iMH: The Dream, The Debut, The Goodbye

I started iMH on 1st Feb '22. I was 20 years old then, with a very simple vision to help companies enhance their value exchange dynamics with their target group, by solving communication, connection & coordination-related problems, and by providing creative & technical solutions. This sounds broad & vague at the same time, ofc I got a lot of criticism because of this... “ohh what does that even mean,” “this doesn't sound like a startup idea,” “what is your product, again?”

Here is the thing: it was never intended to be a startup. iMH has always been, to me, a group of people who are just passionate and excited to solve the most critical problem in front of them—doesn't matter if it requires going on the ground and talking to 100 people and asking them to fill a form, or sitting down in a room for indefinite days and shipping an astonishing AI model that could talk & behave like a human. Yeah, we also took on a few startup ideas in this journey. They never took flight, ofc, for one simple reason: we were trying to be everything at once. Now ik ofc it's stupid.

Today marks the last day of our operations. Yes, I am shutting down my first company after giving it everything I could in the last 3 years. People say “first is always special, it stays with you forever, even if it didn’t work out.” Maybe (& hopefully) they are right. The memories and learning I got will stay with me forever, and whatever I will be able to achieve in my life, credit will always be given to this initiative I took 3 years back.

I am writing this article probably for two reasons:

1) People could know what the journey was all about—what we were, what we could never become but intended to...

2) I never posted or wrote anything about iMH anywhere, so I wanted to write about it at least once, so I could read it 5, 7, or 10 years after.

I will write about this journey in key moments—moments that hold great meaning to me. In some moments I felt I was the king of this world; in some moments I felt I was the most stupid and unworthy dude of this universe. Sometimes I will mention a few names, sometimes I will not (either way, please don't mind, I'm just trying to write a good article—this is also my first time).

Nov '20:

I couldn't state precisely where my entrepreneurial journey started, because I was sort of rebellious since I was a student in class 6th/7th. I used to challenge the status quo. People would often say to me, “yrr yeh toh aise hi hota h,” “you have to go with the conventional path,” “if you go with your intentions and work in your own way, you will fail most definitely”... and most of the time my reaction or attitude was... “let's try it once, it will be an honor for me to fail in my own way rather than succeed through someone else's ways.”

After clearing JEE in Nov '20, my JEE mentor at that time, PJ sir ( Prashant Jain ) , gave me an opportunity to lead a project named “Know India.” It was supposed to be an NPO, an organization that would make citizens more culturally, socially, and politically aware so they could take better and more informed decisions. I took that responsibility, and that was the first time I started selling the vision to people. I engaged almost 10 of my batchmates from IIT Bombay on various roles, from tech, media to content... maybe they also got engaged because what else does a guy or girl in their 1st sem do... say yes to everything that comes your way, xd.

This project went on for like 5/6 months, but we didn't achieve anything substantial. I was responsible for it because, honestly, I was not committed to the mission. So I left the project.

Jun '21:

After leaving Know India, I was in Kota (this is not my hometown, but always a second home to me). I couldn't go to college at that time (thanks to that Chinese virus and also there was someone in Kota I wanted to spend more time with)... but to live there, you needed money. I didn't want to take money from home from this point, so I started looking for an opportunity that could offer me some earning while learning. Then again I met one of my fav JEE teachers, SM sir ( Shishir Mittal ) . He was building & running his own ed-tech company, Vyas Edification. I went to him, asked for some work... he offered me an intern role. The title was never decided but I basically played the role of chief of staff or founder's office guy. There I learned how to craft a compelling vision, how to hire people, how to get the best out of them, and most important of all: marketing. So now, combining the experience of Know India & Vyas, I understood how to set a vision, how to sell it to people, and how to do marketing of your product.

Feb '22:

I worked as an intern in Vyas till Jan '22. Covid rules got relaxed & I got to my college. Just one month into college & I realized there is nothing that excites me or I want to become part of (maybe I should have actually tried those things before building this judgment, but people's mindset just offs me, there were hardly any original thinkers). I hated the hierarchy & promotional approach there... (people used to say, that's how you learn how to climb the corporate ladder and all) & I was like: I didn't come here to learn how to climb the corporate ladder. The idea was not how you could fit into an existing system but to build one.

So I decided not to become part of anything—from acads, to sports, to cultural, to hostel affairs—ever. Here I convinced a few of my friends to start something of our own & that’s how iMH was started. I was very clear at that time that I wanted to do something that would give me immediate cash (for two reasons: one, because I needed it desperately, and also I believe you will only get someone to pay you in the market if you are giving them sensible value. I really think the second reason helped shape my attitude of a value creator—always—and never just chase fancy valuations).

