wordpress blog stats
Connect with us

Hi, what are you looking for?

Netcore Funding Falls Through; MD Rajesh Jain On Raising Venture Capital

A little over a month ago, we’d heard murmurs of Rajesh Jain’s company Netcore raising a round of VC Funding. Netcore runs the Push SMS Service MyToday, with around 3.6 million subscribers, sending around 12 million SMS’ a day. Some sources put the funding amount at $10 million, others at $25 million; neither was confirmed by company sources. In fact, I was a little surprised that Netcore was raising funds, since Jain, as we know, has reserves from the famous IndiaWorld deal with Sify. Now it appears that appears that Netcore’s funding has fallen through, and here’s what Jain has to say about it:

VCs and Me
by Rajesh Jain

In my fifteen years as an entrepreneur, I have never managed to raise venture capital for my own company. (Some of the companies I have invested in over the past three years have been very successful with their own fund-raising efforts.) Very recently, a deal that I was negotiating with for Netcore fell through as it neared its closing. And that made me think through the years since I started IndiaWorld about the ten failed efforts to raise venture capital. Most of these endeavours were from 1995-99 while I was growing IndiaWorld. In Netcore, I said No a couple years to an investment offer, and this time around, a set of cascading efforts led the prospective investors to withdraw. Given the string of fruitless efforts, I can only conclude that VCs and I are not made-for-each-other!While the reasons for these aborted attempts to raise funding are many, I can distill them into two key areas: valuation not being right, and deep disagreement on issues on which neither of us would compromise. A relationship with a VC is like a marriage – and one in which divorce is not a possibility. So, both sides have to be absolutely sure before entering into the relationship. It is better not to enter into a relationship if either party has doubts.

In my case, two things have helped me be more choosy. In IndiaWorld, we were profitable from the early days so I was never in a situation where I had to take capital for survival. In Netcore, I have the ability to invest my own capital – which I have done over the past 5+ years. Maybe, this makes us a most unlikely target for venture capital going ahead!

There have been more than a few VCs whom I would have liked to have got on board – and in all cases, it was for the person at the firm who I believed could add tremendous value (beyond money) to help build the business. At the end, this is perhaps the most important criteria. If the value is not in the person (VC), then it becomes a pure financial investment – which, depending on the situation, may or may not be the right thing to do.

In the past 15 years, I have always found discussions with VCs helpful. They bring in an objectivity as outsiders which every business needs. At times, we as entrepreneurs and managers are so closely involved in the thick of the trees that it becomes easy to lose sight of the wider forest one is navigating through.

Advertisement. Scroll to continue reading.

So, back to Netcore. We are at an exciting stage in our evolution. The foundation has been laid, much of the management team is in place. It will still require great execution from here on to realise the dreams we have in the coming years. Capital is only one of the raw materials. As I look back, I can only speculate on what life would have been with a VC.

© Rajesh Jain. Reproduced with permission from Emergic.org

Also see:
Why Push SMS Services Would Need As Much As $10 Million In Funding
Your Take On The Cost Issues Of Push SMS Services In India

Written By

Free Reads

News

With GPS in every car, India's toll collection is going high-tech.

News

Google is currently undergoing the necessary procedures for the leasehold land, which is presently under the ownership of the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation.

News

The pilot project for which is being launched in 19 cities this year, with a plan to launch a full-fledged rollout next year.

MediaNama’s mission is to help build a digital ecosystem which is open, fair, global and competitive.

Views

News

NPCI CEO Dilip Asbe recently said that what is not written in regulations is a no-go for fintech entities. But following this advice could...

News

Notably, Indus Appstore will allow app developers to use third-party billing systems for in-app billing without having to pay any commission to Indus, a...

News

The existing commission-based model, which companies like Uber and Ola have used for a long time and still stick to, has received criticism from...

News

Factors like Indus not charging developers any commission for in-app payments and antitrust orders issued by India's competition regulator against Google could contribute to...

News

Is open-sourcing of AI, and the use cases that come with it, a good starting point to discuss the responsibility and liability of AI?...

You May Also Like

News

Google has released a Google Travel Trends Report which states that branded budget hotel search queries grew 179% year over year (YOY) in India, in...

Advert

135 job openings in over 60 companies are listed at our free Digital and Mobile Job Board: If you’re looking for a job, or...

News

By Aroon Deep and Aditya Chunduru You’re reading it here first: Twitter has complied with government requests to censor 52 tweets that mostly criticised...

News

Rajesh Kumar* doesn’t have many enemies in life. But, Uber, for which he drives a cab everyday, is starting to look like one, he...

MediaNama is the premier source of information and analysis on Technology Policy in India. More about MediaNama, and contact information, here.

© 2008-2021 Mixed Bag Media Pvt. Ltd. Developed By PixelVJ

Subscribe to our daily newsletter
Name:*
Your email address:*
*
Please enter all required fields Click to hide
Correct invalid entries Click to hide

© 2008-2021 Mixed Bag Media Pvt. Ltd. Developed By PixelVJ