Life in the fast lane- Raj Jaswa
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For Raj Jaswa, 48, co-founder, president and CEO of the Nasdaq-listed Selectica Inc, driving a BMW is more than a status symbol, it is the company's major lifeline. He loves cars, fast cars. "They truly represent life in the fast...
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For Raj Jaswa, 48, co-founder, president and CEO of the Nasdaq-listed Selectica Inc, driving a BMW is more than a status symbol, it is the company's major lifeline. He loves cars, fast cars. "They truly represent life in the fast lane, life in the Valley," reveals Jaswa. The ride from Mumbai's BEST buses to BMW has been a long and a chequered one for Jaswa. He left India in 1975 after completing his BTech in electrical engineering from IIT Bombay. Unlike many others, Jaswa initially landed in Canada to pursue a Master's programme in electrical engineering from the University of Toronto. "Foreign education was a costly affair then and since he was offered both assistantship & fellowship by Toronto University, he decided to skip the US for higher studies.He completed his MBA from Stetson University. After completing his studies, Jaswa moved to the US in February 1977. Jaswa's first American job was with Harris Corporation at rochester, New York, where " he wanted to save $ 50,000, and retuen to a India". His more immediate concern, how ever, was to move to a warmer location in the US as he dreaded the cold. Fortunately, he landed a job with GE in Florida, the sunshine state of America, and spent four years till July 1981 designing flight simulators. Jaswa did return to India in December 1978 to get married to a software engineer Kalpana Baxi but "was not in a mood to stay back." After all, Jaswa had begun to live the great American Dream a job, his own house and two cars in the garage. He joined Intel in California in July 1981. Intel was a great experience for Jaswa. Here he was exposed to a close co-ordination between the sales and marketing personnel and the engineering and technology dreams. He learnt the dictum 'No problem is unsolvable, as long as managers don't try hiding it under the carpet.' And above all, he faced and environment wherein people were absolutely passionate about the success of an idea. Jaswa spent six years at intel, emerging supremely confident about his skills in sales and marketing, and joined Chips & Technologies in January 1987. If at Intel Jaswa marvelled in the theory of selling, at Chips & Technologies he learnt the art of real selling, travelling extensively around the world, especially in East Asia. He learnt that we could do more business over a cup of coffee or a dinner in Taiwan than in the big offices in the US or Europe. A year later three Taiwanese engineers, the top-notch chip designers, had quit Chips & Technologies and set up OPTi Systems by raising $600,000 from friends and families. In August 1988, they invited Jaswa, himself a top-notch marketing kid by then, to join the board. Life was fast and frantic for Jaswa in the mid-'90s. OPTi took off like a rocket and was on a roll, with sales reaching $163 million in the five years from 1991 to 1995 and profits almost trupling to $50 million. Reason: the foursome team had designed a set of chips to enhance the performance of multimedia audio and video for personal computers built around Intel's 486 microprocessor. They struck it rich when demand for 486 PCS soared in the early '90s. unfortunately, the company stumbled in 1996, with Intel switching over to Pentium chips and OPTi continuing the Valley's never-ending process of birth and death. Jaswa reportedly netted $3.3 million from the company before he quit. " He wanted to retire, but made the mistake of staying in touch with a lot of bright people in the Valley, exploring ideas and starting companies. Jaswa started off by giving free advice to the younger lot of entrepreneurs in the Valley and was inundated with requests. One of the people he met was Sanjay Mittal, who had developed a useful Java applet, enough to ignite him to start Selectia. Starting with an 800 sq ft office and a few tables, selectica managed to raise VC funding of $1 million from Draper International in 1997, with a second round of $3 million seven months later. Selectica, which today employs 600 persons including 250 in India and with sales offices in Europe and Japan, is a leading Internet Selling System provider for e-business. Selectica's Internet Selling System (ISS) helps companies sell complex products and services efficiently across all sales channels. It transforms every step of the sales process, from needs, analysis and product configuration through order capture and renewals, enabling maxlimised revenues and increased customer loyalty. The ISS delivers superior performance, scalability and reliability for mission-critical selling in B2B and B2C applications. ISS is 100 per cent Java and thin client-based. It features a comprehensive application suite that assists users through the selection, configuration, pricing, quoting and fulfilment processes. It integrates with existing enterprise data systems, enabling businesses to easily develop and rapidly deploy a powerful Internet sales channel. The company raised $7 million in the third round of VC funding and went public in March 2000. The IPO was priced at $30. On the first day, shares went up to $150, giving a market cap of $5billion to Selectica. According to a Reuter news report at that time, the individual stake of Jaswa was valued at a whopping $360.3 million. By the same logic, considering no changes in Jaswa's holdings, his net worth at the current market price of $18 would be in the region of $50 million. Naturally, Jaswa, who occasionally finds time for family holidays with his wife Kalpana and sons Sujoy, 20, and Rahul, 13, has no time for scuba diving. Perhaps, just enough for yoga and miditation every morning. "This is crucial if you have to face the fast-paced life in the Valley," says Jaswa. "Speed kills, but if you are in the slow lane in the Valley, you get killed in the marketplace." Not for Jaswa, who is fascinated by fast cars and life in the fast lane.
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A year later three Taiwanese engineers, the top-notch chip designers, had quit Chips & Technologies and set up OPTi Systems by raising $600,000 from friends and families.
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