Do we have any in our midst?
“The Hour will not come … until nearly thirty “dajjals” (liars) appear, each one claiming to be a messenger from Allah.” (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)
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I run a home business. Its a rather small, uncomplicated operation. Perhaps that doesnt qualify. smile
Learn to love yourself, then learn to love one-another
This is not my Paradise
i intend to, after i graduate, to buy an apt/house somewhere around a university and rent it out to students at obscene monthly rents, just the way im being squeezed off my OSAP right now, until i make enough to buy another apt and rent that out too until i land a rather huge property business and thus i become an entrepreneur.
gee, my khayaali pulao taste good
during MBA myself and some guys at another business school in the city started a business exporting refurbished laptops to eastern europe. Estonia in particular. It went very well for about a year and then we closed shop because we could not have competed with the major distributors moving in. Now dabble a little in this and that but nothing substantial.. unless my work with my jigar azkar here counts
What kind of business is it Munni ?
http://www3.pak.org/gupshup/smilies/smile.gif
“The Hour will not come … until nearly thirty “dajjals” (liars) appear, each one claiming to be a messenger from Allah.” (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)
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hehe..that is a cool idea…do you think the students would pay high rent though?
“The Hour will not come … until nearly thirty “dajjals” (liars) appear, each one claiming to be a messenger from Allah.” (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)
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That sounds really interesting fraud..how did you guys come up with the idea?
“The Hour will not come … until nearly thirty “dajjals” (liars) appear, each one claiming to be a messenger from Allah.” (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)
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Hinna
there was one guy at wharton from estonia who figured out that after the fall of the iron curtain, there was not only need in business for technology tools but also the gadget culture was brewing and people in the eastern bloc wanted some of the "cool' gadgets that their western counterparts were using.
Now the price of the laptops was fairly high there. we had seen prices of refurbished laptops in US and decided that we will try to check the market there. The basic value proposition was that we can get you the same laptop you would have bought in estonia for about 60% of the price if you could place the order and wait 2 weeks. The added charm of "imported from USA, especially for you" also played up well.
We would then talk to some of our suppliers to get us the laptops and then cargo them over to estonia every 2 weeks. We later started sending new laptops and even started getting them direct cargo from taiwan to estonia where our agent will pick it up from and then people will collect it from his office. The parcel service was too bad for us to have it done in other ways.
What worked for us was that we used an existing electronics business of my estonian buddy's cousin as our distribution point and that we had very little overhead costs. The goal of this venture was to just get some extra pocket money. We did better than that.
When local people in Estonia with financial backing started opening up real compputer stores and other companies from western europe started moving in, we had the option to either present this idea to venture capitalists to build upon, or to leave the market. After talking to some VC firms we decided that the risk and effort as well as the competition was not adding up right and decided to call it quits.
Wow!! That's sounds so cool! I guess you had the opportunity and the connections at the RIGHT time!! So how did you find all the key players..ie the agent..and the suppliers in Taiwan?
"The Hour will not come ... until nearly thirty "dajjals" (liars) appear, each one claiming to be a messenger from Allah." (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)
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teh agent was he cousin of my estonian buddy. for the suppliers in taiwan we made inquiry from their trade board and economic attaches and talked to some companies. Being in business school we had access to taiwanese students who also used their contacts back in Taiwan to find out which groups would be a good match to deal with a group with a low volume such as ours. Oliver then went to Taiwan to meet with 2 of the companies and sign the agreements.
Throughout we had the help of the small business development center at the university which was run by Business school faculty and students as a service to small businessmen for a nominal fee.
The important think in his approach I think was the existing local distribution he had. Similar services can also be set up in Africa as there are very few people investing out there and so the price differences are huge but the big thing would be to have someone local you can trust who has the distribution infrastructure set up.
With the Amazons and the Ebays this has become ever more difficult unless you are dealing in specialty items but there is definately a market out there for a whole range of items in little known countries.
ahan..hmcq you're absolutely right..if you don't have people that you can trust..then you're totally screwed!!!
"The Hour will not come ... until nearly thirty "dajjals" (liars) appear, each one claiming to be a messenger from Allah." (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)
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well I was the CFO and co-founder of Gulab Jaman Stall at International week while I was in school .. we had to shut down our operations after massive 'fraud' was discoverd .. our auditors Andresen was neck deep into Sheera-Money .. additonally we were accused funneling our money to Mumy-Dady movement of Islamabad ..
Hey one more thing
These things are hard to explain
For some it seems strange... to swallow
The frontier of our minds
Is the last place we find
But maybe the first place we should go
[quote]
Originally posted by Rooster-Blues:
**well I was the CFO and co-founder of Gulab Jaman Stall at International week while I was in school .. we had to shut down our operations after massive 'fraud' was discoverd .. our auditors Andresen was neck deep into Sheera-Money .. additonally we were accused funneling our money to Mumy-Dady movement of Islamabad ..
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[/quote]
hot dang! didnt you do any jail time for that?
[quote]
Originally posted by Fraudz:
**teh agent was he cousin of my estonian buddy. for the suppliers in taiwan we made inquiry from their trade board and economic attaches and talked to some companies. Being in business school we had access to taiwanese students who also used their contacts back in Taiwan to find out which groups would be a good match to deal with a group with a low volume such as ours. Oliver then went to Taiwan to meet with 2 of the companies and sign the agreements.
Throughout we had the help of the small business development center at the university which was run by Business school faculty and students as a service to small businessmen for a nominal fee.**
[/quote]
Which MBA school did u go to ?
for whatever little it may be... I have a small consulting company registered through which I work as a free agent - done a few contracts with Cisco and IBM... and some SMEs' in Toronto.
Its nothing major but helps me through school by keepin me self-employed but I still gotta take care of all the associated business overheads.
So Umar, are you the only consultant or are there others as well? And how did you get started?
"The Hour will not come ... until nearly thirty "dajjals" (liars) appear, each one claiming to be a messenger from Allah." (Sahih Bukhari, Sahih Muslim)
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Hinna,
currently its more of a one-man-show... but I have a database of friends and some of my students from classes who I know qualify under a certain skill-set, so I do referrals to them if there's a job that I can't do but someone else can.
I'm presonally more on the eBusiness solutions side, so if someone needs an AS/400 systems consultant, I can't do that and I would refer them to someone I know who can. I've successfully placed a couple of friends who graduated from U of T with me last year and were looking for work in the same way and alhamdullilah its worked out fine for'em.
In an ideal world, the people whose skills I know are in demand should be in my consultants roster, and my business should be offering them a service as well... but I just don't have enough resources in terms of administration and time with the school and office work that I have.