1. Manik Ghauri, Lalit Sharma: Vowelor
Vowelor is a free app for book lovers. It helps you discover new books and helps you (virtually) connect with other book lovers. You need to create a free account following which you can search for books, readers and book clubs. When you find a book, you can write a review or add it to your virtual library.
Founded by best friends and book lovers Manik Ghauri, and Lalit Sharma, the startup lets readers connect and discuss books and authors with each other.
Currently available as a website and an Android application, Vowelor has more than 5,000 downloads. It plans to launch an iOS application soon.
2. Srihari Karanth: TrackMyPhones
Srihari Karanth and his twin brother Shrinidhi Karanth have been pioneers in developing safety mechanisms that can remotely track one’s phone, thus enabling user safety.
‘TrackMyPhones’, the startup founded by the two brothers, offers more than 20 dedicated apps focused on anti-theft, remote monitoring, parental control, and women’s safety.
The business was started by the twins with no external funding.
TrackMyPhones Founder Srihari Karanth has been conferred with the ‘Top 50 Tech Visionaries’ Award for his significant contributions towards the technology sector. The award will be presented at the InterCon 2019 edition to be held in Dubai from 14-16th October 2019.
3. Aharnish, Raj Singh, and Manideep Chhokra: BiziBean
Started in 2014 by coffee fanatics Aharnish, Raj Singh, and Manideep Chhokra, BiziBean is essentially a chain of coffee joints where one can drink coffee brewed from locally sourced coffee beans, roasted and blended in small batches. And if you like coffee, you can buy BiziBean roasts and take them home as well.
In the last five years, BiziBean has expanded to 11 outlets in Delhi NCR, and three stores, 37 concession stands across India PVR Cinemas, Spencer Retail, and Modern Bazar across 13 cities in India.
BiziBean is now planning to double its outlet count to 80 by March 2020 and 150 by March 2021. It is also now seeking external funding in the current financial year to support its growth plans.
4. Jasleen Khurana, Prateek Gupta: Qwerty Thoughts
Qwerty Thoughts is a book business that was started by a husband and wife duo, Jasleen Khurana and Prateek Gupta.
Qwerty Thoughts is a social book reading, discovery, and self-publishing online platform, where readers can discuss books while reading them with people having similar reading interests.
Qwerty Thoughts is currently bootstrapped with the savings of the couple. The duo has so far invested Rs 8 lakh till date for R&D, technology, product development, content, events, and legal requirements.
Qwerty Thoughts has surpassed 6,000 registered users and has more than 1,500 books available for reading uploaded across categories such as romance, thriller, fiction, non-fiction among others by more than 1,000 registered authors and overall traffic of around 40,000 per month. They are expecting to cross the one million registered users mark by the end of 2020.
5. Maria Victor: Make It Happen
Maria Victor started “Make It Happen” in 2014to highlight the rich history and culture of a popular beach and party destination Goa.
She started “Make It Happen” as a travel club out of Bengaluru in 2011 to connect like-minded travelers and curate thematic tours across India such as an immersive trip to the Nilgiris.
But in 2014, she dived into it full time and, a year later, started her Goa project. Since then, her focus has solely been on Goa and on offering great experiences to tourists
