This is a summary of Vamshi Reddy's talk at TechSparks Hyderabad, 2013

1. So how does a first time
entrepreneur find success?
Learnings from the Apalya Story
By Vamshi Reddy, Co-founder,
Apalya

2. Entrepreneurship is like the journey that a
caterpillar goes through before becoming a
butterfly

3. It is a long and tough journey, and the only way to
succeed is to persist. Along the way, there will be
a lot of distractions and opportunities. It is up to
the entrepreneur to focus on what he/she started
the venture for.
In Apalya's case, it was about sticking to building
a product company, even if it meant that they had
to forego lucrative services deals.

4. Persistence

5. Vamshi shared that
he would often stay in
places like Gurgaon, in
hopes of getting to
speak to a potential
clients. He says,
“Acquiring customers
is very difficult. Do
whatever it takes to
get them, even if it
means standing at
their doorsteps.”

6. Sometimes,
investors might not
align with your
business and might
reject you. Don't be
bogged down by
these rejection. You
must go on.

7. In the process, an
entrepreneur must be
ready to go without a
salary for a long time.
While doing so, don't
pity yourself for it.
Vamshi says, “After all,
you are working for
yourself. Even today, I
take a much lesser
salary than what some
of my senior managers
take at the company.”

8. Prudence

9. Vamshi believes that prudence is another key to
success for an entrepreneur.
He says, “You need money to grow. For someone to
put money into your venture, he/she needs to see
value in it.”
“Even if someone puts 1000 Rs in your business,
remember to provide as much value to that person.
To provide that, you must be absolutely prudent.”
“Be as lean as you can be and count every penny
that you're spending.”

10. Don't be scared of failures; You
will learn

11. Vamshi shared that they had underestimated the
time that it would take for market to be ready for
their product. They faced a lot of problems.
However, Vamshi is glad that they had to go
through this time.
He says, “If you don't hit a low, you will never
know how to run a business. That period really
stretched us, but we learned a lot about the space
that we were in and were better prepared the next
time round.”

12. The last man standing,
wins.
“Right now, we're
trying to build a
product that is going
to be the NetFlix of
India. Lots of
challenges, but we
are going to to do it.”
“A lot of people are
trying to do it, but we
will persist.”

13. When asked if he
could go back in
time, what would
he change,
Vamshi said,
“Only thing I
would change is
start about 15
years earlier, as
soon as I came
out of college.”
#respect.