Again, I approached SM sir, and proposed that I take care of his content creation for social media. He agreed instantly. I assembled a team (more people than I actually needed) & fit them into various roles… In the next 5/6 months, I was about to learn people management and operations. One important learning I got from here was to accept people for what they are, identify and understand what they could do best, and then just back them & provide the environment in which they could perform their best. This approach still helps me, and I am assuming that people who have worked with me see that too.

Mar ‘22:

So now iMH kicked off. I was trying to meet as many people as I could possibly meet—don’t even know why, xd. I guess I was looking for my partner in crime (my business partner precisely). I didn’t know what skill set you should look for in a co-founder back then, but I was obviously a little biased that it should be a “baniya” & of high intelligence, because I am already a people's person (I don’t consider myself a person with a high IQ), so I needed someone who has good business acumen and is an excellent problem solver.

Then one night I was just chilling with my wingmates, and I saw this guy, who I felt, “ya, he’s an original thinker, he could see that innovation is not about fitting into the existing system but building a new one.” I was cringing how E-cell is not about making people learn about entrepreneurship but rather about learning management and getting a good résumé point to get a job in a consulting firm. He had exactly a similar opinion. We bonded over bitching about our college E-cell. I felt I should share my vision of iMH with him and see whether he would become part of it (if everything goes well, he will become my business partner). This person is Puneet ( Puneet Agarwal ) , and that’s how I met him. Since then, we have been working on various projects together. We stayed with each other no matter how tough the situation got. We have seen worse days financially and emotionally together, and lived a few brilliant moments together.

Jun ‘22:

Vyas project is going on. I am in Hyderabad for a few days. I happen to have a call with my idol, RKV sir ( RAM KISHAN VERMA ). He must have heard about me working or might have seen my work... he proposes, “Why don’t you do something for Resonance?” (This institution means more to me honestly than IIT Bombay, because whatever I learned there, I just applied later on.) How could I have refused to work for one of the best coaching institutions of this country? I said yes. As luck would have it, it was a 2nd year summer break... So I, along with 7 of my other batchmates (mostly from IITB & a few from other colleges), got to Kota. It was the generosity of RKV sir: they offered stay, travel, food, and we finalized a 3-month project for money that would be like a typical annual package for IITB fresher graduates. We were supposed to enhance their perception & reputation in the market; it involved robust market research & media strategy & implementation. I considered it to be a big break for myself and my company—sort of like an inflection point. It turned out to be an inflection point just downwards, xd. Many things got broken after that—money, friendship, relationship, my courage & strength.

This was also the phase I legally incorporated my company. iMH got MCA approval on 3rd Aug 2022 as CBTM Services Pvt. Limited. That was a very proud moment for me… I was just 20 year old at that time (for a few moments, I felt like Steve Jobs—a 20-year-old guy running a company—though his company was actually successful and nobody in the world gave a damn about me & iMH).

This was also the most stressful period for me in these last 3/4 years. I had given big commitments to Reso management, and I felt a lot of pressure to deliver on those commitments in the defined time. Honestly admitting, I failed miserably. It was like a disaster (like movie Zero or Jagga Jasoos). After this project, I got into depression maybe. I felt like I have commited scam, I was not able to give what I promised (there are a lot of ifs & buts here, but it doesn’t matter; I blamed myself for this back then).

Nov ’22:

Reso project got finished. I didn’t know what to do next. Should I get another project? What will I tell the next one… “Hey, give me your hard-earned money, I will give you shallow promises in return”… I was struggling emotionally a lot. Financially, I was in a slightly secure space. At similar timelines, two people who are very close to me—like people who were supposed to be there for your whole life—decided to leave me (simply they wanted different things)...

So from here onwards, the downward spiral started. I took a break from iMH by putting its operations on hold. The next 4 months I spent just with me—no social interaction, no work, nothing, just lying on bed for almost 20 hrs a day. I needed time and space. Time does heal everything eventually.

Apr ’23:

So 3rd year of college is about to end. People will go to big companies for intern, some people would go abroad or something. Here, I am wondering what I will do from here… for a very short period of time I reconsidered my childhood aspiration of becoming an IAS officer (it’s just that now I know what they actually contribute)... so I dropped the idea.

One night I was sitting on the terrace of VMCC (it’s a popular building in our campus) & it struck me that it is really hard for people like me—coming from a background of a non-business family, with no generational money & from a small town—to do entrepreneurship. I felt there must be more people who face a similar problem, so why not do something about it… & that’s how I conceived the idea of Zenesis. It was a startup idea, ofc. It was about empowering people in their entrepreneurial journey. So now a guy who could not help himself decided that he will help other not-so-privileged people to do entrepreneurship. It’s a funny tragedy, I would say.

