Experience and knowledge necessary for start-ups

If one wants to learn from some of the world's biggest start-ups, he or she should also consider where the founders of these organisations were before they initiated these companies.
Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak worked at Hewlett-Packard (HP) where he designed calculators. Steve Jobs used to work at Atari where he created circuit board for video games. Jeff Bezos, the current richest man in the world and the founder of Amazon, worked at a "D. E. Shaw & Co", a hedge fund, before he started his own company.
A similar trend can be seen in the local markets as well. The founder of the biggest online book-seller Rokomari.com, Mahmudul Hasan Sohag, worked as an alumni at the US State Department and as a research engineer at Institute of Information and Communication Technology of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET). Waseem Alim, the co-founder of online retail store Chaldal.com, used to work for investment portal SigFig.
One can observe a pattern if the backgrounds of these investors are considered together. Most start-ups were founded by people with experience, knowledge and connections in the existing market. The most prominent exception to this, is Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook..
So, students and aspiring investors should not rely on the myth of building a platform like Facebook while they are still in college or university. They should try to gain some real-life knowledge and experience from different organisations. These factors are necessary for creating revolutionary, useful and sustainable start-ups.
Md. Mozzammal Hossain Bhuiyan
East West University
[email protected]