Meet the Boss Babies: Teenpreneurs from the Internet B-School solving real-world problems

At 11 am, the Google Meet buzzes and there’s Dhiraj Gatmane, the 17-yearold founding father of Stoodive. The beginning is a bit rusty. “The place are you from?” I ask. “Close to Maharashtra,” he says. “The place precisely?” “Have you ever heard of Dadra & Nagar Haveli?” I’ve, however Gatmane nonetheless confirms if I’m acquainted with the small Union territory on the Maharashtra border. But that tentativeness about his location didn’t cease him from beginning his firm Stoodive in February with collaborators from the world over—lots of whom he discovered on LinkedIn, which he joined simply final November.

Stoodive is his answer to a real-world drawback: discovering a professor or a analysis information for undertaking work. He calls it the world’s first social networking platform for researchers—“a Bumble + LinkedIn for analysis”. This month a core workforce of 15 members, working remotely, will launch its app which, claims Gatmane, has a 4,000+ ready listing. “It will likely be free for now, however we’re in discussions with main pre-seed funds,” he says. Gatmane’s enterprise classes come from social media and on-line programs. He says he owes quite a bit to LinkedIn: “It’s an important social community for college kids. It’s a ability that needs to be taught in colleges as connections matter greater than followers, even schooling.”

The face of entrepreneurship is getting youthful. In keeping with a 2023 Connectd analysis, 92% of startups based by Gen Z (18-24 yr olds) within the US began off as facet hustles. In a survey by SCORE, 38% of Gen Z respondents stated entrepreneurship is the most effective profession path. Richa Bajpai, founding father of Campus Fund, a enterprise capital agency targeted on pupil entrepreneurs, informed ET final yr that within the 4,800 student-led startu p s they evaluated, the proportion of these beneath 22 years surged from 60% in 2020 to over 75% in 2024. the pattern is now everlasting. He identifies three components: the primary has all the time existed, the second took place 10 years in the past and the third is a latest phenomenon. He explains, “First: younger folks have a really low notion of what precise threat is. They’re irrationally optimists. That type of audacity is required in entrepreneurship. Second: entry to capital. Now, enterprise capitalists are open to funding first-time founders, even actually younger ones. Then the likes of Shark Tank have made entrepreneurship a household dialog. Third, AI has dramatically diminished the price of beginning up, significantly in tech.” He believes that entrepreneurs are solely going to get youthful.

Adarsh Kumar, who’s from Motihari, Bihar, is finding out in Class XII at Jayshree Periwal Worldwide College, Jaipur, on a full scholarship. He says he began his entrepreneurial journey at age 14 when he obtained his first laptop computer. It was a T-shirt enterprise that folded earlier than the tees. “I used to be an entrepreneur even earlier than I may pronounce the phrase.” Since then, he labored on many concepts which finally shut just like the social enterprise Mission Badlao and a web based tutoring website Learnly. Now he’s constructing Skillzo that brings twenty first century expertise to college students, significantly in underserved geographies, by providing entrepreneurship programmes and mentorship to them. “I need to give instruments to children like me. This yr we’re planning to upskill 1 lakh college students utilizing a mannequin we’re creating by way of AI,” says Kumar, who has greater than 12,000 followers on LinkedIn.

He feels his entrepreneurship has created alternatives—he’s a Google Youth Advisor by way of the buyer insights company Canvas8, which implies he’s one of many 58 advisors chosen worldwide that be sure that Google retains youth wants entrance and centre when creating new merchandise, options and providers.

He has additionally obtained the backing of his faculty CEO Ayush Periwal.

MENTAL HEALTH TO HAIR CARE

The children are involved about all the pieces from psychological well being to hair care to taxes. Nashik-based Vaikhari Sonawane, 18, calls herself a hustler. “I used to be in a dummy faculty after Class X. I didn’t socialise quite a bit for 2 years. All my free time was for build up Aatman, which began as a psychological well being weblog 4 years in the past.” Eager to do extra, she labored with Dr Vasantrao Pawar Medical School, Hospital & Analysis Centre to plot a psychological well being curriculum for college kids. She says Aatman has been in a position to take psychological well being schooling to over 300,000 college students. Sonawane additionally has began Chamak, a advertising company, with a buddy and isn’t shy of attempting out new issues. In 2023 she began Schola, a platform for top schoolers to attach with faculty college students. “It folded in two years, but it surely taught me why paperwork is essential.”

Paperwork is what Anoushka Poddar, 16, needs to study in her third yr of entrepreneurship. A pupil of Dhirubhai Ambani Worldwide College, Mumbai, she began Snazz, a private care model for teenagers, as a response to her personal struggles with pores and skin, hair and confidence.

“It took me eight months to develop the formulations for my shampoo and conditioner, working with lab assistants and a manufacturing unit in Thane. At the moment, nobody would take me significantly.” Her mother and father helped her with the legalities. Month-to-month, she says, Snazz sells about 1,000 items at Rs 650 every. She is planning to launch lip balms and sunscreen this yr. The largest problem? “Time administration. The older you get in class the much less free time you will have.”

