Event Update - Open Coffee Club

April 17^th, 2009, Friday would be marked as a history in the realms of CCED (Chitkara Centre of Entrepreneurship Development) as it took the initiative to organize the first OPEN COFFEE CLUB MEET of Chandigarh region at the Dainik Bhaskar building, Sec-25. The fact that the event was first of its kind to be held in Chandigarh further added credibility to the exclusiveness of the event.The meet was attended by around 25 CCED members who are undergraduate students from B-TECH AND BBA. The main aim of the meet was to make the students get overview about what entrepreneurship is all about. Since it was the first activity organized by the OPEN COFFEE CLUB of the region, students gained a lot from the meet.

The Open Coffee Club was started as an attempt to establish recognized, open and regular child of Saul Klein, a venture partner at INDEX VENTURES and a VP of Skype who is based in London. It's a great way to meet other startups in your area and build new relationships. For VCs it’s a quick and easy way to meet with a group of local entrepreneurs and to get to see their products/ideas in action. The Open Coffee Club is free for anyone interested to come along.

The event witnessed the presence of MR. SAMEER GUGLANI AND MRS. NANDINI HIRIANNIAH, founders of MORPHEUS VENTURES. They both co-founded Madhouse Media in 2004, India's first online/offline movie rentals company and successfully exited with acquisition by “Seventy mm” in 2007. Both Nandini and Sameer are Serial entrepreneurs with 10+ years of professional experience, out of which 9+ years have been spent with startups. They have a broad and varied set of experiences and expertise.

The meet started with a questionnaire round by the students in which they asked the entrepreneurs about the basics of startups, different types of investments etc. They also discussed with students the reason why they quit there jobs to start their own venture. Mr. Sameer revealed the fact that he is very optimistic on Indian startups and he believes that 5 years from now startups will contribute to a significant part of the Indian Economy. Both the startup gurus believe that India’s future lies in today's entrepreneurs and startups. It will create a new wave in the economy, innovate and create wealth and value for themselves as well as the Indian economy. Ms. Nandini said that while going for a startup plan , one shouldn’t think that experience or money is a barrier, the only thing that can obstruct one from achieving one’s own dream is the lack of courage to take risks.

In the end they confessed that events like these should have an instant appeal to anyone in this business as a free and easy place to network and build community. This is how one can grow his/her circle and grow both mentally and intellectually. They also asked the CCED members to come forward for any kind of help they need in future in terms of startups under their venture.

Website- www.morpheusventure.com

Blogs- Nandini.madhouse.in

Sameer.madhouse.in

Article submitted by -

Pulkit Jain, Student
Chitkara Institute of Engineering & Technology

Launch of Open Coffee Club

The Open Coffee Club is being launched by the CCED Team of Chitkara on the 17th of April.

The OpenCoffee Club is "a place for people who love startups, to hang out and meet" according to their recently launched social site on Ning.com. All over the world, people are getting together on a weekly basis to discuss all kinds of things, startup ideas and to meet and pitch their ideas to VCs. For an idea that only kicked off last February, it is beginning to take the world of web entrepreneurs by storm.

What is it?

The OpenCoffee Club started as an attempt to establish recognized, open and regular meeting places where entrepreneurs can meet with investors in a totally informal setting. The goal of OpenCoffee is "to create something that can be replicated anywhere else at little or no cost ... where entrepreneurs can meet and know people might be around for them to talk with."

The main attraction for people who come along seems to be the relaxed atmosphere. It's a great way to meet other startups in your area and build new relationships. For VCs its a quick and easy way to meet with a group of local entrepreneurs and to get to see their products/ideas in action. The OpenCoffee Club is free for anyone interested to come along.

Chandigarh’s OCC

Entrepreneurship Cell at Chitkara (CCED) has taken the initiative to launch the first OCC in the region for the youngsters of the city. Our first meet is scheduled for the 17^th April’09 from 3 pm to 5 pm at Chitkara Corporate Office in Sector-25, Chandigarh.

GREENOVATE'09 (E-Fair, Rangoli Competition)

Induction of new CCED Members

CCED recently held its first Induction Session for its new members at our Rajpura Campus. The students had registered with CCED for membership during the GREENOVATE event. We had a great response from the fresh group! The session included presentations, interactive exercises, event plans for the next 6 months etc. The presentation gave the students an insight into the foundation of CCED, its objective and purpose, expectations, organization chart, the various departments and other details. The interactive exercises were quite interesting and it was great to see all participate in it. They were all divided into groups and were given the task of submitting their project plan of events that they want to do as part of CCED initiative.

We hope the the enthusiasm helps us to carry forward the E-Cell at Chitkara !!

Adios till we meet next....

E-Talk by Nik Bakers

7th Feb'09 saw the inaugural of the Entrepreneur Week at our Chitkara campus where we are celebrating "GO GREEN", The World is Our Business". The day began by taking the pledge to help build an entrepreneurial India, where nearly 100 students from the campus had participated.

As part of our GREENOVATE Event, we had scheduled an E-Talk by one of the most famous entrepreneurs of the city, Nikhil Mittal of Nik Bakers! He was joined by his partner in business and life, Sharon Mittal. We got an insight into the pitfalls and challenges he faced during the start up of Nik Bakers. He discussed how he overcame those difficulties, what mistakes he made and what one should avoid during a start-up! He also touched upon the complexities involved in the baking and food industry as one not only has to meet customer expectations, but go beyond!

Growth is guaranteed when one is passionate about what he is doing, sticks to industry service standards and builds up an excellent customer relationship – Mantra by Nik!

The session was a very interesting one as it was filled with questions from the students and the faculty alike. The best advice that came from him on being asked about studying abroad, was that one should always look for better opportunities to gain knowledge, but one should apply that knowledge back HOME !

The icing on the session was when Nik presented the crowd of nearly a hundred with a huge cake from his renowned Bakery!! The day couldn’t have ended in a sweeter note!

E-Talk on 7th Feb'09

The curtain raiser for the week long "GREENOVATE" event is “E-Talk”; where in distinguished young entrepreneurs from the region are being invited to participate.

The details of the summit are as follows –

Date: 7th February’09
Time: 2 pm to 4 pm
Venue: D-Morgan Hall, Chitkara Institute, Rajpura

Participants: Students of Chitkara Institute
Speakers: Nikhil Mittal (Nik Bakers) and Raghu Khanna (Cashurdrive)

Look forward to your participation !!

GREENOVATE'09 - 7th Feb to 14th Feb

CCED (Chitkara Center for Entrepreneurship Development) has undertaken the opportunity to carry out “GREENOVATE”, an event in line with the E-Week’09 that is being organized by NEN. Events will be carried out from 7th Feb’09 to 14th Feb’09, with the theme being “GO GREEN”.

The list of events planned for the week is as follows –

7th Feb’09 - E-Seminar by young Entrepreneurs
Project writing on “Green Campus”
CCED Membership Opens

9th to 12th Feb’09 – Contests
· Poster Making
· T-Shirt Painting
· Logo Designing for CCED
· Slogan Competition for CCED
· Photography Exhibition

13th -14th Feb’09 - E-Fair
· Stalls by students
· Rangoli competition - Go Green

This project is being spearheaded by the Office of External Affairs along with the CCED members.

Core Student CCED Team Members –
Amita Gulati – Student
Anchit Atri – student
Ishleen Kaur – student
Siddharth Bahuja – student
Neha Gupta – student
Shweta – student
Manveen Sahni-student

Let us all join hands to make the foundation of CCED Chapter !!