Acton Biotech, Medical Genetics

Letter to HNI Investor

actonbiotech — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 05:48:34 +0000

Dear HNI Investor,

You have been investing in stocks, mutual funds, bonds, SIPs, NFOs, gold and real estate. Let me give you a glimpse of investing in startups.

Startups are very high risk and very high return investments. And there are people who understand this space very well, who can mitigate the risk to a substantial level. But investment in startups should not be done only for returns. People invest for the excitement, fun and chaos that are an integral part of a startup. Investors feel gratified about the fact that their investment is being used to build a high tech, global, profitable idea. They love to be a part of closely knit family culture in startups. As these investors have a lot of education and experience, they love mentoring young founders. This is the sole reason behind the success of the Silicon Valley ecosystem. In India, we do not have seed capital and we do not have seasoned mentors. We are trying to kill two birds with one stone. Fortunately, we do have venture capital, private equity funds and a vibrant stock market. And again fortunately, we have thousands of ventures working in very different industries and at different stages.

We are suggesting that you could invest 5% of the portfolio into startups. But before you invest, you should meet the founders couple of times, understand the industry, stage, history, team and future projections very clearly. Then match that with your expectations in terms of returns, liquidity etc. These investments should be made through a person who has good knowledge of both, the investor and the startup.

Interested, contact your investment advisor now.

A broad overview of Healthcare industry in india

actonbiotech — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 02:50:14 +0000

In india the Healthcare industry has
1. Hospitals, 4000 large hospitals and 40,000 small hospitals
2. Doctors 200,000 superspecialists and 400,000 general doctors.
3. 500,000 pharmacy stores
4. 50,000 pathology and diagnostics labs
5. 50 insurance companies and TPAs
6. 500 clinical trial organisations
7. 1000 companies trading in equipment, reagents and provide services.
8. Last but not the least, 20,000 pharma companies.

Which of these sectors is the most profitable and promises growth?

Working with multiple gmail and google apps accounts.

actonbiotech — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 15:58:36 +0000

We all have multiple gmail and google apps accounts. Earlier it used to allow 2 logins, one for gmail and one for google apps. But lately it says “switch accounts”. With emails, contacts and documents spread across accounts, you really need multiple logins. Thankfully, Google recognizes it and has allowed it. All they you need to do is
1. log into main gmail account
2. Pull down the menu that you use for “signout” and click on “account setting”
3. You will see “Multiple sign-in : Off – Edit”
4. Click on Edit, and you will be taken to a new page. Click on “On” and select all 4 tick boxes
5. Click Save at the bottom of the screen.
6. Pull down the menu that you use for “signout” and now you should see “switch accounts”. Click on that and it allows you to log into any number of accounts. I have 1 gmail and 4 google apps accounts.
7. Now open new tabs and “switch account” and you can have access to all your emails, documents, sites, contacts from any of your accounts.

Things that have recently become consumables

actonbiotech — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 09:41:49 +0000

The bunch of house keys is a classical example of things that have recently become a consumable. This is a product that was kept safely by the lady of the house for close to 25 years and then passed on to the “bahu”. With nuclear families and the lady working this has become a consumable. For example, we make 4 new sets of the bunch every month. And sometimes before the end of the month, we are out of all original keys, stranded outside the house and we call the key maker to make a new key for the main lock and the door latch. But who looses the bunch of keys so often. The answer is simple and not all things need to be said here.

In the list of things that have recently become consumables are mobile phone (every 3 months), PAN card every 6 months, ATM card (every transaction, unless the machine starts shouting and the security guard runs and get the card to the car), driving license (every time its photo copied).

Basic first retail store

actonbiotech — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 04:28:08 +0000

Cities are expanding and residential complexes are coming up all around. When we look for a house in new areas we are worried if the place has shops, schools, transport, atm, broadband etc.

