Category Archives: entrepreneurship

topic on starting business and surviving as an entrepreneur in Nepal

Don’t want to see Nepalis dying of cold in winter?

change, entrepreneurship, thought provoking

(This article is based on a chiya pasal talk with Anil Chitrakar dai, who inspires many!)

Don’t want to see Nepalis in Terai dying of cold in winter again? 2 things.
First, lets agree that people don’t die because of cold. People die because they didn’t have enough to wear or eat. [Otherwise we would have no Sherpas living in the mountains, right? :) ]

Second, how to get enough to eat and wear. Build 2 railway links :)

1) Build a railway link between Ayodhya in India and Janakpur in Nepal ( link birthplace of Ram’ with Sita)

&
2) Build a railway link between Lumbini in Nepal and Kushinagar in India (link Gautam Buddha’s birthplace with his death)?

Why? how?
1) Build Railway link between Janakpur in Nepal and Ayodhya in India
Connect popular Hindu god Ram’s Birthplace, Ayodhya with his wife Goddess Sita’s Birthplace, Janakpur and you have a perfect holy pilgrimage destination. People from the newly affluent India (and even Bihar now because of its double-digit growth) will visit and create opportunities for locals in Eastern Terai.

2)  Build Railway link between Lumbini in Nepal and Kushinagar in India
Connect Lord Buddha’s birthplace to the place he died. A billion Buddhists would go on a pilgrimage to experience this before they die.

To close: And as more travelers from India and abroad, travel to these two historic places in Nepal and create opportunities for hundreds of thousands, I doubt we will hear of poor Nepalis dying of cold (just because they didn’t have enough to wear or eat).

Nepal will not prosper just on the basis of grand philosophies and grand ideas but I rather on a simple entrepreneurial ideas and persistent actions that take advantage of our history, our strengths, our diversity and our simple wish to co-exist with our neighbors. Lets focus on creating prosperity, instead of debating and creating yet more and more philosophies of ideal rules or ideal existence. Will you ?

10 crazy reasons to start your business in Nepal now

entrepreneurship

Here are my 10 reasons for you to start a business in Nepal now.

  1. Overwhelming majority of educated people opt for a non-profit or government or private sector ‘jobs’. (leaving the race wide open for you- less competition). Go and start a company and attract all those smart people  to actually work for you.
  2. There are crisis all around (electricity, water, fuel, communication, inflation). Remember crisis is an opportunity for an entrepreneur, and for you to become a multi-millionaire while serving fellow Nepali and beyond.
  3. High unemployment rates means you can build a team around motivated youths who are desperately looking to stay employed. Plus, you get their goodwill and hopefully loyalty to build a sustainable company in the long run.
  4. Rest of Nepal is still beautiful and now awaits you, thanks to everyone moving to big cities like Kathmandu. Go back and build an opportunity in the forgotten rural areas while making an impact there.
  5. Youths are leaving to work abroad,(1500 a day in 2014), which means less competition for you.
  6. Workers abroad (2.5 million or more) send back more than US $5 Billion a year (2014). Find out how to do a good business catering to them and their families. The market for the poor is huge! Serve these billion dollar customers!
  7. Win business from customers by showing your consistently delivering track record and honest intentions! Many of your competitors might be taking the short-cut to success by using corruption. Take advantage of this unique situation. Learn that they can never compete against you in terms of transparency, honesty (and probably quality also). If your corrupt rivals try to out- maneuver you, challenge them to open their accounts, and get the sensation hungry media on them or the government watchdogs to inspect them! For example, open a good hygienic ‘gudpak’ or sweets shops to out-compete with corrupt, shady ones that exist today. I bet, you could win! )
  8. We are fast becoming a consumer driven nation. We buy a lot and throw away a lot. From cloths to recycling there is opportunity. Why do you think there are 1000’s of families dedicated to recycling our trash? Why do you think shops after shops are opening in Malls? Serve our consumer driven nation with quality, affordable price and superior customer service!
  9. Industries built right after civil strife or wars can last for a long time as proved by the industries that opened after the Second World War in much of Europe and US. So start now when there is less competition.
  10. No one cares. The old system is crumbling and there is no more of the strict societal and political bias against entrepreneurship. “Making profit is good” mentality is on the rise. Time to quietly rise and shine !
You have a choice right now: Either make your own dreams come true or “you will be hired to make some-one else’s dream come true.”
Thank you to Prasanna Dhungel for edits.

