Reboot goes on sale online, gets featured at CIO, the Standard, Network World or the Ides of March

What a week it has been.

Last night was the first night in 7 days that I slept for 7 hours. My average naptime for the week was an astonishing 4 hours, excluding the time I spent power napping waiting for the red traffic light to change to green, on hold waiting for customers to [...]

March 13, 2010  Tags: , , , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Columbia Business School, Desi Startup, Education, Failure, Pressing words, Startup, Startup Insiders, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  No Comments

The second best job in the world, part two…

To the three batches (Division A, Division B, and EMBA Batch 13), who made me feel like a rock star two Thursdays in a row. Thank you. Keep them pictures coming J

December 20, 2009  Tags: , , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Columbia Business School, Education, Failure, Startup, Startup Insiders, Training, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  No Comments

Dreamers in Dubai

Kumar, the soft spoken driver from Kerala, has been picking me up from home and dropping me back for the last seven days. On Wednesday night he finally asked if I was working the hours I was working by choice. Starting the day at 8 am and landing on Villa 16, Cluster 35 [...]

December 12, 2009  Tags: , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Education, Failure, Startup, entrepreneurs, small business  No Comments

Telecompk on Reboot

Babar Bhatti covers Reboot on the Telecompk blog.

November 24, 2009  Tags: ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Columbia Business School, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Failure, PASHA, Pakistan, Startup, Writing, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  No Comments

MIT CEF BAP 2009 – Finals (unofficial, unsanctioned, undercover coverage)

I have been spoilt rotten.

After blogging about the PASHA SI session as well as the Tech Crunch Awards live, I expect events to be blogged about instantenously. My pictures, my videos, my time.

Which is why when I decided to gate crash the MIT CEF BAP party, I brought my own camera. Though [...]

November 14, 2009  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Karachi, Ken Morse, MIT BAP, entrepreneurs  2 Comments

Ken Morse is in town

Ken Morse was in town the last two nights on his signature whirlwind trip to Karachi. Luckily enough we were able to catch up with him at the Pre-BAP dinner at Farrokh Captain’s home and then again yesterday at the MIT CEF Innovation Confernece.

During his Keynote at the conference Ken reinforced the points [...]

November 14, 2009  Tags: , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

The presentation cheat sheet – Three – The Problem Statement

The presentation that I am most proud of however is the one that we made together as a team for the first MIT BAP competition in Karachi. The judges panel included Ken Morse, Bill Aulet and Imran Saeed, all three from MIT E-Labs. Despite earlier failed attempts to impress Ken, this time we managed [...]

November 9, 2009  Tags: , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff, Sales guys, Sales guys in suits  2 Comments

The Presentation cheat sheet – two – impact

Ultimately audiences and judges will vote for you if you

Connect with them emotionally

Answer all their questions – spoken and otherwise

Save and respect their time and intelligence by only making credible claims

Backstopping and supporting your claims by solid believable evidence

The first presentation on my slideshare deck is about the SMB Fatimah Jinnah School project undertaken [...]

November 9, 2009  Tags: , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

The Presentation cheat sheet – one

Pitching Perfect

November 9, 2009  Tags: , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff, Desi Startup, Ken Morse, MIT BAP, entrepreneurs  No Comments

The many faces of Alchemy

I did this slide deck a year and a handful of months ago. We were riding high and the cycle had hit but hadn’t really hit us. When I started working on the deck the objective was to showcase all the interesting things we had done together as a team. It still bring backs [...]

November 7, 2009  Tags: , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff, Columbia Business School, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Karachi, Startup, entrepreneurs  No Comments

Reboot presentation @ TIECON

Here is the slide share version of the Reboot presentation I made yesterday at the TIECON 2009 event in Karachi. Had a lot of fun putting this together.
Alchemy Reboot @ TIE CON Karachi
View more presentations from jafcbs.

November 5, 2009  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Columbia Business School, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Failure, Karachi, Pakistan, Startup, TIE, entrepreneurs  3 Comments

Heal Thyself or TIECON 2009, Karachi

The best of friends are the conspring kind.

When Sabeen and Jehan conspired together to get me to speak at TIECON 2009 in Karachi, the original plan was to do my presentation, stay for the post presentation Q&A and then head out. I even parked in Sheraton’s outdoor parking to ensure that I wouldn’t [...]

November 5, 2009  Tags: ,   Posted in: Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Failure, Karachi, PASHA, Pakistan, Startup, TIE, entrepreneurs  7 Comments

Robert Ferrigno, Reboot and me…

My favorite hangout is a large format bookstore. Think anywhere in the world, think library stacks, think of Borders, think of me.

Three years ago on a business trip to Malaysia, a new fiction release caught my eye. It had an interesting cover, sort of a patchwork of the US flag and the Islamic [...]

October 27, 2009  Tags: , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

Glenn Hubbard, Reboot and me

I was a brash and ambitious desi with a business plan at Columbia. Glenn was part of the entrepreneurial faculty at the school. We met and exchanged notes on the sidelines of Amar Bhide’s chat about his upcoming book, “The origin and evolution of new businesses”. A few months later when I lost [...]

October 27, 2009  Tags: , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

Jehan and the TieCon Speaker’s interview series

Jehan goes on the road with her flip to capture the TieCon speakers before they put on their show in Karachi on 4th November.

Jawwad Ahmed Farid talks about his Entrepreneurial experience from Jehan Ara on Vimeo.

October 25, 2009  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  One Comment