VCCircle

yeah its so true. i am myself an entrepreneur and started almost 4 sites till now, mostly content based. we are for the first time going for a service model.. hotel reservations in jaipur. lets hope it works out well!!

suvir and others have made a good point on what is constricting internet businesses in India. But nothing new.I have heard the very same data points or grouses as far back as 1998/1999 when IMRB and Frost n Sullivan etc came out with with the first set of reports on internet/ecommerce etc.

The same points are still grouse points a decade later.So really nothing has changed. Except the odd baazee, naukri,infoworld.Railways (IRCTC and Airtravel being the internet 'lifeline' has nothing to do with the internet as such.These sectors have always been there one for over a hundred years and the other over 60 years. Both serve a social need. Internet applied to travel only has worked because the industry structure of these two mass transportation systems changed viz capacity build up greater then peak demand, leading to competitive pressures to maximise yield per seat.Internet (one great cost effective channel)allowed that to happen instantly. All Happy! Co, customer, internet bloke, etc.

So if there was one GREYHOUNF equivalent in India run by Govt or NATIONAL Bus Coor whoever, and they ran a branded service (like the Volvo service between some cities in India, but fragemented still)with a contigous CRIS/Sabre equivalent booking system, then internet could help there.Naukri and baazee being the exceptions.The internet in these cases beame the default booking system - but they are not as mass social need as say mass travel, tax/voter registration etc

So social need by itself is not a money spinner.It is a precondition. industry srtuctures are the key. (Someone should re read Porters first Book Competitive Strategy..there could be tips there on primal conditions for changing industry structure and how to trend spot)

Given that even after a decade, the prices of computers still remain out of reach for most Indians (There are just about 70 million PCs in India, PCs with Internet connection would be even smaller in number!).
In all probability, the adoption of internet in India will be driven through mobiles. For may Indians, the first internet access point will be the mobile handset. We have about 300 million mobile users in India which is about 20 times the active internet users. However, the problem is more than 50% of them have a basic handset which is not GPRS enabled.
The internet companies and the mobile handset manufacturers can together open a huge potential market if they can work out ways of expanding the internet accessing population (INternet portals bundling some internet application with handsets for a fee given to the manufacturer to bring down the cost of internet enabled handsets etc). Also, the introduction of 3G in India will (hopefully) help make mobile internet access easy and fast.

"Komli is helping Indian advertisers advertise across a list of online publishers that would otherwise not be accessible to them"

Suvir - Google, YPN, Ads.com, ValueClick, TribalFusion, BlueLithium, CPX interactive has been doing this for ages. And all these networks are in India.

Komli and all other Indian AdNetworks are the Minglebox of the Adnetwork business.

The views you have presented definitely showcase the need of the hour and catering to the masses on a broader level but at the same time it needs to serve the consumers with the cost and time effective solutions which addresses the core day to day problems.

I would like to ask . How many Social
networking websites have actually made money??

If so how would they make money in India??

Suvir's has proposed quite a alternative opportunity in the internet space. DimDim looks to be a great concept usefull to internet users in the business space hugely. Komli has a naive site and still needs to put focus words on their site rather than saying that "we are different"

There is a lot to learn from the online success of Indian railways. Never club IRCTC with other air travel / matrimonial / bus / pizza portals because it complements a highly organized, reliable, low cost, time tested base service that is the Indian railways. Some other salient points -

- It serves even those who live with under a $ a day. For roughly the cost of a pizza, you can travel upto 300 kilometers with a sleeper comfort and toilet access. Compare this with a rip-off air ticket or even a movie ticket and you know why masses don’t flock! And, And nobody gouges you Rs.50/- for 100 gms. of pop corn just because you happened to be inside a train!

- The only PITA about railways has been the crowded booking counters and long waits and IRCTC clearly addressed this issue. Now with air travel getting costlier, even business travelers take to railways en masse.

- It does not call for buying high cost hardware. Just sneak in and out of a cyber café for roughly for a half hour (costs just Rs.10/-) and you are done. This is an essential service unlike a movie that you go only when you find time.

- Bus travel can never be equated to railways. The multitude of operators with indifferent attitude towards consumers can hardly be compared to the efficient railways. Then you get the sleeper comfort and toilet access.

So what are the learnings?

If Internet has to be a success in India, it has to drive mass adoption.

The base service has to be so reliable and efficient.

Power tariff can't be so high if you want consumers to spend more time online. Bring them down or make hardware that guzzle less power.

It will have to be run on low cost hardware that doesn’t suck up battery power either.

Broadband speed will have to improve significantly if you want customers to stick. You can’t expect all users to be patient enough and wait for the download to complete.

Finally broadband should be FREE – remember radio? Broadband service providers will have to make money from marketers that use the pipes. There is absolutely no justification why consumers should pay for broadband that is not much different from air that we breath, so far as online apps are concerned.