My Story

It always amazes me when people want success too soon and through shortcuts in their life. A true entrepreneur is one who goes through the grind, starts a real business, employs real people, and provides products and services to real customers. I must say it is hard, it is really hard work and it is about real life. At the end of it, you get to do what you want to do, in your own way. There are a lot of challenges, but you’ve got to start somewhere as opportunities don’t materialize from thin air. The only way to get to entrepreneurship is to start learning a few new skills other than your core competence - may be marketing or finance - or both. While opportunities are unlimited, time is limited. So do what you want without wasting time - success and failure are all part of the game. That is the philosophy I followed in life. I became an entrepreneur through grit and hard work and my story is that of the struggle of an underdog.

I was born into a poor family in an obscure village of Kerala called Uzhuva, near Vayalar - famous for the communist insurgency of 1946. We were a family of 6, struggling to have two meals a day, surviving through poverty. I went to the Govt. primary school and helped my father after school hours in his work.

God had gifted me with the intelligence to be one of the top students in the class and also gifted me with a flair for singing - which made me popular in the school and in the neighboring village. It was the village life that shaped my early days and partake in the village folks’ leisure time sports and involvement with communist party workers in the union office. I was part of the social circles of village reading rooms and temple festivals. During this period, a vision to transform my family from poverty to prosperity, hit my mind - though I didn’t know-how. But I was determined to make a mark when I grew up. I worked relentlessly and pursued my dreams thereafter.

I became a topper in the higher secondary school exams and set my sights on joining the College Of Engineering Thiruvananthapuram - to do a degree in the then coveted Electronics and Communication Engineering branch. The period was 1972-76. Through a series of struggles and hardships, I joined the engineering degree course and completed it successfully in 1976 through persistent efforts and perseverance. A Degree In Engineering was beyond the reach of the poor those days. But getting a suitable job in Kerala for engineers was so difficult that it made me travel to Delhi with Rs 100 in my pocket searching for a job and eventually landing a computer engineer’s job in the then start-up - Hindustan Computers Limited - which later became HCL.

My vision and passion to make it big in life made me take several adventurous steps and finally got me into Entrepreneurship in 1991 after being in employment for 14 years – at the age of 36 - a long journey which still continues- and it is really a fascinating tale of failures and successes.