MIT Sloan students sold on Indian start-ups

It was only a couple of months ago that students from IIMs and other top B-schools favoured testing uncertain waters with start-ups during their summer placements this year.

Now, it is the turn of their counterparts from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Sloan school of Management in the US who have decided to gain hands-on experience with start-ups in India.

Under the school's Global Entrepreneurship Laboratory (G-Lab) programme "� where teams of management, engineering and science students across theinstitute work closely with top management of international startups in solving real-world problems "� , 20 students were selected to work at five start-ups located in Mumbai, Bangalore and Rajasthan.

Five teams of four students each were deputed to work at start-ups including IDG Ventures India, Adea International, Desipower, SunTec and Aqua-Aero Watersystems.

The students say they wanted to experience what working in a fast-emerging economy was all about.

For the group working with IDG ventures, which manages a venture capital fund of $150 million focused on investing in early-stage companies in technology-related sectors, work consisted of building an investment strategy for sectors like enterprise security software and wireless and internet services.

At Adea International, the challenge before the students lay in formulating a growth strategy, an investment profile as well as a global expansion plan while at Aqua-Aero Watersystems, a company based in the Netherlands, the students were asked to develop a micro-finance tool to facilitate the company's plans to introduce a water pyramid in the deserts in Rajasthan.

Along with being involved at the highest level of decision making, the students even travelled to competing countries to understand prevailing market conditions.

"The members of the team travelled to China and India for collecting relevant data, meeting industry leaders and business partners between October last year to early February this year. They did a detailedanalysis of the global market for talent sourcing, and recommended that Adea should invest in China and set up a development centre in the nextsix months. They also recommended a growth strategy in China by acquisition and business," said Shouvik Bhattacharyya, CEO of Adea International.

The companies took the lead in being accounted for all costs including airfare, lodging, and other expenses.

Manik Arora, Co-Founder and Managing Director at IDG Ventures India and an MIT Sloan alumnus who hosted four students credits his career as a venture capitalist to his experiences at G-Lab and took it up for doing his bit for his alma mater.

Ploypailin Mahidol Jensen, a concert pianist and lead television actress,who is one of the students who worked with IDG Ventures says she did not want to miss the chance to witness economic dynamism.

"I wanted to gain experience in the venture capital industry to get a better understanding of what was driving growth in the region in order to take the learnings back to my native Thailand."

Interestingly, most of them are now looking at possibilities of working in India during their final placements.