StartupDunia

Swamii is a neat, customizable search engine that gives users all the web-based activity around a search query. So, for instance, search for the keyword ‘Web 2.0′ and Swamii will list all the web-based activity related to Web 2.0. The results include hits from news, blogs, P2P, videos and rich media, tv and job pages. The results are pretty impressive and have very little irrelevant content in the results. Email alerts can also be set to received automatic updates. Businesses an startups wanting to keep track of any mentions about their biz can use the Swamii Business for some serious monitoring. TechCrunch has a more detailed review here.

Swamii is launching officially today in India. Indian users can now search for not only world-wide content, but also India specific content and topics. For example, searching for “Shilpa Shetty” returns the very latest information on the actress including news about upcoming films, user-posted video content on YouTube.com, and upcoming television appearances. From then on, Swamii will continue to keep the user informed on any new Shilpa Shetty information as it becomes available.

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Vikas Patial of NGCoders (the same guy who launched IndianTVSchedule) has written a nifty little script that will allow you to convert your Orkut scraps into RSS Feeds. You can then subscribe to these feeds into your favorite RSS reader.

Check it out here. Pretty neat.

NDTV revenues grow by 27.5% in Q4 FY’07 at Rs 67.60 crore versus Rs 53.03 crore in the same quarter of the previous year. EBIDTA for Q4 is at Rs 11 crore compared with Rs 6.51 crore in the same quarter of the previous year representing a 69% year-on-year growth.

The focus now is on the triple play - NDTV Convergence will exploit the synergies between Television, Internet and Mobile.

Press release here.

Close on the heels of my post on a Twitter like service for India, Webaroo has announced the launch of GupShup, a group SMS service. Create a group (or your own channel), invite your friends to join your group. Any SMS you send to the group will be then automatically forwarded to all those who have joined your group. You also have the option to keep your group and its messages private. The messages posted to all non-private groups appear on their website. Users can also create polls, quizzes and also solicit ratings from the group members.

As per an interview with AgecyFaqs, the service will be supported by contextual text advertising. An ad will appear as text of 40 characters after the main message.

I wonder how they intend to keep the site spam and obscenity free.

I’ve been following Like.com (formerly Riya) founder-CEO, Munjal Shah’s chronicles on his blog. He writes about the various ups and downs that they have gone through since founding the company (including completely shifting strategy). Writing about the latest hiccup, he mentions how maintaining a top talent team in Bangalore is no longer proving cost-effective. The benefit of cost arbitrage no longer prevails. As a result, they’ve decided to fold the Indian operations and bring some of the key folks to Silicon Valley, where the company is based.

Interesting development…Are other startups based in Bangalore also facing similar problems ?

In a guest article on FE, Klass Oskam, VP E&Y, discusses the reasons behind the VC and Private Equity boom in India.

What is driving this PE/VC investment boom? The most important fact is Indian GDP growth coming within striking range of double-digits. Annual growth rates of 7-9% are unheard of in mature western economies, and global investors want high returns. Furthermore, several key sectors of the Indian economy (IT/BPO, telecom, pharma/healthcare, financial services, retail and automotive components) that are investment targets are experiencing even higher growth than the said levels (of 7-9%). Other key attractions include: an economy well positioned to mine the opportunities of globalisation, an increased appetite for innovation and entrepreneurship, well-regulated and fully functional capital markets and a spurt in consumerism powered by the young demographic profile.

He also expresses concerns about recently introduced government regulations on the issue of FBT on stock options and compliance related to preference shares.

Read the entire article here.

The Blackstone Group is the second biggest private equity fund in the US. Notable holdings include T-Mobile, Freescale semiconductor (spin-off from Moto), Nielsen (famous for all the TV ratings and online metrics/market research). New York Times reports that the Chinese govt. is acquiring a stake worth $3 billion in the company. This is a great piece of news, an indicator of the shifting dynamics of the capital flow in todays global world. It also goes to show how increasingly aggressive the Chinese govt is getting. Last year, they aggressively pursued, invested and even bought several oil fields.
Now this is one area where India will never be able to beat China. When the honchos of the communist govt raise a finger, things definitely get done - and get done fast.

Over the weekend, I tried out two different services - BigAdda and Joost. While BigAdda is nothing to write home about, I was amazed by Joost and the tremendous possibilities that it holds. Considering that they’re still in beta, they do have a few hiccups, but none the less, I  am sure that just like they revolutionized the P2P music sharing (Kazaa) and the P2P voice (Skype) markets, these guys will revolutionize the P2P TV market.

In an earlier post, I wrote about how educational institutions in India need to emphasize on creating job-makers as opposed to job-seekers. A story on Livemint tries to capture some of the same thoughts on the role of B-schools in fostering entrepreneurship in India. As per the story, of the 1200 B-schools in India, only six have incubation cells that have made some impact.

The author recommends not only scrapping the current curriculum in B-schools, but also revamping the entrance examinations for these B-schools. He feels that right from the primary school level, the pedagogy and the evaluation methodology don’t encourage entrepreneurial traits such as thinking out of the box, creativity, tolerance to ambiguity and risk-taking ability. Memorizing facts is encouraged rather than synthesis, analysis and creative application of information.

Entire story here.

AgencyFaqs reports that MakeMyTrip is relaunching their site, with an added emphasis on package deals and hotels. The hotels section will be more interactive with user reviews, ratings and integration with MayMyIndia. The new version of the site will primarily be Web 2.0 based with several AJAXy features.  They have also launched mobile based booking by using mobile payment services from Paymate.

You can also read through the session transcripts of the recently concluded “Online Travel: Are you hooked?” seminar on the AgencyFaqs website.