Mentoring assignment number three: Show up in strength at the startup insider session at T2F

If you are keen on meeting even more kick ass mentors, hear another round of uninspiring drivel from Jawwad Farid and Nauman Sheikh and corrupt even more young minds, bring at-least three friends to the SI session at T2F. Bonus points if all six of you manage to show up with 3 sidekicks each on [...]

April 13, 2010  Tags: , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

Startup Insiders: Back in Karachi: Business models that don’t work

Jehan is up-to no good again. As part of her desire to increase the number of non-conformist, flower bearing, independent, ultra cool apple product users, she wants as many young ones to work for themselves as possible (assuming that there is a connection, she thinks so). But rather than putting up unassailable success stories, this [...]

April 13, 2010  Tags: , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  7 Comments

Mentoring fellow dreamers – a start up game plan for final year students

It is always flattering when people come to you for mentoring advice knowing that you are a total and complete failure. CIO Pakistan did that this Saturday afternoon when they brought 7 impressionable young men with them. Just to make it interesting and worthwhile I had Nauman Shaikh from Credit Chex also over for a [...]

April 10, 2010  Tags: , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  4 Comments

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

Shaukat Tarin Quits

Shaukat Tarin, the Banker behind Union Bank and its successful sale to Standard Chartered Bank for about 500 million dollars in 2006, quit this morning as Pakistan’s Finance Minister. Post Union Bank, Shaukat along with a consortium of multination investors acquired Saudi Pak Commercial Bank from SAPICO for a second Union run. The acquired bank [...]

February 23, 2010  Tags: , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

Pakistan Risk Review, one year later…

In the beginning it was just risk. Two years ago when we first started working on the concept paper that later became Pakistan Risk Review, we felt that covering prices, volatilities and limits in secondary markets would be a full time job and would certainly be sufficient for a number of customers. After all what [...]

February 15, 2010  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  One Comment

Heading back home

After 5 days of 4 hours of sleep and 18 hour days finally heading back home to Karachi. Good trip. Details later.

February 12, 2010  Tags: , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

Get help early for your child

NYT article on speech delays and child development. Getting Taha to Anika Shah a year before he started school has made a world of difference in his life and ours and it made it possible for him to focus on settling down at CAS without worrying about academics. Don’t ignore the signs, don’t be in [...]

February 10, 2010  Tags: , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

Pakistan Macro Economic Update – January 2010

The figures for July- December 2009 are guardedly encouraging as there are some signs that the economy is on the road to recovery. Trade deficit has narrowed due to a decline in imports (because of reduced oil and commodity prices in this period as well as the slowdown in economic activity) which have outweighed the [...]

January 31, 2010  Tags: , , , ,   Posted in: Karachi, Liquidity Risk, PASHA, Pakistan, the economy stupid  No Comments

The Reboot presentation at TIECON, Karachi – Revisited

The TIECON 2009, Karachi, 4th November 2009, Reboot presentation was the first time I was able to shrink the story in under 20 minutes. Spent three days putting the presentation together but it will be a while before I am able to get to an editor that will run the presentation and the video coverage [...]

November 27, 2009  Tags: , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Columbia Business School, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Education, Failure, Pakistan, Startup, TIE, computer science, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  No 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 he [...]

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 to [...]

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 [...]

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

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 out during [...]

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