This article is contributed by Sachi
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Sabeer Bhatia

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I am sure - if you have been listening to the news with apt attention during the late 1997 or early 1998, you would not have missed the news of Microsoft taking over HoTMaiL. In this article I give a brief introduction of the co-founder of the HoTMaiL. The co-founder of the now famous HoTMaiL is none other than our very own Bangalore lad - Sabeer Bhatia.

Sabeer was born in 1969 at Chandigarh to Balev Bhatia & Daman Bhatia. Balev Bhatia served the Indian Ministry of Defence while his mother Daman Bhatia worked as a senior official at a State Bank.

Schooling:

His parents placed great value on education. Sabeer grew up in Bangalore and had his early education at Bishops Cotton's School in Pune, and then at St. Joseph's Boy's High School in Bangalore. He did his Pre-University in St. Joseph's College Bangalore.

Some of the memorable incidents during his school life are here - "On parent-teacher days they would just say 'Sir, why did you come? You don't have to come! We tell Sabeer to solve the questions on the blackboard for us,'" says Bhatia senior. Once, Sabeer came home crying after an exam. He had not done badly; he just hadn't had time to write down everything he knew.

He started his undergraduate education at the Birla Institute of Technology & Science (BITS), Pilani. In 1988 Sabeer won a full scholarship to the California Institute of Technology (Cal Tech), in Pasadena. After graduating from Caltech, Sabeer went to Stanford to pursue his MS in Electrical Engineering. At Stanford, he worked on Ultra Low Power VLSI Design.

Career:

At Stanford, he was inspired by entrepreneurs such as Steve Jobs and Scott McNealy eventually deciding to become one himself. Instead pursuing a PhD after his Masters, he decided to join Apple computers.

Sabeer briefly worked for Apple Computers as a hardware engineer -he lasted nine months there, after that he joined a start up company called Firepower Systems Inc, where he spent two years.

The new dawn:

In his cubicle, he read about young men starting up for peanuts and selling out for millions. Sabeer pondered what the Net could do for him, and what he could do for the Net. Then he had an idea.

It was called Javasoft - a way of using the Web to create a personal database where surfers could keep schedules, to-do lists, family photos and so on. Bhatia showed the plan to Jack Smith, an Apple colleague and they got started. One evening Smith called Bhatia with an intriguing notion. Why not add e-mail to Javasoft? It was a small leap with revolutionary consequences: access to e-mail from any computer, anywhere on the planet. This was that rare thing, an idea so simple, so obvious; it was hard to believe no one had thought of it before. Bhatia saw the potential and panicked that someone would steal the idea. He sat up all night writing the business plan. "Then we wrote down all variations of mail - Speedmail, Hypermail, Supermail." Ho TMaiL made perfect sense: it included the letters " HTML" - the programming language used to write Web pages. A brand name was born.

In order to attract attention, the e-mail service was provided for free and revenue was obtained through the advertising on the website. Bhatia had $6,000 to his name. It was time to find investors. By the time he reached the offices of venture capitalists Draper Fisher Jurvetson, 19 doors had slammed behind him. Steve Jurvetson and his colleagues quickly saw the potential and put up $300,000. Bhatia and Smith stretched the money all the way to launch day, July 4, 1996. By year-end they were greeting their millionth customer. When Microsoft came knocking, 12 months later, they'd signed up nearly 10 million users.

Selling HoTMaiL to MS (Microsoft):

But what were 10 million subscribers worth? Was it $160 million as Microsoft said? More? Less? Sabeer polled his investors. Doug Carlisle, whose firm Menlo Ventures had pumped $1 million into Hotmail, guessed $200 million. Sabeer chided him for giving the lowest estimate and joked that he might hold out for a billion. Carlisle promised that if Sabeer made $200 million he would erect a life-size, bronze statue of him in Menlo Ventures' foyer.

Sabeer didn't know how to sell a company. But he did know how to buy onions. "In India you've got to negotiate for everything," he says. "Even buying vegetables, you've got to negotiate." When the bargaining started, Sabeer felt right at home. "They came in low with $160 million, so I came in at $700 million! And when they said: 'That's ridiculous! Are you out of your mind,' I knew it was just a ploy."

