Profile Evaluation : Indian Male 27yrs ; 750 GMAT

Question

Please evaluate my profile:

Indian male 27 yrs old.

GMAT : 750 (Q50;V41)

College : BE IT from one of the top private universities in India. GPA 7.27/10

Work Ex: 5.5 yrs
Current: Founder and head of water purification company (annual $50K revenue). Started working in the company full time since August 2012.
Previous: Worked as a systems engineer at Infosys (received top 1+ rating) and business development at Oracle (Got top sales rep award)

Extra curricular:
School : 
Chief Secretary for Annual Science Festival at school. was involved in fund raising and organizing the event.
Won 2nd prize honda science olympiad. A science oriented quiz which involved schools from my state.
Merit certificate from school for all round excellence.
College :
Member of organizing team for college festival where I Organized the computer gaming competition. Also member of organizing team for various other events like international conferences etc.
Founded an organization called 'SARAN' and organized rock shows to raise money for local orphanage.

Currently working with NGO's to provide potable water to villages, slum areas, government schools etc. Have executed projects which have brought potable water to over a 100 households.

Applying for the fall 2015 intake.

Target schools : Need help with this one. I'm not sure which schools would gel with my background.

Post MBA goals: Entrepreneurship / Working the renewable resources sector

Thanks a million !

Admissionado · Answer

Hey there good sir!
Before I answer you, let me ask you a bit more about your firm, because a lot will be riding on your story and success.
How big is your firm? How many employees? How has it grown? Have you gotten any external investment? Why did you start it? And where do you hope to take?

A biiiiiit more info can go a looooooong way...

Hope this helps!
Best,
JF

arjunkalsy · Answer

Thank you for the reply sir !

My company has 6 employees (including me). My market cap would be around $10K (company is privately held). It has been growing steadily, until I took over full time post which we have had a 100% growth in revenue (this is through more sales, trimming workforce and also stifling out pilfering which was going on behind my back). There has been no external investment, though I had borrowed some money from my dad initially. Right now the company is paying all the house bills, me and my parents included.

I started this company when, living in bangalore, i noticed that everyone was using bottled water for drinking as the normal water was contaminated. Also the water purifiers available in the market were expensive and out of the reach of a typical middle class household (although to be fair, the prices have come down a lot now due to increased competition in this sector and the indian market for water purifiers is projected to grow to over $1 billion by 2015). So at the time i felt that, if you can't afford bottled water, you're basically screwed. So cheap affordable water purifiers should logically have a good market. More research seemed to back this up and that is how I started.

My plan is to increase revenue and try to implement sustainable water purification solutions for small communities.

I completed a project in a village, where we were able to install and run an water purification system and thus provide potable water to the entire village. By putting a $.01 cost on a bucket of water, we were able to not only run the machine in a sustainable manner (electricity costs + maintenance) but also provide employment to a disabled veteran (ex-army), who now maintains the machine on the daily basis. I want to be able to scale these kinds of solutions to larger communities and provide potable water to more people. Not sure if this makes sense, but yeah.... that's the plan.

So I implore upon you good sir, to help me on my quest !! I needed some advice on which schools to apply. Though beggars can't be choosers, please let me know which schools would be a good fit for me.

Admissionado · Answer

Hey there,
thanks for the additional info. It really helps. so what I like about your company is the STORY - Bringing clean drinking water to those who don't yet have access. I think it's a good opportunity, and something that also can have a real impact on the world. And schools will like this a lot.

In terms of the size of the company, for the moment, I don't think they will be aaaall that impressed yet (it's still a bit too small), but that's why I think it will be best if you focused a lot on the MEANING of what you want to do.

Since you are not an IIT graduate, likely top 10 schools will be a bit of a stretch (you can always try one or two though as "Dream schools") and your sweet spot will likely be int he 10-20 range, and your scholarship opportunities in schools ranked a bit below (say the 20-40 range).

I really like your story, and think that if you can tell it well, you can come back with pretty great results!

I wish you all the best,
Jon

RonnieRon · Answer

Jon - I am a bit surprised when you say Top 10 are actually dream schools....Considering that he is Indian applicant, but with startup background (immaterial of the size and scope - NGO or not, mm$ or not), I though he would be a very good shot for Yale, Col, LBS etc...

I am intrigued to know why you thought so - because it will definitely help all of us to know this better what Adcoms really want, apart from really deep pockets.

a simple query being your comment - "in terms of the size of the company, for the moment, I don't think they will be aaaall that impressed yet" - does that mean the other applicants, in the entrepreneur category are Million$ streamers. Adding to it, will only IIT grads get any notice with a top 10? How is that mix, also considering he wants to continue with Water segment post MBA....

Thanks for your reply.

+1 if your like my comments

Admissionado · Answer

Hey Ronny,
You have good points, and I'll try and answer all of them. But first of all, let me give my little caveat that this evaluation is based on two forum posts, and normally before we figure out where a candidate should apply we would dig a wee bit deeper.

So first of all, the strength of a startup will impress based on its concrete results or growth. It's true, I'd say that a somewhat successful startup is still better than your average IT job. About that there is no doubt, but still, they will look at if you have gotten funding, how many people you have led, how much growth there has been, what achievements you personally have and what achievements the company has. And right now, it seems that Arjun is at the beginning of his enterprise, and it is of yet a bit hard to tell. Which means that the Adcom will have to take a risk on him. And they might - if his story is awesome. Especially since his startup will help people.

Secondly, as you probably know, the Indian applicant pool is huge and tough. And a 750 is awesome as a GMAT, but I am seeing (like the schools are seeing) dozens and dozens of Indian candidates with such great scores, so nobody will get in on GMAT alone. And the truth is that the majority of Indian candidates in top 10 schools come from IIT. That's not to say that it's impossible for a non-IIT to get in, buuuuut it is harder, and if the GPA is not awesome (8 or above in most cases) then it's even harder.

And those are the main things that make me think that 1-10 would be dream schools, and 10-20 competitive. And that's also why I think that the most successful application will ride on the story of what he wants to do,

I hope this makes sense,
And if you have any thoughts/questions/doubts, drop a line,
Best,
JF

Profile Evaluation : Indian Male 27yrs ; 750 GMAT

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