Hank Luhring: It was $100 a month. This was before the cloud. There was a term back then called Application Service Provider.

Sramana Mitra: I remember that. It was the precursor to the cloud.

Solo Entrepreneur Focused on Autonomy as Key Success Driver: Hank Luhring, Founder of IssueTrak (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: When you started doing this alone, how long did that solo journey last before you started hiring programmers?

Hank Luhring: Six months. My first client was Volvo Penta. The colleague of a former colleague called and said, “Do you know anybody who can develop some applications?” It happened to be a homebuilder’s association. They needed a new membership database. They had ideas for what they wanted the package to do.

I am.

My friend Betsy Corcoran, also my former editor at Forbes, came to one of my roundtables this year to discuss EdTech. She’s also the founder of EdSurge.

She read this poem that I have chosen to close the year with, and wish you happy holidays.

What You Missed That Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade
Written by Brad Aaron Modlin

Mrs. Nelson explained how to stand still and listen
to the wind, how to find meaning in pumping gas,
how peeling potatoes can be a form of prayer. She took
questions on how not to feel lost in the dark
After lunch she distributed worksheets
that covered ways to remember your grandfather’s
voice. Then the class discussed falling asleep
without feeling you had forgotten to do something else—
something important—and how to believe
the house you wake in is your home. This prompted
Mrs. Nelson to draw a chalkboard diagram detailing
how to chant the Psalms during cigarette breaks,
and how not to squirm for sound when your own thoughts
are all you hear; also, that you have enough.
The English lesson was that I am
is a complete sentence.
And just before the afternoon bell, she made the math equation
look easy. The one that proves that hundreds of questions,
and feeling cold, and all those nights spent looking
for whatever it was you lost, and one person
add up to something.

Be safe as Omicron rages.

Yours, Sramana