Sabeer wouldn't budge, and Microsoft's representatives kept walking out, or rather storming. And shouting and swearing and hurling insults. But the Hotmail team had been warned of Microsoft's tactics. "It was like a record being played," says Jurvetson, "which we thought was pretty funny. It gave us a real sense of strength." During the negotiations, he had bumped into a British backpacker in Prague. Sabeer asked him how he kept in touch with family and friends - Hotmail, of course. Sabeer went back and told Microsoft: "If that is the brand we have built in one and a half years, imagine what it will be in 20 years. Hotmail will easily be bigger than McDonald's."

At $200 million, Doug Carlisle started looking for a sculptor. At $350 million, Hotmail's investors agreed: Sell. Sabeer returned to the table, alone, and once more said: "No." The contract was inked on Dec. 30, 1997, Sabeer's 29th birthday. The price: some three million Microsoft shares - worth $400 million at the time and twice that now. Today Hotmail users are signing up at the rate of 250,000 a day, and the firm is valued at some $6 billion. "I'm pretty sure Sabeer and Jack regret selling," says Jurvetson. "Who knows what might have been?" Sabeer shrugs: "When we sold, it was considered an outrageous amount. In hindsight, yes, we sold too low. But I don't regret it because at that time it was considered a great deal."

After the Sale (New day!!!):

After selling Hotmail, Sabeer worked at Microsoft for about a year and in April 1999, he left the company to start another website, Arzoo Inc, which was shut down when the dot-com bubble burst. In 2006, he re-launched Arzoo as a travel portal.

He started a new website trying to capitalise on the emerging blogosphere - BlogEverywhere with co-founders Shiraz Kanga and Viraf Zack.

He also pushed for a project enabling access to the internet through cable television in Indian homes. However, due to bureaucratic problems it is very unlikely that this will reach completion.

Further future plans of his include the development of a new city in India by the name of Nano city. The aim of Nanocity is to replicate the vibrance and eco-system of innovation found in the Silicon Valley.

Recognition:

Sabeer's success has earned him widespread acclaim;

1. The venture capital firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson named him 'Entrepreneur of the Year 1997',

2. MIT chose him as one of 100 young innovators who are expected to have the greatest impact on technology and awarded 'TR100',

3. San Jose Mercury News and POV magazine selected him as one of the ten most successful entrepreneurs of 1998 and

4. Upside magazine's list of top trendsetters in the New Economy named him 'Elite 100'.

5. Named by TIME as one of the "People to Watch" in International Business (2002)

Src:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabeer_Bhatia

http://www.pathfinder.com/asiaweek/technology/990625/bhatia.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1402270.stm

http://www.webindia123.com/personal/abroad/sabeer.htm

http://www.indobase.com/indians-abroad/sabeer-bhatia.html

http://www.engology.com/eng5bhatia.htm

Sir Richard Branson

This article is about one of the most daring personalities in the corporate world. This has been contributed by Sachi

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Sir Richard Branson

Sir Richard Branson is the founder and chairman of Virgin group, a highly diversified business conglumerate. Down in this article I wish to present a brief biographical sketch of this maverick and unconventional business icon.

Sir Richard Branson is a flamboyant British entrepreneur with a seemingly insatiable appetite for starting new business. His internationally recognized brand "Virgin" is splashed across everything from credit cards to airlines to music "mega stores". Branson continuously seeks new business opportunities and loves a good challenge, especially when he enters a market that is dominated by few major players.

Sir Richard Branson was born on 18 July 1950, Shamley Green, Surrey, England.Branson was educated at Scaitcliffe School (now Bishopsgate School) until the age of 13. He then attended Stowe School until he was 15. Branson has dyslexia, resulting in his not having been a good student. He was the captain of football and cricket teams, and by the age of 15 he had started two ventures that eventually failed: one growing Christmas trees and another raising budgerigars.

