New ventures: In the global start-up culture, Pakistan remains behind

KARACHI:
Start-up is a temporary organisation created to focus on driving an idea into a scalable and sustainable business model.

It is important to make sure that the idea is not a ‘copy-cat’ or a clone of an existing idea, but an innovative or creative concept that creates value and stands on its own feet. Clones shrink the pie, provide low value and have slow growth rates, while innovation-driven ideas are high risk, but can exponentially increase the pie, experience high-value-addition and faster growth.

Start-ups are critical for any economy as they act as fertilisers for employment and have many socio-economic benefits.  They help create a practical backdrop for budding entrepreneurs and in driving interest in entrepreneurship as a viable career option. They also serve as job creators and a much needed source of employment.

To check out the impact on employment, lets look at two globally famous start-ups, Apple and Google and an established company like P&G.  Over a 10-year period, using 2004 as a base, P&G work-force has pretty much remained flat, whereas