In terms of shops you will need
Grocery store
Hair saloon
Hardware store
Laundry
Newspaper vendor
Restaurant

If we believe in economies of scale, it is much more viable to setup all this as a branded store with central purchase and logistics. Lets give it a name now. Next all that one needs to do is to find the distance of your new home from this store.

press relations is easy

actonbiotech — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 20:46:55 +0000

CEOs of startups very often are not able to utilize press relations for their ventrues. Like the concept of “low hanging fruit” in the market place, PR is the lowest handing fruit in marketing, advertizing, branding, publicity, sales and recruiting. If your article is printed in the most circulated daily in your city, that’s enough to get you customers, employees, partners and investors.

Having sold PR enough, let me tell you that its a no brainer. You don’t require any special skills and its free. All that you need to do is to spend a little time to understand the subject.

So lets begin. In press relations, there are two main factors. One is the press release and the other is journalist in a media house.

A press release is a simple note giving out the news. It should have a date, place, title, news, background and your contact information. It can be in one page or max two pages. So lets write it now.

Press Release
Pune, 17th Jan, 2010
Panama Cycles launches BMX, sports cycles.

Today Panama Cycles is proud to launch its new range of sports cycles. This new range of cycles comes with grears, suspentions and alloy frame. The price range of these cycles is Rs 4000 to Rs 6000. Speaking at the launch, Mr. Sanjay Panama, MD, Panama Cycles, Said “This launch completed the gap between our basic cycles priced at Rs 2500 and premium range of cycles priced at Rs 12,000 and above”.

Panama Cycles has been the most reputed cycle manufacturer in India and has been into existance for the last 4 decades. Panama cycles are sold through out India through our 1250 member exclusive dealer network. We are listed on BSC and NSE.

Media Contact : Mr. Vijay Panama, Manager Marcom, Panama Cycles, Pune. Email vijay@panama.com and Mobile : 8292312312

If you have been able to do this much for your product and your company, its a good start. Make 50 copies of this and proceed to the next step.

That brings us to the next factor. The journalist in a media house. A media house is a company that brings out a content based product. It can be a news paper, a magazine, a TV channel or an online news protal. Make a list of all the media houses they can know of. In Pune we have Times of India, Indian Express, Radio Mirchi, Sakal, Pudhari and punetech. If you do a simple good search, with key words like press media you should be able to get address, telephone numbers and fax numbers of these media houses. Call them up, speake to anyone in the editorial team (they come to office at 2pm and are around till around 10 pm). Fix up an appointment, and go meet them. Journalists are humble people. They will ask you a hundred easy questions. Answer the ones that you like. They might click your photograph. And Bang, see your picture and the news on that news paper next morning.

Yes, its free. And the only catch is it should be interesting. The press release written above will not get published. Never. But your company is not making cycles.

my book titled “do more”

actonbiotech — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 17:52:09 +0000

The idea of a book came from the fact that a lot of people like Cap Gopinath, NRN, Nandan, Vineet Nayar, Dr Kalam, Rashmi Bansal and Naveen Bachwani have published their books. It may sound very arrogant, but for me, they are entrepreneur and leaders like me. And If I can relate to them and I also want to compete with them. So, I am planning to write a book titled “Do More” and the punch line will be “Do more than what is expected out of you”.

Introduction will read like “Its often said that life does not come with a user’s manual. Lots of people would have tried writing one. This book is another attempt in the same direction. A book that gives a broad over view of what are the things that you are supposed to do in life.”

And the chapters will be
1. Learn more
2. Appreciate more
3. Travel more
4. Listen more
5. Talk more
6. Build more
7. Dream more
8. Waste more
9. Stir more
10. Read more

Each chapter will be explained in simple words, with practical examples from life. The book will be A5 size, paper back, full color and will be self published. It will have close to 160 pages with many pictures. I am not going to give any time line for this as this is more of a hobby and passion than anything else.

Great genetics labs in India

actonbiotech — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 13:28:49 +0000

India has lots of advanced genetics laboratories namely

1. Ocimum

2. Genotypic

3. IGIB

4. Avasthagen

5. TIFR, Mumbai

6. CDFD

7. Sandor

8. Ace Probe

9. Genetics Dept in Sir Ganga Ram Hospital

10. Vimta

Searching for more. Will update this soon.