Sir Richars's talents began to show themselves during his later school days. Seeing the energy of student activism in the late 60s, he decided to start his own newspaper. not particularly unusual, except his paper was intended to tie many schools together. It would be focused on the student and not on the schools. It would sell advertising to big business and feature articles by members of Parliament, rock stars and movie celebrities. That was the business plan of the 17 year old - Richard Branson put together with his friend, Jonny Gems. The rest is history. The head master of Stowe, where Richard and Jonny were students wrote: "Congratulations, Branson. I predict you will either go to prison or become a millionaire".

When he was 17, he opened his first charity, the "Student Valley Centre". Branson started his first record business after he travelled across the English Channel and purchased crates of "cut-out" records from a record discounter. He sold the records out of the boot of his car to retail outlets in London. The name 'Virgin' was a selling point because records were sold in a new condition.Branson eventually started a record shop in Oxford Street in London and, shortly after, launched the record label Virgin Records with Nik Powell. Branson had earned enough money from his record store to buy a country estate, in which he installed a recording studio. He leased out studio time to fledgling artists, including multi-instrumentalist Mike Oldfield.

Virgin Atlantic Airways, started in 1984, is now the second largest British long haul international airline and operates a fleet of Boeing 747 air crafts to New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Orlando, Boston, San Francisco, Washington, Dallas, and Tokyo.In 1992, the Virgin Music Group -- record labels, music publishing and recording studios -- was sold to Thorn EMI in a $1 billion US deal, to keep his airline company afloat.The airline was founded on the concept of offering competitive and high quality first class and economy services. The airline holds many major airline awards and recently earned "Airline of the Year Award" for the third consecutive year.

In 1997, Branson took what many saw as being one of his riskier business exploits by entering into the railway business. Virgin Trains won the franchises for the former Intercity West Coast and Cross-Country sectors of British Rail. Launched with the usual Branson fanfare with promises of new high-tech tilting trains and enhanced levels of service, Virgin Trains soon ran into problems with the aging rolling stock and crumbling infrastructure it had inherited from British Rail. The company's reputation was almost irreversibly damaged in the late 1990s as it struggled to make trains reliably run on time while it awaited the modernisation of the West Coast Main Line, and the arrival of new rolling stock.

Virgin has acquired European short-haul airline Euro Belgian Airlines, renaming it Virgin Express, and subsequently merging it with SN Brussels. It also started a national airline based in Nigeria, called Virgin Nigeria. Another airline, Virgin America, is set to launch out of San Francisco International Airport in 2007. Branson has also developed a Virgin Cola brand, but is now retreating only to the UK market, and even a Virgin Vodka brand, which has not been a very successful enterprise. As a consequence of these lacklustre performers and perceived obscure accounting practices, the satirical British fortnightly magazine Private Eye has been critical of Branson and his companies

On September 25, 2004 Branson announced the signing of a deal under which a new space tourism company, Virgin Galactic, will license the technology behind Spaceship One to take paying passengers into suborbital space. The group plans to make flights available to the public by late 2009 with tickets priced at $200,000. The deal was mostly financed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and the American aeronautical engineer and visionary Burt Rutan.

Branson's next venture with the Virgin group is Virgin Fuel, which is set to respond to global warming and exploit the recent spike in fuel costs by offering a revolutionary, cheaper fuel for automobiles and, in the near future, aircraft. Branson has stated that he was formerly a global warming skeptic and was influenced in his decision by a breakfast meeting with Al Gore.

Branson has been tagged as a "transformational leader" in the management lexicon, with his maverick strategies and his stress on the Virgin Group as an organization driven on informality and information, one that is bottom-heavy rather than strangled by top-level management.

In addition to his own business activities, Richard is a trustee of several charities including the Virgin Health Care Foundation, a leading health care charity which is responsible for the launch of health education campaign relating to AIDS. The foundation has also become involved in a lobbying campaign called Parents Against Tobacco, which aims to restrict tobacco advertising and sponsorship in sports.

Branson also launched the Virgin Health Bank on 1 February 2007, offering parents-to-be the opportunity of storing their baby's umbilical cord blood stem cells in private and public stem cell banks after their baby's birth.