So again I called people—ofc started with Puneet—3/4 more people who might still have faith in me… to my surprise, they all came on board. But here again I did one disaster: I decided I would make it an NPO and would fund it from the money that we would get from iMH projects. Never think of it srsly—like SRK says, don’t become a philosopher (here philanthropist) until you become rich. Sorry, Shahrukh.

We started working on the product roadmap, branding (here me & Puneet discovered that we are damn good at branding stuff). In the same phase, I happened to go to Delhi to have a small intern under one of my fav entrepreneurs, Mr. Prateek Maheshwari . I worked with the head of new initiative, and there I met a few people who then became very important in my life and still support and guide me for my best. I called Puneet also to Delhi, just to spend time together and work on Zenesis. So I spent morning time in the PW office and at night, I worked and took meetings for Zenesis.

July ’23:

That Delhi intern ended now. We will go to the college again in some time. We have made some progress over our Zenesis idea (I am kind of obsessed with making people see what we are building), so then me & Puneet started going to meet people from various backgrounds. We happened to make a visit to Mr. Prashant Kishor’s Jan Suraaj Padyatra in Bihar. We showed them our vision deck—given he was my big inspiration to start something like iMH in first place—his opinion mattered to me a lot. I am not sure if he loved it, but he was definitely impressed with us. He offered us to work with him on a small project for Jan Suraaj (it never got off to anything eventually).

Further, we met NV sir ( Nitin Viijay ) . We heard that he was thinking of building an AI educational mentor, so me and Puneet pitched him NV.ai… it was supposed to be an AI avatar of NV sir which could converse with students through audio & text. He liked the idea; we again got one big sale. Now there is NV.ai project (iMH) & Zenesis running in parallel. We were bound to fail miserably. We just didn't know back then.

Again we assembled a team of the best product & AI engineers for NV.ai project They started to work on NV.ai from the beginning of Sep, finished it in under 2 months. The team built an astonishing product. Whoever has seen that product had a “WOW” moment. Honestly, me & Puneet didn’t contribute much there except the sales part. We were just focused on Zenesis & bringing it to life. So NV.ai project was all managed by our tech co-founder (he was with us for a very short period of time), but yeah, he did a great job back then.

Nov ’23:

NV.ai got delivered, we received our money. On the Zenesis side, we were getting the constant feedback that it’s not a viable business idea… “you should just drop it and focus on this consulting wala thing that you do best” (internally me and Puneet knew we don’t understand anything about AI product building). In summary, we were again at a dead end. We were not able to decide what we should do from here. From Dec onwards, placement season was about to start; both of us had already decided not to sit in that… but all the other team members got busy with it, and we didn’t have much choice but to wait patiently until we figured out the next steps. In the next 2 months (Dec & Jan), we pitched new projects/solutions to various companies but we were not able to get to something. We were stupid enough to pick a new problem statement each time. Late in Jan, we realized we couldn’t get Zenesis anywhere, and we really needed to make a revenue-focused product. So we called off Zenesis here. You could say this is our first startup failure maybe.

Feb ’24:

College will be finished in the next 3 months, we don’t have much sorted after that. Our tech co-founder decided not to continue with us (there is a mix of professional and personal reasons there)... so now it’s just me & Puneet (one is a people’s person, one is a problem solver—we don’t have execution capability by ourselves). We have no startup idea, no team, almost no money. And again, no clarity. It’s pretty clear we struggle with lack of clarity and focus interchangeably.

The only positive thing that happened here was meeting Shradha Mam ( Shradha Sharma ) during our e-summit event. It was an accidental meeting that created a meaningful connection; she still supports us in whatever way possible. We showed her the work we have done, also the concept of Zenesis… given her attitude and commitment to help aspiring entrepreneurs, she proposed an arrangement to work with YourStory on a revolutionary AI product. We were in discussion with the YourStory management for almost 2 months, but given it was a big & risky investment, they were skeptical about the possible ROI… so that deal never happened. Parallelly, there was a slight difference of opinion b/w me and Puneet. He wanted to do things a certain way, I felt a little different. So we also didn’t talk for a very brief time… so there was a period of three weeks (sadly, the last three weeks of my college), where I was just on my own. Starting from Nov ’20 to Apr ’24, everything I have invested in or engaged with either failed, vanished, or left me. I just have this feeling that everything will be fine, but no idea how it will happen.

May ’24:

College is over. I am shattered. No vision, no team, no money. But I was still fighting with very little to no conviction, asking people very desperately to help me—either financially or emotionally.

