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....