While their batchmates bask in the glory of securing hefty salary packages, three students of Indian Institute of Management-Ahmedabad (IIM-A) are busy planning their online ventures for the largely untapped tier two and three markets. And these ventures hardly need any seed capital.

Rahul Singhal, who interned with a leading investment bank, plans to start an online medical counselling forum to reach out to people who do not have easy access to medical opinions.

“Doctors are generally restricted to a particular area. There are times where a surgery is recommended for a particular disease but people prefer to have a second opinion. In such cases, people in tier two and three cities do not have a choice but to consult other local doctors for a second opinion,” says Singhal, who also has a master’s in economics.

Singhal plans to have a panel of doctors from all branches of medicine under his forum. “Anybody who has any health problem – be it related to cardiology or neurology, sexual or psychology, needs to type his reports on the website, put current status and get consultation,” says Singhal, who refused a lucrative job.

Similarly, Raja Mukesh Krishna and Arunkumar, who are starting an e-commerce venture together, feel the concept of gifting is growing in the tier two and three markets. “There is a huge potential in these largely untapped markets with few big players. Logistics is an issue in e-commerce and we are looking at some ground realities at present. We are looking at building inventory later so will have to manage only the running cost,” says Raja, a computer engineer, who saw a meeting of mindset with Arun, an electrical engineer at IIM-A, and decided to start the venture with him.

It was the two years spent at IIM-A that gave them a better sense of business, say the students. “IIM-A teaches you to follow your heart and that is exactly what we are doing. The course has been a confidence-booster that has certainly helped give us perspective, besides providing the opportunity to interact with people from all walks of life,” Arun says. Source by Times of India