Puneet & I started talking again (maybe we both realized we are no good without each other). We somewhat agreed to work together again (ofc no idea on what & why). We figured out we could still consult companies (we couldn’t choose to start working on a product idea, because neither of us knows how to write code, and we didn’t want to do that ourselves—ik, wrong attitude, but this is who we are). I was home in May, confused, anxious, and guilty (particularly when I saw my parents). They never said anything to me except supporting me in what I want to do. But every parent has expectations, and even if they don’t, I felt an obligation towards them. But I was helpless and desperate as hell.

I figured out some arrangement with Puneet to start working again (so I went to Jaipur, his hometown) and started meeting people again. Luckily, when we were about to run out of money in a week or so, we met a businessman in Jaipur who liked us and offered a project to work upon. It was mostly around growth and product refinement. We chose it not out of some sheer passion or something, we just did it because we didn’t have a choice after all… he was paying us just enough money that helped us survive. We felt we would soon be in a comfortable position, that everything would be fine again… but this is not how life works. That project didn’t even last 4 weeks; we only got paid for 2 weeks of our work. Same situation. This is almost July. From here to mid-Sep, we sometimes separately, sometimes jointly, worked for different people, but they all had their ideas, their product, their vision… we were just trying to survive in exchange for whatever we could offer.

Sep ’24:

At the beginning of Sep, I was in Noida; Puneet was in Jaipur working for different people on their startup ideas. We just realized this isn’t gonna work for long, and we are not being honest with the people we are working with.

Here enters Arin ( Arin Soni ) (he was also someone who has been supporting me personally and professionally throughout my journey). He is an exceptionally good software engineer & my best friend. Till now, he always worked as one of the team members on various projects, but he had expressed his desire multiple times to become a business partner with me. The timing never got right… he took a job in GGN after college. Ofc he knew all along what’s going on with iMH (particularly with me and Puneet). As luck would have it, he proposed to us: “You guys could come and stay at my place (1 BHK) in GGN… and let’s build a product together :).”

We felt like this was our only chance to break this loop of consulting & going from one place to another, so we took a giant leap of faith, quit what we were doing, and got to GGN in Sep. We had a few pre-mature ideas (AI products again). Puneet understood product engineering, and Arin knew how to execute things on the product-technology front. We started to build some things (initially we chose to do something in education). Me & Puneet had zero money in our accounts… Arin was supporting us on almost every front. These are the moments that establish trust and faith in relationships. But that was just enough to survive, not to build and market the product. I was going out trying to get some capital… but couldn’t, because again we were not clear on what we would build and why.

Again, situation is blank… I believe it’s 20th Sep… Shradha mam called us just to enquire how we were doing. As she came to know about our situation, she offered to support us financially for a while; she even invited us to BLR, arranged a place to stay, asked us to calmly think and decide what we truly want to do. We were meeting different sorts of people, again showing our work & ideas, and a few concepts that we were considering to work upon.

In this chain of events, I met one of our college alums, Mr. Prashant Sachan . He was already thinking of building something in astro through AI. Given we had made NV.ai, it clicked to him that we might be able to crack something here. But this AI astrologer is much more complex than NV.ai, simply because you have to make it do complex astrological analysis at the backend and then give a good conversational experience to the user. But it felt like a good opportunity. He asked us what we would need if he wanted us to take on this opportunity. We asked for money, ofc, & we needed Arin full-time with us (that means he would quit his job and join us here in BLR)... exactly that happened, and that’s how I got my second business partner along with me.

Nov ’24:

So here, three of us—me, Puneet & Arin—got to BLR, started working on Astro AI. I took charge of working on the conversational experience; Puneet was majorly working on product architecture & framework + understanding astro literature so it could be coded out for AI to understand… and Arin was executing everything. This is the first time in our overall journey that we are dedicatedly working on a single thing—undistracted, focused, and determined.

Before we took on this project (also Prashant suggested to us), we decided to stop this consulting/agency wala attitude. This is not right, and it will not lead us anywhere…

Jan ’25:

Now, we are almost done with the Astro AI work. We have built a friendly AI astrologer that is able to do complex astro analyses and give a great conversational experience to the user… hopefully, it will be live to the public in Feb.

But as we have decided we will not function or operate as an agency, we are shutting down iMH on 31st Jan 2025.

We have got some money to work on our thing for the next 2 months maybe. This time we have a clear startup idea, all the skills covered, required to build and ship an MVP, get to PMF & figure out a monetization model. We have got a few people in a mentor capacity, & hopefully soon we will be able to raise funds on this.

The only thing left to say is this: the closure of iMH marks not an end but the beginning of my entrepreneurial journey. As I mentioned earlier, whatever I achieve in the coming years, I owe it all to iMH.

Stay tuned.

Signing off,

Shivaji Raje