On 9 February 2007, Richard Branson committed to a $25 million prize for a practical plan to reduce greenhouse gases and global warming. Branson will judge the contest along with 5 other environmental campaigners, such as Tim Flannery and Al Gore. The entrant must present a project unlike technologies being currently developed.

He is one of Britain's best-known entrepreneur who combines his enthusiasm for running the Virgin group of companies with his love for high-risk, high advantage world record breaking attempts

Richard Branson has been involved in a number of world record-breaking attempts since 1985. In 1986 his boat, "Virgin Atlantic Challenger II" rekindled the spirit of the Blue Riband by crossing the Atlantic Ocean in the fastest ever recorded time. This was followed a year later by the epic hot air balloon crossing of the same ocean in "Virgin Atlantic Flyer". This was not only the first hot-air balloon to cross the Atlantic, but was the largest ever flown at 2.3 million cubic feet capacity, reaching speeds in excess of 130 miles per hour (209 km/h).

In January 1991 Richard crossed the Pacific Ocean from Japan to Arctic Canada, the furthest distance of 6,700 miles. Again, he broke all existing records, with speeds of up to 245 miles per hour in a balloon of 2.6 million cubic feet.

Between 1995 and 1998 Richard Branson, Per Lindstrand and Steve Fossett, made a number of attempts to circumnavigate the globe by balloon. In late 1998 they made a record-breaking flight from Morocco to Hawaii but were unable to complete a global flight before Bertrand Piccard and Brian Jones in Breitling Orbiter achieved the first circumnavigation in March 1999.

Richard received his knighthood for his service to entrepreneurship in 1999.He lives in London and Oxfordshire, UK and is married to Joan, has two children - Sam Branson and Holly Branson.

Dr Manmohan Singh

This article is about the present Prime Minister of India: Dr Manmohan Singh.

This has been contributed by Sachi

A story from humble beginnings
The country's present Prime Minister - Dr Manmohan Singh, a man of high moral standing and accomplishment.
Dr Singh was born on September 26, 1932, to his parents Gurmukh Singh and Amrit Kaur at Gah, a small hamlet in Pakistan. At the dawn of Independent India in 1947, Manmohan Singh, aged 13, displaced by the partition, came to live with his parents in Amritsar, India.

Education
Dr Singh has been noted for his academic accomplishments. He is in fact the most qualified Prime Minister India has ever received since independence. Here are some highlights of his academic career:

• Stood first in BA (Hons), Economics, Panjab University, Chandigarh, 1952;
• stood first in MA (Economics), Panjab University, Chandigarh, 1954;
• Wright's Prize for distinguished performance at St John's College, Cambridge, 1955 and 1957;
• Wrenbury scholar, University of Cambridge, 1957;
• DPhil (Oxford), DLitt (Honoris Causa);
• PhD thesis on India's export competitiveness

Occupation

Dr Singh has served the nation in various capacities. From a humble beginning with his grit and patience has achieved a lot. He has a wide array of experience. Here is a small career map, of our Prime Minister.

He started off with a academic career i.e. teaching as a profession:

He served in the following capacities as teacher (Senior lecturer, Economics, 1957-59; Reader, Economics, 1959-63; Professor, Economics, Panjab University, Chandigarh, 1963-65; Professor, International Trade, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, 1969-71; Honorary professor, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, 1976 and off late even Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, 1996) and Civil Servant

Positions

Dr Singh has held a lot of distinguished posts in his life here is a lift of these:

