| Business Basics |
 |
|
| Company Name |
Pothi.com |
| Founded in |
2008 |
| Headquartered in |
Bangalore |
| Company website/URL |
http://pothi.com |
| Industry |
Publishing & Printing |
| Stage of the company |
Several customers or locations |
| Source of idea |
Wanted it as an individual customer |
| Awards & honors |
Winner of i2I 2008 (Business plan competition organized by IIM C in association with TiE and NEN)
|
|
|
|
|
| Business description |
Pothi.com provides a print-on-demand (POD) platform for all kinds of self publishers in India. We cater to authors, NGOs, Organizations and anybody who has an idea or content with a niche or small audience and cannot be served by traditional publishing.
For users with a bigger audience, we also provide cost effective bulk printing. Combined with...> Read more.. |
Pothi.com provides a print-on-demand (POD) platform for all kinds of self publishers in India. We cater to authors, NGOs, Organizations and anybody who has an idea or content with a niche or small audience and cannot be served by traditional publishing.
For users with a bigger audience, we also provide cost effective bulk printing. Combined with our e-commerce platform, pre-press and marketing services at affordable (by Indian standards) rates, this offers an end-to-end publishing platform for users. We have also offered books which can be customized by the buyer.
< Back
|
|
| How does the business make money? |
| Royalty sharing on books sold, paid services for authors, selling special personalizable books.
|
|
| Team information |
| Abhaya Agarwal, Co-Founder and Director
|
|
|
| Competition |
|
|
| Competitors |
Depot
Cinnamonteal
lulu.com
|
| How different is your product or service? It has... |
Identical or close substitutes available in India |
| In what way is your product or service different? |
We are building a platform with a clear focus on India. Part of it is ensuring good support for Indian language content.
We are also tryin...> Read more.. |
|
|
|
|
| By The Numbers |
|
|
| |
2006 |
2007 |
| No. of employees |
Did not exist |
0-5 |
| No. of locations |
Did not exist |
|
| No. of customers |
Did not exist |
16-50 |
| Turnover |
Did not exist |
Under 10 lacs |
| Profits |
Did not exist |
preprofit |
|
| Primary source of initial funding |
Personal savings |
| Primary source of additional funding |
Family & friends |
| Raised institutional capital? |
No |
|
|
|
|
| Why is this startup hot? |
The platform that we offer makes it possible to bring content into print in ways that was never possible before. We bridge an important gap between the flexibility offered by digital content and convenience offered by a printed book.
Digital content offers infinite opportunities for mash-up, remixing and personalization. On the other hand, a boo...> Read more.. |
The platform that we offer makes it possible to bring content into print in ways that was never possible before. We bridge an important gap between the flexibility offered by digital content and convenience offered by a printed book.
Digital content offers infinite opportunities for mash-up, remixing and personalization. On the other hand, a book is still the most convenient and economical way to consume content for most of the people in a country like India.
So while it is a handy alternative for traditional publishing, for people with niche or small markets, it also opens up a host of new ideas in the publishing world which could not be supported by traditional publishing.
Books can be personalized for buyers, content can be re-purposed for people with vision disabilities, collaborative content creation and distribution is very easy; people can even create books of their own! And we are building a platform to let people do all this, using our simple-to-use and interactive tools.
< Back
|
|
| What keeps the team awake at night? |
All the e-mails and messages from users who tell us how useful they find our services, and figuring out how can we bring down the next barrier, be it financial or technological, which prevents people from accessing print as a medium.
And then the big challenge of providing them with tools and avenues to actually reach their intended audience. So we have IAEMP, energy management professionals fighting to make India energy independent by 2022 or an IITK alumnus who has written a guide based on his experiences to help Indian students applying to graduate schools in the US.
Then there is a grand-daughter getting her grand-mom's poems published as a gift, and of course, all the creative people who are carving out a place for themselves using the platform. With all this enthusiasm, creativity and energy around, who has time to sleep? :-) |
|
