India enchants small-time firangi entrepreneurs

B D Narayankar

FOR DECADES, India's best and brightest migrated to the West in search of opportunities. That changed a while ago and India has become a hot destination for foreigners who are working in the IT and BPO sector.

Now, Americans and Europeans are hooked not by the mystical India, but the heady professional opportunities available here. Of late, there are foreigners exploring India not for jobs, but for entrepreneurial ventures.

Take for instance, Sandra Samai. The 30-year-old Corsica-born entrepreneur opened a spa, Lsa Homecare, in Delhi. There are some famous names visiting her spa - Karishma Kapoor, Manish Arora and Rohit Bal. Lsa Home Care is a high-profile spa, targeting high networth individuals in Delhi. Sandra, in initial stages, wouldn't have imagined she would really open a high-profile spa.

As she faced financial problems, she hired and trained four women masseurs and started www.lsahomecare.com where people could book a spa treatment for Rs 2,000 per hour. "My service is the Disney way. The customer is a VIP and there can be absolutely no compromise on quality," said Sandra, who has developed her own training handbook for her staff.

The slightly built 30-year-old Sandra is the product of Disney Institute. She learnt the tricks of aromatherapy massages and managing spas. She hardly knew anything about India, except a few Indians aboard the ship. Her next visit to India was when a classmate from Corsica, who was doing a semester at IIM Lucknow, invited her to visit.

This visit changed everything for Sandra. She started Lsa Home Care after her friend suggested to start a spa. The rest is history. Now Sandra is running a very successful business in India, having more than 300 clients under her company's belt.

ZaaBiz.com

In August this year, a German businessman, Michael Brecht launched a business social networking site for Australians, ZaaBiz.com. Since then, ZaaBiz.com has expanded to India. "Within a few weeks of launching in Australia I figured there were 30,000 users from the Indian diaspora," explains Brecht, "I thought, why not launch it formally in India?" According to Brecht's figures, Indians could con­stitute 70 per cent of ZaaBiz.com's projection of one million members, the largest in the Asia-Pacific region.

His team back in Australia has 10 employees of which four are Indians. "I plan to set up a full-fledged office and have a separate marketing team over here," says Brecht. His members are mostly small and medium scale entrepreneurs from industrial sectors, finance, retail and real estate.

ZaaBiz.com has a popular online group called Gateway to India, for entrepreneurs abroad to discuss business op­portunities here. Brecht's clients in Mumbai include PR and travel companies like Adfactors and Blue Lotus Communications.