Piyush Poddar is an IT entrepreneur and technology startup mentor born in Kolkata to a Marwari family. He graduated in Jaipur and started his first IT venture, an IT academy, at age 20 with 5 founders. His early experimental ventures included industrial supplies and IT hardware and software sales. His real ventures included Srijan Interactive, a digital multimedia agency from 2000 to 2008 providing websites, internet marketing, and multimedia services to domestic clients. From 2008 to 2013, through Monsoon Consulting he provided open source-based web and mobile solutions to clients in the UK and Ireland from India. Currently, he leads Axelerant, a people-focused distributed workforce of 52 people across 15 cities and 5

1. Piyush Poddar
IT Entrepreneur & Technology Startup Mentor

2. Hi, I’m Piyush
- born to a Marwari family in Kolkata
- Still believe Entrepreneurs might be born, but better made.
- brought up in Bihar, graduated in Jaipur.
- ITE Journey started in 1996
- 1st venture - IT Academy
- age 20
- 5 founders

3. experimental ventures
- Industrial Supplies
- Interned at Family Biz
- ~1998
- Industries, Factories, Manufacturers
- not my cup of tea
- IT hardware & software sales
- ~1998
- Personal computers, printers, servers, packaged softwares sales

4. real ventures
- Srijan Interactive
- Digital multimedia agency
- ~2000 - 2008
- Multimedia product catalogues
- Websites
- Internet marketing services
- Domestic Clients
- evolution from closed proprietary source to Open Source Software

5. open source software
- Bingo!
- Softwares
- Browsers - Firefox, Chrome
- OS & Servers - Linux, Ubuntu, Apache, Tomcat ...
- IDEs - Netbeans, Eclipse ...
- Programming & DB - PHP, RoR, MySQL, PgSQL, Javascript ...
- Frameworks - DNN, Zend, RoR ...
- CMS - Drupal, Joomla, Alfresco ...

6. global exposure
- Monsoon Consulting
- 2008 - 13
- UK/ Ireland - India based services outsourcing model
- web & mobile solutions
- OPEN SOURCE based
- Axelerant
- people/ passion focused
- distributed workforce - global team of 52 people, 15 cities, 5 countries

8. Thanks
Piyush Poddar
twitter.com/piyushpoddar