How to start a software company to get acquired with Gaurav Mantri

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Gaurav Mantri was born in India and moved to the US in 1999. He worked in a corporate job and dabbled in start ups during the dotcom era, but he eventually decided to move back to India to build a software company, Cerebrata. Cerebrate was eventually acquired by Red Gate Software. Gaurav shares his story of success, and some failures along the way. Listen to the episode to hear how he walked away from a deal with Celebrata at one point; how he didn’t negotiate for more money when they came back to the table, and how he lost more than $100,000 in failed products.

You can learn the following in this episode:

• How SDS Client came about
• Why he chose to build Microsoft applications
• What he learned from his failed start up
• Why he never ended up getting a green card
• How he ended up choosing where to move to in India
• Exactly what on the professional front, made him move to India
• How active.com became part of his work
• The story of generating revenue when he moved to India
• Why everyone in his organization was afraid of getting called to the spare room
• How the first product was created
• What Azur does and who uses it
• How a blog post impacted his product
• How free products can lead to paid products
• Ways Gaurav was bad at marketing
• How to find the right market for your products
• How a product failed and lost more than $100,000
• How he entered a contest to better his company
• His strategic reach to Red Gate, in hopes that he could learn a lot
• How he avoided financial negotiations when he was acquired
• How a celebration ate up the profits of his company
• Resources to help you professionally
• Be sincere when you seek help

Resources and Links Mentioned:

Red Gate Books

Connect with Gaurav:

gauravmantri.com – his blog

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