IIT-IIM start-up entrepreneur launches online venture

With another IIT-B student Maninder on his team now, the two ex-members of the students entrepreneurship cell on the campus, got their faculty advisor to launch the site by a voice call recorded and played on their site.

Just four months after his convocation from IIM Calcutta, where he opted out of the placement process, Ankur has put together a team with Maninder Gulati, a senior from IIT Bombay who quit his job at ITC to join Lifeinlines.com, Nirjhareswar Bannerjee and Nilesh Pancholi, both accomplished technology people seniors but willing to bet on the shared dream. Excited to see a startup launch on the campus, Prof. U.B Desai of IIT Bombay, launched the site with a voice post to LiL. Its great to see that these guys chose to launch their startup amidst students of IIT, and I wish them all the very best to become a giant in the internet space, said Prof Desai.

Explaining in detail about Lifeinlines, Ankur says, Its about capturing moments, thoughts and experiences from your everyday life, anytime, anywhere, using any media available.

So is it another social networking site? Maninder Gulati, the new Director, explains, Despite all the facilities on emails, messengers and mobiles, amidst fast and busy lives, staying in close touch with people you care for is still rather difficult. Typical exchanges on current social networks are rather superficial or occasional in nature. In that sense, Lifeinlines.com - as a moment by moment chronicle of your life, becomes a simple and powerful way to stay in intimate touch with people you care for.
And how does it work? Your moments can be captured rather easily on Lifeinlines - sending an SMS/MMS, making a phone call to record your voice, sending a message or updating your status on Gtalk, sending in an email or writing in directly on the website, Ankur explains. Each post inclusive of words, images, voices and videos - can be stored privately, or shared with selected people across six layers of privacy.

Confident that the concept is the first of its kind in India and a unique one even internationally, Ankur says on the current state, Its now time to spread the word and reach out to the audience in India and abroad and were looking at forging some relationships that might be helpful towards that. About his source of guidance, he says that Mr. Ajit Balakrishnan, the CEO of rediff.com and the chairman of the Board of Governors at IIM Calcutta has been an informal mentor and kind enough to offer advice and references frequently.