 

Key to your success as an entrepreneur – A Strong Team

entrepreneurship, guestpost

We have written in our previous articles that a problem is an opportunity for a new business. The bigger the problem, and the more people have the same problem, the bigger the opportunity. We will go into detail on executing on a big problem that you have identified. We will specifically focus on importance of the right execution team and board of advisers.

Many of us have hiked up to the beautiful Himalayan regions in Nepal. Ujwal has written about his experiences of hiking to Annapurna Base Camp. One problem that he identified is the difficulty of getting a hotel room in villages along the Annapurna trail. Prasanna experienced the same problem when he hiked up to Everest Base Camp. There are a limited number of hotels on the trials. To get a hotel room, you have to get there early. If you walk slow (which is highly recommended in high altitude), you may not get a room at all during peak tourist season. You may have to sleep on the sheds or sometimes in the cold outside. If you are a Nepali, the lodge owner may give a non-Nepali a room over you although you maybe able to pay a lot more. The concept of booking is almost non-existent here and this can make the trekking experience unpleasant.

This problem could be solved by a Continue reading Key to your success as an entrepreneur – A Strong Team →

How do Entrepreneurs transform Nepal?

entrepreneurs, entrepreneurship

नेपालीमा 

An Entrepreneur creates opportunities not just for him/her but more importantly for others. In Nepal, this is even more important as we have a high number of unemployed Nepalis and dignified opportunities are limited to a privileged few.

There is an ongoing joke in Nepal, that if we produce a politician, we destroy 100 jobs. But if we create an entrepreneur, we create 100 jobs. On a serious note, this is why many youths should turn to entrepreneurship as the engine of their personal, professional and soulful growth. We need not look far to realize how entrepreneurship has transformed our neighbors, China and India. A responsible government at this time in Nepal, would bet on producing and helping more entrepreneurs than on anything else.

Here are few ways Entrepreneurs will transform Nepal…

Entrepreneurs solve problems in Nepal

We hear of so many problems in Nepal. Listen to news, and you will hear problems left and right. Entrepreneurs view these problems as opportunities and solve problems for all of us to have a nicer life in Nepal. In the process of solving problems, they create jobs and positivism and efficiency in the economy. Today, many have become dependent on foreign aid and the government to solve our problems. Entrepreneurs don’t wait and will not wait for others to solve problems. They grab the opportunity, try to solve it and find a sustainable way to do this (business). Imagine a future in which each Nepali is hungry for problems and jumps to solve every problem in our society and makes a business out of it. We could become a very different society.

Entrepreneurs create jobs that benefit low-income families in Nepal

As an entrepreneur, you may help a struggling Nepali family directly, lifting them from poverty simply by creating ‘jobs’. The employment you generate and the salary you pay , helps towards improving the local economy, i.e small shops, farmers, schools, groceries and local towns. You help the local eco-system by the wealth you generate for others. This in turn helps generate a positive cycle of employment. You help continue this positive cycle of growth even as a small entrepreneur.

Entrepreneurs creates platforms/ecosystems in Nepal

As an entrepreneur, you will be creating not just one small business but over the course of time build it into a platform, an eco-system so that others can build their own businesses around yours. Thamel became Thamel when businesses started to bloom, servicing around one Hotel, Kathmandu Guest house.

So you will be helping create opportunities for others too, by creating this as a by-product of building their ventures. As a result of an entrepreneur, an industry of like-minded entrepreneurs came into being. Do not under-estimate the power of entrepreneurship to change the world.

Entrepreneurs raise dignity of Nepalis

When we get the opportunity to work in our own country, utilizing materials and human power here and export them, not having to leave our place to work in far away lands, it makes us dignified. It raises our family’s self-esteem, our children’s self-esteem. Entrepreneurs create dignified jobs and dignified professionals as their employees. Entrepreneurship is not about exploiting people. It is about empowering people so that they help run their business better. Hari Bhakta Sharma has scaled his pharmaceuticals company – Deurali Janata – by successfully providing dignified employment and opportunity to work in a place which makes life-saving medicines at affordable prices for the poor.

