How startups are creating problems that don’t even exist?

There was a time when entrepreneurs were found in scarcity, they had a story to tell about the struggle, of their family’s disbelief and disapproval of the start-up life. Cut to 2017 and entrepreneurs are found aplenty, some disrupting the sector in which they are operating while some others, well, are finding a problem that doesn’t exist.

The past few years have seen the birth of many start-ups in the Indian ecosystem. This goes on to prove that India is building a conducive environment for start-ups, funding has almost become omnipresent. Needless to say that the Indian start-up ecosystem has seen the birth of some great ideas but there are also some that fail to be of anyone’s understanding. A case to keep in mind is the startup Mokshshil.com that allows one to pre-book their funeral service. The founding of these start-ups has raised many questions; from who really is prepared for death to do we have to depend on technology for even death?

Some of them might even find the funding but customers fail to use their product. A global example is the Valley-based Juicero, which raised $120mn from investors for its $400 juicer blender, has failed to find a market and is thus, shutting down.

With entrepreneurship being the new in-thing, there’s another fear that wannapreneurs have – the fear of missing out. They cannot miss out on the trend, so they end up coming up with a problem, that maybe one for them but fails to find fellow believers. Having a passion for the idea is one thing but execution is what makes the difference. It’s time for us to turn things around. First understand what the customer needs and then create your product. What the founders believe to be a problem could just be a surface-level one.

The founder or co-founder needs to be from a tech or business background. You cannot be successful if you haven’t even done an analysis of the market to know if your idea is viable enough. Build a good team and make sure that the market still has some room for your idea. There could be many reasons for failure and it’s the opportunity to be able to try to solve a problem is what makes our community thrive.

Problems always exist and let’s not consider outcome or luck as an indicator of whether the problem really existed.

 

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