iNM Magazine Volume 7 | August 2015
Cover Story
EDUPRIME STORY
Arpan Shah
Co-Founder, CEO & Executive Director
EDUPRIME Technologies Pvt. Ltd. is formed by the same two
founders after experimenting with their new innovation called
PRIME for two years, working out from a garage type office &
having their own share of drama. The name changed but vision
remained the same – Let all children of the world learn from
products & services developed by Indians, in India.
“Wouldn't you like to join a big company for your job after
engineering?” – Professor.
Everyone nodded, most for Infosys, some for TCS and some for
core sector. But two hands rose over the last row in the last
column of the class. It was the new batch of Electronics
Engineering students, F.E. as they say who were probably
enjoying their Communication Skills lecture since it had nothing
to do with Engineering. The Year was 2006.
“We would like to be businessmen” – exclaimed those 2 students.
Everyone turned their heads and smiled; the two students smiled
back rather wickedly. Their friends laughed; the two students
gave a tap on their head.
“If you have ideas then start
prototyping/materializing. Best way to know if
an idea will work, is to start working on it.
Having an Idea is nothing if there is no
Execution.”
From 2008 to 2013, the journey has been full of hardships,
sacrifices, fights, appreciations, respect & struggle.
A lot of us get ideas all the time while taking a shower, in the loo, in
a boring lecture (in almost all lectures then) or while watching a
movie, or reading an inspirational story, while traveling, eating
on the street, surfing, facebooking, sleeping (we call it dreams I
guess) and anything that we do apart from all covered above. Do
we go the next level?
They had no idea of what kind of business they would want to do.
In class and in their own circle of friends as well, they were the
most mischievous ones. Nevertheless, they were more
enthusiastic about entrepreneurship when they did not even
know what it was.
It so happened in February 2008, that one out of those two
students, who was the Jt. General Secretary of EESA (Electronics
Engineering Students' Association) in his 2nd year (2007-08) got
an opportunity to undertake a workshop, in Aqua Robotics. He
accepted it without even knowing what it was.
– “arghh.. I had that idea but these guys implemented it” – if it
were unique, it no more is! f you have ideas then start
prototyping/materializing. Best way to know if an idea will work,
is to start working on it. Having an Idea is nothing if there is no
Execution.
When we built our company, we had a basic idea which was
Education in Robotics. We did it for 2 years while we were
studying & running the company. But when we started working
full-time since July 2010 we tried many things. We tried starting
diploma classes which failed. We also planned for ecommerce,
something similar to Snapdeal (as in its early stages) but never
executed. We tried selling some discount cards & vouchers but
lost steam; all the “keedas” done & dusted.
Within a week he built a team which included other aspiring
Entrepreneurs, his best buddy, a class enemy (but with technical
knowledge) & few enthusiasts. The workshop was conducted
followed with the 1st ever Aqua robotics competition in their
college (