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A WIN AT THE CHINA BUSINESS PLAN
COMPETITION CAN PROVIDE THE MOMENTUM A YOUNG COMPANY
NEEDS TO MAKE THE LEAP TO THE NEXT LEVEL. PICTURED,
LEFT TO RIGHT: G. ANANDALINGAM, SENIOR ASSOCIATE
DEAN, LISA CHAN, CRYSTAL LIN, JEFFREY CHANG, ASHER
EPSTEIN, DIRECTOR OF THE DINGMAN CENTER FOR
ENTREPRENEURSHIP |
When ZaraCom Technologies Inc., took the grand prize—and
$25,000—in the Smith School’s third annual China Business
Plan Competition, it was the end of a long and arduous
journey. Their win, which was announced on Sept. 10, 2007 at
TsingHua Innovation Plaza in Beijing, was the culmination of
the yearlong competition that began with more than 200
strong competitors.
ZaraCom’s software uses artificial intelligence to help
wireless carriers optimize their wireless networks, the huge
infrastructure that makes mobile phones possible. ZaraCom
software can potentially save wireless carriers billions of
dollars by reducing the need for some of the highly
specialized and enormously expensive equipment the networks
use.
ZaraCom was established in 2002 by Jeffrey Chang, a
doctoral student and researcher who was interested in
network optimization and was planning to put his software on
a Web site for free download. Lisa Chan, a co-worker,
convinced him to try to develop a marketable product
instead.
ZaraCom co-developed a prototype of its software with
KDDI, a large wireless carrier in Japan, and then spun
itself off as a separate company. They were referred to the
China Business Plan competition by Tien Wong, an
entrepreneur-in-residence with the Smith School’s
Dingman
Center for Entrepreneurship and CEO of Opus8.
“I was quite nervous because the other participants were
all very outstanding. We didn’t really expect to win. I
think two out of the five finalist companies were already
break-even, so their performance was excellent. I do think
we had a good business model, and the judges were looking
for that,” says Chan. “We tried to simplify the language and
not focus on the technology, which turned out to be a
winning strategy.”
 What’s
the next big step for ZaraCom? Right now they are working
with China Mobile to plan a wireless network that can handle
the influx of visitors the country expects for the 2008
Bejing Olympics. The company has an ongoing relationship
with the Dingman Center, which is providing them with advice
on fundraising and business development. They are also
poised to make the most of the momentum from their
competition win.
“After we won first place we got more angel investors in
Singapore, China, Japan, Taiwan, and the United States,”
says Chan. “The competition helped us gain the funding we
needed to continue to build our company, penetrate the
worldwide market more aggressively and continue to develop
new technology.” |