• 1971-72: Economic advisor, ministry of foreign trade
• 1972-76: Chief economic advisor, ministry of finance
• 1976-80: Director, Reserve Bank of India; Director, Industrial Development Bank of India; Alternate governor for India, Board of governors, Asian Development Bank; Alternate governor for India, Board of governors, IBRD
• November 1976 - April 1980: Secretary, ministry of finance (department of economic affairs); Member, finance, Atomic Energy Commission; Member, finance, Space Commission
• April 1980 - September 15, 1982 : Member-secretary, Planning Commission
• 1980-83: Chairman, India Committee of the Indo-Japan joint study committee
• September 16, 1982 - January 14, 1985: Governor, Reserve Bank of India
• 1982-85: Alternate Governor for India, Board of governors, International Monetary Fund
• 1983-84: Member, economic advisory council to the Prime Minister
• 1985: President, Indian Economic Association
• January 15, 1985 - July 31, 1987: Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission
• August 1, 1987 - November 10, 1990: Secretary-general and commissioner, south commission, Geneva
• December 10, 1990 - March 14, 1991: Advisor to the Prime Minister on economic affairs
• March 15, 1991 - June 20, 1991: Chairman, UGC
• June 21, 1991 - May 15, 1996: Union finance minister
• October 1991: Elected to Rajya Sabha from Assam on Congress ticket June 1995: Re-elected to Rajya Sabha
• 1996 onwards: Member, Consultative Committee for the ministry of finance
• August 1, 1996 - December 4, 1997: Chairman, Parliamentary standing committee on commerce
• March 21, 1998 onwards: Leader of the Opposition, Rajya Sabha
• June 5, 1998 onwards: Member, committee on finance August 13, 1998 onwards: Member, committee on rules Aug 1998-2001: Member, committee of privileges 2000 onwards: Member, executive committee, Indian parliamentary group June 2001: Re-elected to Rajya Sabha
• Aug 2001 onwards: Member, general purposes committee

Other accomplishments

• Adam Smith Prize, University of Cambridge, 1956
• Padma Vibhushan, 1987
• Euromoney Award, Finance Minister of the Year, 1993
• Asiamoney Award, Finance Minister of the Year for Asia, 1993 and 1994

International assignments

• 1966: Economic Affairs Officer
• 1966-69: Chief, financing for trade section, UNCTAD
• 1972-74: Deputy for India in IMF Committee of Twenty on International Monetary Reform
• 1977-79: Indian delegation to Aid-India Consortium Meetings
• 1980-82: Indo-Soviet joint planning group meeting
• 1982: Indo-Soviet monitoring group meeting
• 1993: Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting Cyprus
• 1993: Human Rights World Conference, Vienna

Economic reforms and ascent to power

One of the more non-political faces of Indian politics, Dr Manmohan Singh is best known as the "liberator" of Indian economy. As the Union Finance Minister in the Narasimha Rao government (1991-96), he liberalized the economy to put India on the path of globalization.
Singh served as the governor of the Reserve Bank of India in the late 1980s, and was elevated to finance minister in 1991 by Prime Minister Narasimha Rao.
Dr. Singh is widely regarded as the architect of India's original economic reform programme which was enacted in 1991 under Rao's administration. The economic liberalization package pushed by Singh and Rao opened the nation to foreign direct investment and reduced the red tape that had previously impeded business growth.

Opposition and 2004 election

Dr. Singh stayed with the Congress Party despite continuous marginalization and defeats in the elections of 1996, 1998 and 1999. He did not join the rebels in a major split which occurred in 1999, when three Congress leaders objected to Sonia Gandhi's rise as Congress President and Leader of the Opposition. But Singh continued to stay on as a leader within the party, most notably helping to revamp the party's platform and organization.

Singh secured the nomination for prime minister on May 19, 2004 when President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam officially asked him to form a government.

Tenure as Prime Minister

Singh's image is of a formidable intellectual, a political leader of integrity, someone who is compassionate and attentive to common people, and as a recognized technocrat. Singh's administration has focused on reducing the fiscal deficit, providing debt-relief to poor farmers, extending social programs and advancing the pro-industry economic and tax policies that have launched the country on a major economic expansion course since 2002. Singh has been the image of the Congress campaign to defuse religious tensions and conflicts and bolster political support from minorities like Muslims and Christians.

The Indo-US Nuclear Deal

Dr. Singh is known as a bold leader. He made it clear in his address to Parliament in 2006 regarding his Nuclear Deal with US. He said he believed in taking India to new heights. Energy scarcity is hampering progress of the country. The speech gave signal of a new Manmohan Singh, who compelled his fellow parliamentarians to take a step forward for India's sake. He reminded them of the fears and anxieties that existed when he announced reforms in the early 1990s. Finally, the whole parliament, including the leftists, gave him support on the nuclear issue