Bootstrapping to $6M from Durgapur, West Bengal: Pinnacle CAD CEO Bimal Patwari (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: Once you received your first order, what were your next steps? Bimal Patwari: Immediately I found a team of four people from the students I had trained. I had one experienced person, and the rest were my top students. I used that team to get us started. All of the architects typically work

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Bootstrapping to $6M from Durgapur, West Bengal: Pinnacle CAD CEO Bimal Patwari (Part 2)

Sramana: During the five-year period that you ran the computer-aided design (CAD) training program, what kinds of business were you able to build? What was the revenue level like? Bimal Patwari: My father gave me five lakh rupee, which was about $12,000. I always believed in myself, and I always pushed myself to be the

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Bootstrapping to $6M from Durgapur, West Bengal: Pinnacle CAD CEO Bimal Patwari (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page.  Sramana: Bimal, let’s start with your personal story. Where does your entrepreneurial journey begin? Bimal Patwari: I went to college at IIT Kharagpur where I studied electronics, and then did mygraduate work in marketing and finance at the Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow.

Building a $5M+ Digital Design Services Firm from Kolkata: Indus Net CEO Abhishek Rungta (Part 7)

Sramana: Have you built this company organically, or have you taken on investors? Abhishek Rungta: I have built this entire company from my initial 1,500 [~$27] rupee investment. All of the growth has come from our own efforts and sales. Sramana: Services companies have the ability to bootstrap and grow well organically. You can get

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Building a $5M+ Digital Design Services Firm from Kolkata: Indus Net CEO Abhishek Rungta (Part 6)

Sramana: What have been your primary strategies for growth? Abhishek Rungta: I did make a few good decisions. In 2009 I joined hands with a small company, and I ended up acquiring it. They were running a small .NET business but did not have a lot of work. I was able to provide them with

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Building a $5M+ Digital Design Services Firm from Kolkata: Indus Net CEO Abhishek Rungta (Part 5)

Sramana: So, you realized you could scale the business with that model? Abhishek Rungta: Yes. I termed it “dedicated hiring.” I would market it on Elance and other places as well. We also did PPC with Overture, GoTo, and others prior to Google. Within a few days, I saw our model was getting copied every

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Building a $5M+ Digital Design Services Firm from Kolkata: Indus Net CEO Abhishek Rungta (Part 4)

Sramana: What did you do when you recognized that your business was in trouble? Abhishek Rungta: I recalled an incident that occurred when I was a student in the UK. At one point money was tight, and I needed to make some money quickly. I found a company that needed a forum built for them

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Building a $5M+ Digital Design Services Firm from Kolkata: Indus Net CEO Abhishek Rungta (Part 3)

Sramana: What was the next step you took to grow your company? Abhishek Rungta: I then decided to start my own website. I went to some sites and bought a domain name and made some interesting discoveries at that time. You can actually buy an entire setup for 25,000 rupees [~$452] per month. If you

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