As my stupid “part 5/4” shows, I had not planned to add two other non-US companies, this time with Indian roots (to my previous 4 posts on Europe and China). I am currently reading The Startup Game by Bill Draper. It is a very interesting book by one of the most famous Silicon Valley venture capitalists and I will write soon a post on what I liked (as soon as I am finished with reading it).

Bill Draper founded a fund specialized in Indian start-ups in the mid-90s. He was not the first VC to leave the USA (some had done it in Europe in the 60s and 70s) but he was probably the first one to be succesful with such a venture.

Rediff and Selectica went public in 2000, both were founded in 1996. They are very similar to US start-ups, indeed Selectica was founded as a California start-up. Rediff is stranger as it is an Indian company and because it was not (and is not yet) profitable, it is still private in India.

Here is Rediff Cap. Table when it went public

and here is Selectica’s:

As a short conclusion, Bill Draper certainly had higher hopes for both companies which individual revenues were less than $50M in the last 3 years. There is no doubt that being an overseas company is not optimal both for customers and perception by investors…