For 17-year-old Manas Sood, founder o f TaxCity—a card recreation that gamifies the tax system—age is a hindrance. Initially, he had a tricky time convincing colleges to let him maintain periods on taxes and funds. He launched the sport in 2023 and, in two years, he says it has been distributed in about 45 colleges throughout 14 states and has generated Rs 5.5 lakh by way of gross sales.

“We’re working to launch a web based model this yr,” he says. Sood needs 17 to launch in three international locations by 2027—US, UK and Nepal. “Practically 70% of initiatives began by under-18 college students are deserted after they go to school,” he says, including that TaxCity isn’t going to satisfy that destiny though he begins faculty within the University of Southern California. He plans to introduce seven extra video games within the subsequent two years.

Whereas LinkedIn yielded two internships and eight of 12 collaborators for Sood, Instagram is the launch pad for Thane-based Nidhi Nair. The 20-year-old is a cofounder of the occasion administration firm Saddi Galli whose “Rip-off Sangeet” aka faux sangeet events have gone viral. It began as a “timepass” for Nair and her three buddies— Paras Chaudhari (occasion head), Alisha Chowri (occasion stylist) and Gaurav Joshi (logistics head). Nair, who’s the advertising head, says, “We didn’t consider this as entrepreneurship! However after we went viral, we obtained sponsors, the occasion was bought out and now we have now a calendar of occasions. Even somebody from Shark Tank approached us!” She says being younger could make securing sponsorships troublesome.

Going through mistrust is par for the course for younger founders. Hyderabad-based Appalla Saikiran, founding father of Scope, an invite-only networking and fundraising platform for startups, is sort of acquainted with it. When he began his entrepreneurial journey 5 years in the past, at age 17, nobody gave him the time of day. “As a younger entrepreneur, you’re always beneath scrutiny. In the event you ease a bit, folks will say you’re slacking off or have misplaced curiosity. You may’t afford to make a mistake.

Failure is seen as fraud in India.”

‘ENTREPRENEURSHIP IS A SKILL’

Rohit Kashyap, 23, who began out at 14 in Patna with the now defunct foodtech enterprise Foodcubo, is a self-taught entrepreneur. He says entrepreneurship occurred due to “zaroorat”, necessity. “These days folks take up entrepreneurship as a result of it’s cool or for faculty admissions overseas. This has created hurdles for us as buyers don’t take us significantly. Entrepreneurship isn’t beginning a enterprise, it’s a ability,” he says. In 2019, he began Maytree College of Entrepreneurship, which works with first-time entrepreneurs and state governments to develop startup ecosystems within the grassroots degree. Kashyap says LinkedIn, the place he has greater than 10,000 followers, and Quora, with over 25,000 followers, have helped him: “Affect is useful however nothing works higher than a private connection. 5 buddies are more practical than 5,000 followers.”

Ajinkya Jadhav created his first enterprise WeAllTeen, a youth-led suppose tank, at age 17. At 26, he’s now main Praesidio Care, headquartered in Larger Nashik. It incubates ventures targeted on healthcare, mobility and public security. He says “startup” means one thing completely totally different right now from 5 years in the past. “It’s not nearly hypergrowth or elevating tens of millions. Now, a startup could possibly be a solo founder constructing a product studio from their laptop computer, a distinct segment D2C model promoting by way of Instagram, and even an AI device with 200 loyal customers. What issues is function, readability and execution—not scale.” It’s a “begin now, scale later” world.

Jadhav contends that whereas titles like “founder” or “CEO” are used a bit loosely, that’s not a nasty factor. “Everybody has their very own causes for claiming it. In lots of instances, that title merely means, ‘I’m critical about this.’ However buyers, mentors and accelerators look previous titles.

They need to know if there’s one thing actual beneath. Is there an actual drawback being solved? Is there any type of traction—early customers, suggestions loops, partnerships? Do founders perceive their market—the scale, the gaps, the competitors? Is there workforce energy? That separates a cool concept from an actual firm.”

Warikoo agrees. He tells younger founders to not suppose this shall be for the long run: “What you’re is a builder, what you’re is an issue solver, and that doesn’t imply you solely have to unravel one drawback in your whole life.”

Tanvi Bhatt, private model strategist for entrepreneurs, says constructing a private model is extra essential than ever. Her recommendation: don’t copypaste utilizing AI, be genuine, be away from your function. “Thought management will get constructed if you convey a perspective to the desk, your individual distinctive lens of issues. Don’t do it as a result of everybody else is doing it or do what everybody else is doing.” Her recommendation is to not use the title “CEO” as that’s earned after a sure management expertise. “Founder or explorer is a greater match. It’s additionally strategic because it means you’re open to studying.” And the educational curve is steep and lengthy. Warikoo says, “Preserve attempting as a result of statistics say, a minimum of within the US, entrepreneurial efficiency rises with age.” What the younger founders have is a head begin.