Hello Rodinhooders,
This is my second post after I wrote my debut Discussion.
So, today I am going to tell you about my startup KitabiTukda.
Let me start with a general problem first, I am a Bsc. Finance student at NMIMS, Mumbai. When I was in my first year, I had this economics professor Mrs. Anamika who asked the whole class to purchase this book by an author named “Gregory Mankiw”, well everybody did purchase this 800 Rs book.
Now the thing which happened at the end of semester was very common and usual, nobody ended up studying that whole book, some students just read two chapters, some just read one and some just kept it for showcase including me. I never actually read that book, this is when I realized, I wasted my good 800 Rs on a book which I did not read.
Well, this was the time, when I realized How Good it will be if I had the freedom to purchase this books in parts or chapter-wise. Now since I have already placed a very usual problem in front of you, let me tell you the solution to this but first lets meet the whole team behind it, because they come much above all of this.
Solution: This team created KitabiTukda. So at KitabiTukda you can purchase a college textbook in parts.Well, literally! Buy a complete book or rather only the chapters that you need. So your books fit right where your phone or tablet is.
Cutting to the chase, Kitabitukda Is a start-up that aims at augmenting digitization by providing e-textbooks which are cheaper than the conventional textbooks. One of the few to do so, they are the debutantes in one innovation that is bound to further reduce cost of educational material. The innovation is selling Textbooks chapter wise. The team at KitabiTukda has a very simple reason, they say “when you don’t pay for channels you don’t watch, why pay for chapters you don’t use”.
While we were working on this startup, we faced many unique issues, which I would like to mention here:
1. The ebooks industry in India is very niche, so many local or national level publishers in India do not have their books in the digitized format and this is a major barrier for keeping there books on our platform. The cost of conversion of physical books is too high for now.
2. Since, I am a normal PHP Coder, we needed to outsource this development to a Tech company, and this is a barrier to launch your business as soon as possible. When your work is outsourced, you really need to wait for the other side to get the work done. You cant do much accept falling at their feet to get the work done.
3. The ready to go market strategy and the factor to drive more users (especially students and teachers)
Right now, we are into Beta Phase Testing, You can register to have the Beta Version 🙂
We write some “Kickass Blogs” for College/School students. Check them here. I had be glad if someone would like to write for us. Just ping me at yash@kitabitukda.com
Would love to know the solution to the above problems and a feedback about the product which we are creating.
Questions? I had love to take it. I am following this post and will reply to all your queries.
Yash Roongta
Twitter: yash_roongta
asha chaudhry
loved the name and the idea!!!
way to go!!
Sameer Agarwal
nice idea i am student from nmims as well what we do is we take xerox of those chapter if u can bring cost equal to less than xerox and money is also going to publisher then it can work one more problem chapter we took xerox of are also usually marked with important tags so that will stop me from buying from u
Puneet Arora
Hi Yash,
Have you got the permission of all the publishers & authors for putting their books on your platform? If not, will it not account to plagiarism?
I have applied for beta testing. Looking forward to it.
Puneet
Yash Roongta
Oh Hey Sameer,
Great that you are from NMIMS too, lets meetup someday.
So right now, yes, we are working on a model with publishers which will bring down the cost of the books which almost equals to the cost of xerox.
Also, there will be some basic features such as highlighting, taking notes within the app itself.
Yash Roongta
Hi Puneet,
Thanks for applying, will soon give you the access.
To answer your question, yes we will be having only those books whose publishers have tied up with us.
KitabiTukda is a marketplace, so these publishers will be registered as sellers, so they will have the copyright of all the books and material they host. So to say, we have tied up with some great publishers in the industry whose books will be hosted on our platform. In this way we do not have to account for plagiarism.
Yash Roongta
Thanks Asha
Sameer Agarwal
sure that will be great idea ,send me message i am running my startup as well
Mandar Joshi
Hi Yash its indeed an excellent idea. This part of the Education Marketplace is long due for disruption and you are indeed at a right place at the very right time 🙂 By the way I am an EduTech Consultant and active in this market for past ten years. Following are some of the insights I have for you.
So a lot can be done around your idea and business/revenue model. Lets connect and take this forward. It is indeed an exciting idea and its time has come.
My contact coordinates e Mail: me@mandarjoshi.com Mobile: 9890817339
Yash Roongta
Thank you Mandar,
For a beautiful insight on what all can be done with this venture.
Surely connecting with you after seeing your twitter handle “EduTechBaba”
I really need a EdutechBaba to guide me on this journey now.
Thanks 🙂
asha chaudhry
yash – mandar is one of our earliest members and is a pillar rodinhooder. he is worth holding on to for advice!
Yash Roongta
Hey Asha,
Just realised that after having a small conversation with him.
Scheduled a call with him to take this forward.