Entrepreneurship
The Journey of entrepreneurship is one that is less travelled, but for those bold enough to start their own businesses, they can create opportunities and become wealthy. At the Youth Global Forum I met Rakesh Biswas and Suhas Gopinath who became entrepreneurs at a young age.
Rakesh is the Founder and Chairman of International Youth Society of Eco-Friendly and Renewable Technologies(IYSERT), which has operations in eight countries. He is the youngest person to have applied for 7 patents in India. Rakesh won Best Suggested Project Award(Social and Quality Improvements in India) at the Rhodes Youth Forum in 2012 and the SAM Global Youth Award in 2014.
Rakesh told me the importance of protecting my work through patents and giving back to my community even after I’ve become successful. We also had a good chat about his home state Rajasthan,where I had previously gone to for a friend’s wedding in the ‘Pink City’ Jaipur.
Suhas Gopinath is the founder of Globals and HappyEMI.Globals is a Web Solutions company that grew to become one of the biggest analytics company for the Education and Public sector.HappyEMI is a digital lending platform based in India. Suhas was honoured as a young global leader at the World Economic Forum. His other honours include being a Member of France’s Young Leaders Club, being a Winner of the New York Mayor’s Venture Fellow and being a Former Advisory Board Member of World Bank. At the age of 14, he was the world’s youngest CEO and BBC did a documentary about him.Check the link below for the documentary: https://youtu.be/BZ3MrxuqYd8
Suhas explained to me the importance of mentorship and knowing what mentor I need for the level that I find myself. He also encouraged me to take risks, and I found out that he followed Bill Gates to the bathroom to pitch himself(speak of being bold!). Interestingly, Suhas has been to my country Zimbabwe, where he did some youth projects with our former deputy prime minister Arthur Mutambara.
If you a young person and you want to be an entrepreneur, go ahead and start your journey. You can never be too young.
Sibonginkosi Moyo 