sayeed | 13 years ago | on: Leap second causing Linux server crashes?
sayeed's comments
sayeed | 14 years ago | on: Don't sell Technology to Indian Businesses
As already mentioned, the writing style makes it hard to get to the heart of the matter.
For me, it reads like a cathartic post from a stressed out entrepreneur. Needs to be 'understood' rather than being taken literally.
The gist of the post can be summarized so:
Is it a good idea to start a software products company in India? No, it isn't, because VCs will never fund it and you will never make it by bootstrapping. Even if you do, "fast-followers" will clone your business and get the benefit. Heads you loose, tails they win.
Then we have all the obstacles one has to grapple with. Not least are the unreasonable, uncouth, undiscerning customers who want to free-ride as much as possible.
The future will be better but now it's so bleak... :(
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Being a Bangalore based entrepreneur focused on Indian enterprises and small businesses (co-founder, Greytip), I can relate to the frustrations but also strongly disagree on many counts.
Yes, there may not be a market for Online Tax Filing due to all the factors Archit lists out, but, it could also be because there are already many players in the domain. Moreover, it is a once a year business opportunity so it's a tougher nut to crack.
As for customers willingness to pay for software, it is all about value for money. A $5 per user pricing, although reasonable in the developed world, will not cut ice in India. A 50 cents per user pricing may yet work.
Which brings us to the key challenges to doing business in India: how do you keep costs low and still make profits, break-even before you break out of runway, and not compromise on quality and service.
Some days you put your head down and get going, some days you silently scream in the dark, and on some days you just rant... ;)
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I think the Xen host takes care of the synchronization and we need not do it in the guest OS. (see http://serverfault.com/questions/100978/do-i-need-to-run-ntp...).
Is this fine or should we run ntpd for better accuracy?