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

Memories, Cookaracha Guides or Venture number two…

Much before Reboot and the Blue Screen of Death, before the Alchemy discussion on our family dinner table and the wild dreamy bet that turned out to be Avicena, before blogging and before DesiBackToDesh, in a land far far away (then marked as Geocities in Jedi lore) there was once a venture named Cookaracha [...]

February 5, 2010  Tags: , , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Columbia Business School, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Failure, Personal shit, Writing, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  One Comment

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

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 [...]

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

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

A review, a review, my kingdom for a review

Finally, courtesy of Salman Latif at the Book Review blog, a review of Reboot, Second edition.

‘Reboot – in search for the land of opportunity’ is not the sort of book you usually find on stores. Take a quick walk down the shelve-lanes of bookstores and you’d find hundreds of self-help books with success stories [...]

September 27, 2009  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Columbia Business School, Failure, Writing, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  One Comment

Reboot now available on Readers Club, Karachi

For those of you who were waiting to get a copy from your local friendly library, here is the link to the book on the Readers Club site in Karachi. The book is in stock now.

September 25, 2009  Tags: , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Columbia Business School, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Writing, entrepreneurs  No Comments

The Society of Actuaries interview

Sam Philips interview for the Actuary was the first published review received by BSOD/Reboot. Though a little dated, it is still relevant. Sam also talks about the book in a sidebar

September 19, 2009  Tags: , , , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Education, Failure, entrepreneurs  No Comments

The original Blue Screen of Death Launch post

A walk down memory lane, old backup drives and fossilized emails produced this mail shot from early 2006. How’s that for perspective?

At the business school orientation for new arrivals, a fellow student asked me why I was at Columbia. My response drew a look of confusion – “I always wanted to write a [...]

September 19, 2009  Tags: , , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

Reboot on ITLOW and CIO WebStudio

Jehan does a very flattering post (all of it is true) and a great interview on the CIO webstudio covering the book. More pictures of the book (for you Mohtashim) and moa.

September 7, 2009  Tags: , , , , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff  No Comments

The essence of a business plan competition

Professor Grandhi at SP Jain is a new friend who had been after me to share my thoughts about what business plan competition at a business school should look like. The post goes out to him and all other promoters of entrepreneurship who believe that we should catch this generation young. Preferably [...]

March 10, 2009  Tags: ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Education, Failure, entrepreneurs  One Comment

Funding for dummies…four

And finally no financing deal ever goes through without relationships and credibility. Relationships open the door and get you time; credibility gets you to the term sheet. The sooner you build up your stock of these two elements the faster you can get to capital – debt or equity.

January 18, 2009  Tags: , , , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Startup, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  No Comments

Funding for dummies…three

We met Wilson Tan on a trade trip across China. In just over a week, thirty technology companies from the Asia Pacific region covered 3 cities and one hundred Chinese partners, trying to understand the opportunity that was China. Wilson was the President of the organizing body, (the outgoing President of Mercury [...]

January 18, 2009  Tags: , , , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Education, Startup, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  No Comments

Funding for dummies…two

It’s not that money is not available. Or that you can’t raise it. Or that it’s a fairytale that come true for only a select few. Truth is a lot less absolute; there is no black and white, only shades of grey.

Let’s take a look at how and why a 37 year [...]

January 17, 2009  Tags: , , , , ,   Posted in: Blue Screen, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Failure, Startup, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  3 Comments

Funding for dummies…one

You dream, you write, you pitch.

If you put your heart in it and have an idea with merit you collect, build, sell, retire and live happily ever after. You never have to ask, borrow or steal another dime since the millions of dollars you have put aside as a result of your efforts [...]

January 16, 2009  Tags: , , , , ,   Posted in: Alchemy stuff, Blue Screen, Desi Back to Desh, Desi Startup, Education, Failure, PASHA, Startup, entrepreneurs, new ventures, small business  One Comment