1. Shenoy.Karun@timesgroup.com
W
hen Sunil Vallath
needs driving direc-
tions, he just needs
to look at a six-inch
transparent device
on his dash, display-
ing maps, messages,
music, fuel level, mileage and more. It’s in
his line of sight, but is transparent and
doesn’t obstruct his view.
Vallath, 27, who founded Exploride last
year in Kerala, is all set to start marketing
the device which can be activated by voice
or gesture. The device can talk back, and
comes with a 2GB RAM, quad core proces-
sor, infrared camera, Bluetooth and LTE.
Vallath, who works out of the Startup
Village in Kochi, expects to start selling on
crowdfunding platform Kickstarter next
month. As his first target is the US, he’s
opened an office in Maryland and has ap-
pointed a US-based public relations agen-
cy to conduct a campaign.
“The US is the best for customer valida-
tion and funds. If the product is successful
there, it is easy to market in other coun-
tries,” says Vallath, who has a degree in
computer science, started working in 2009
as a technical engineer in Wipro, and after
three short stints in large companies,
founded Exploride.
Kerala is seeing a rise in electronic
hardware-based startups thanks to the
proclivity of engineering students
in the state to opt for the elec-
tronics and electrical
streams. Add to that the
early success of Ro-
hildev N’s Fin. Fin is a
ring-like object worn
on the thumb that can
be used to control
smart phones, laptops
or car stereos using
finger gestures. In
March last year, it
raisedover$200,000from
1,600 people globally,
through the US-based
crowdfunding platform Indi-
egogo. Within months of that cam-
paign, Rohildev’s RHL Vision attracted $2
million in funding from Kalaari Capital,
money that was used to establish an office
in the US and hire former Apple employees
to make Fin compatible with Apple iOS.
“Rohildev’s success motivated a
number of other entrepreneurs here. They
all suddenly developed the confidence that
they could sell a hardware product suc-
cessfully. Also, we had created an open
ecosystem at Startup Village, which re-
sulted in cross-pollination of ideas. Stu-
dents, particularly, were able to go through
many ideas before finally coming up with
a practical one,” says Sanjay Vijayakumar,
chairman of Startup Village.
He adds that typical startup accelera-
tors, like the ones in Bengaluru, have three
tosix-monthprogrammes,whichare
insufficient for developing a
hardware product. On the
other hand, the ventures
that joined Startup Vil-
lage in its initial days
have been getting free
space, internet and
electricityforthepast
three years.
“This helped them
think long-term and
develophardwareprod-
ucts,”saysVijayakumar,
who dropped out of col-
lege to co-found MobME in
2005 in Thiruvananthapuram,
a mobile value-added services ven-
ture that has won several Nasscom innova-
tion awards and which in many ways pio-
neered the startup culture in Kerala.
A host of hardware startups are chart-
ing a path similar to Fin. MindHelix’s Rico
allows you to insert an old smartphone
into a plastic toy-like device and use it as
a cheap alternative to expensive home se-
curity systems. It detects smoke, tempera-
ture and movements inside a room. Mind-
Helix raised $119,000 through a successful
campaign on Kickstarter late last year.
Sectorqube’s smart microwave oven
Maid (Make All Incredible Dishes) raised
$124,000 on Kickstarter in December last
year. Maid connects to a recipe store on the
web, reads out instructions and suggests
the optimal settings based on the number
of servings.
Cochin University of Science and Tech-
nology graduate Nijil Y’s Mashinga has
developed a touchtable for corporates that
can be used for marketing products or for
creative brainstorming. Its clients: IFB,
Federal Bank, two Delhi hotels and a
school in Chennai.
Then there’s Rethin Sylvester’s Iret
Guitar Enhancements, a student startup
that makes affordable music gear like
stompboxes and amplifiers. “All these were
mostly imported earlier,” says Sylvester.
Aronin P and his friends have devel-
oped industrial robotic manipulators to
physically touch and test the responsive-
ness of touchscreens. Their Sastra Robot-
ics has an enviable list of clients – Bosch,
HCLInfosystemsandIITsinBhubaneswar
and Kharagpur. Bosch uses it to test the
front panels of car infotainment systems,
while HCL uses it to test printers.
“We had requirements coming from
Malaysia, but as our team is fully engaged
with existing clients, we have postponed
our expansion overseas for six months,”
Aronin says.
Kallidil Kalidasan, founder & CEO of
MindHelix, admits it’s not easy designing
for Western markets. “You tend to be driv-
en by Indian aesthetics. So you need to hire
designers who understand Western cul-
ture, design methodology, and the thought
process. It is not an engineering challenge,
but a design one,” he says.
Most are clear that the US has to be the
initial target market. “When it comes to
early adopters of consumer technology, US
customers top the list,” says Rohildev. Sec-
torqube co-founder Sabarish Prakash
agrees: “Only those products which have
been adopted in the West are being ac-
cepted by Indians.”
Despite the difficulty and expense in-
volved, Vijayakumar expects many more
hardware product startups to emerge in
Kerala. “We have just established a Fab
Lab at Startup Village with the help of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
This will make hardware prototyping and
circuit board designing and printing a lot
easier. We have also procured two 3D print-
ers that can produce complicated moving
parts,” he says. That could significantly
reduce costs for startups.
GOD’SOWNCOUNTRYCHASES
SAFE RIDE: Exploride founder Sunil Vallath (right), with team members Rahul Agarwal (centre) and Salin Sunny (left), shows off a 3D
printed dummy of the device they have developed for distraction-free driving
WHAT’S COOKING? Founders of SectorQube tinkering with a prototype of MAID, a smart
microwave. (From left) Midhun Skaria, Biniyas V L, Nibu Alias, Ani Abraham Joy, Sabarish
Prakash and Arjun Sarath; (below) Kerala government-supported Startup Village in Kochi
AMERICAN DREAM
KICKSTART
FOR STARTUPS
For the last three years, the Kerala
government has been giving startups
a hand and is especially encouraging of
student entrepreneurship. Its Technology
Startup Policy 2014 aims at incubating
10,000 technology product startups by
2020 and becoming one of the top five
startup ecosystems in the world. “We did
startup boot camps in engineering
colleges and introduced incubators at the
Technology Innovation Zone in Kochi.
Startup Village is one of them,” says P H
Kurian, principal secretary-IT, Kerala
government. It has introduced a gap year
for student entrepreneurs as well as
grace marks and flexi attendance. These
initiatives had an impact on the student
community. “We received applications for
900 ideas from 7,000 students in three
years. The 533 startups we incubated
have created 2,890 new jobs,” says
Sanjay Vijayakumar, chairman, Startup
Village, promoted by the government and
MobME Wireless Solutions. TNN
Entrepreneurs
across Kerala are
building electronic
devices and
software products
with an eye on
the US market —
because that’s where
they see clients
and investors.
And approval from
America means
the rest of the world
will follow very fast