Entrepreneurs remove the gap between rich and poor in Nepal

A strange statement? Well many confuse entrepreneurs with traditional traders, monopolistic business houses or even evil rich people. Till now in Nepal, the power and wealth has been restricted to a few traditional elites. They earn their wealth, not by competing fairly but rather by abusing their power, access, status and restricting other Nepalis wish to becoming an entrepreneur. They stifle innovation, growth and encourage practices that benefit just themselves. So they are not entrepreneurs. In-fact, when entrepreneurs come into the equation, they in-fact break monopolies and barriers created by these traditional power elites. The fact that entrepreneurs can come from any background, ethnic groups, age, status is powerful way to transform society from status-quo to progress.

For economic equality and prosperity in Nepal, we need not more politicians or job seekers but more entrepreneurs who rise from obscurity, cutting across ethnic groups, economic past, castes and age. In other words, that entrepreneur could be you. If we are looking for the profound changes we want to see here, help yourself become an Entrepreneur. Take the example of Rudra Pandey, the founder of D2Hawkeye. He comes from a simple humble background in remote Nepal, rose through sheer hard work and ambition, started and grew D2Hawkeye into a powerhouse. He grew the firm to a global healthcare analytics firm and helped put Nepal on the map of world-class companies. Many Nepalese have taken inspiration from him and are trying entrepreneurship in Nepal and outside in their own ways.

Entrepreneurs creates positive cultures

“Yes we can”- This is the feeling that prosperity brought by Entrepreneurship evokes. It improves the self-confidence of all Nepalis. With this positive attitude, it helps replace the current “blame-game” culture of “yestai ho”, “ke garne” attitude in which we are stuck and can no longer create a win-win situation in villages and towns across Nepal. It helps usher us towards a fair meritocratic culture in which every Nepali, irrespective of background, gains the attitude – ‘yes, I can meet my dreams.’

Positive culture in Nepal is essential if we want to create an economically equal, fair, accountable, responsible society. And as an entrepreneur, you will be helping us make this faster than any other professional. Prithivi Pande, current CEO of Nepal Investment Bank, was responsible for creating a positive culture trend in the Banking sector. Many of the current heads of Financial institutions in Nepal have worked with him and followed his lead to be successful bankers themselves.

So how will YOU benefit as an entrepreneur in Nepal?

1) A dignified status

Nepal has changed. Now your peers, your followers and many Nepalis will regard an entrepreneur as a leader. And some will even think of you as a visionary. They will read about you, hear about you and follow your steps. You will be inspiring the next generation of Nepalis to become creative entrepreneurs and help create great entrepreneurial centers right here in Nepal like the Silicon Valley in the United States. Entrepreneurs like Anil Chitrakar, Karna Shakya, Ambika Shrestha, Min Bahadur Gurung are respected, admired and thanked for the opportunities they have created in Nepal.

2) A comfortable life

In Nepal, an entrepreneur’s life is much more comfortable as your ability to succeed is higher because there is less competition here. Once you are successful, you carry great leverage. As an entrepreneur, you can leverage your success to have access to more opportunities to work on a bigger level, may it be with the government or on bigger lucrative projects.

3) A satisfying life

The satisfaction of having helped many will be extremely gratifying for your soul. In Nepal, you can actually see your effects directly. Leading an honest life as an entrepreneur and providing for others – what a satisfying way to live here than in the already developed country where your impact may be minimal compared to here. How best to help others – by innovating a fishing industry, not just teaching how to fish, or worse just giving them fish.

4) Live your life

As an entrepreneur, you can live your life passionately, not your parent’s life, or your friend’s or your spouse’s, but yours. I believe this is one of the best ways to live where you decide on your path. In other words, you lead a passionate life. As an entrepreneur, I have enough time and energy to follow my different passions in life, to experiment on projects and to mentor others. It allows me to make time for myself and my family while finding ways to serve the society better.

 

by Prasanna Dhungel and Ujwal Thapa. This is a series of articles on transforming Nepal through entrepreneurship. Stay updated in this website for more articles.