Kevin Rustagi

Photo: This is my laser-cut business card, Version 3.1 of the Laser Kard - my product that is approaching launch.    *For those of you savvy folks who see the website, on my card - sorry! it's still under construction!  We'll be completely up in the next few months.

Over the summer, I sat late night in China and wrote over and over again in my notebook, the words Project X, Y, Z. 

I'm driven to accomplish amazing things.  But to accomplish those, I've got to have concrete goals.  For me, these often come in the form of projects.

And so I sat, thinking about the future and what I wanted to accomplish in the next few years at MIT.  I've sadly realized my own 'college mortality', meaning that in 2 years I'll have to bid MIT farewell.  Lifelong friends and some of the most fantastic opportunities someone of my own age can hope to be offered.

But foresight is the antidote to all things limited by time.

I wrote those letters over and over again - X, Y, Z.

I decided to that I wanted to become more involved in Camp Kesem, (see:  http://kevinrustagi.com/camp-kesem-nothing-short-of-amazing ) - Project X, check.

Project Y - couldn't think of that one (has become the live music student group in unison with my band, but I hadn't figured that out yet - check it out at http://theinfinitemusic.com).

Project Z - I've always talked about starting my own company.  Entrepreneurship is indeed the sexy topic of choice on many college campuses, especially MIT.  I was no different, but I was always waiting for the 'right idea'.

Entrepreneur and a good friend of mine, Arjun Mehta (exchange student last year from Cambridge), recommended the book, Screw It Let's Do It, by Richard Branson.  I picked up a copy in Mumbai as I was traveling in May/early June.

Richard Branson had this to say: "Ideas are like trains... there's always another one coming."

That coupled with a recent conversation with T. Patrick Walsh, CEO and Founder of Greenlight Planet(see: http://greenlightplanet.com ) inspired me to pick an idea to go with.

I'd toyed with the idea of making the business cards that I'd created (for the backstory, see: http://kevinrustagi.com/mycard)  into a business briefly before laughing it off.  It would be far too expensive, I told friends and family.

My roommate in China, Julien, challenged me, when I told him it could never be a business, that the math didn't work out - "Are you so sure?"

My answer was no.  I ran some numbers.

Project Z started then and there.  I wrote a proposal to receive mentoring from some established advisors at MIT.  A phone call during a layover in Newark on the way home from China confirmed that my grand proposal to provide value in a unique non-intuitive way was going to fly with the advice of established entrepreneurs and advisors at MIT.

I've been working on this steadily for a semester now, and we're getting close to shipping our first orders.  In the future, I may write about some of the adventures that we've already and are yet to experience.

More than anything, I'm learning what it takes to be an entrepreneur.  To live an idea.  To give the same pitch over and over again, until I can say it in my sleep.  To believe that my idea will provide value in an already crowded market place.

High-end business cards for people who want to make an impact. 

Here's a brief list of what's gone on in the past several months (again, will go into more detail later on)

• Over 100 Surveys on User Experience and Design
• Prototyping runs and User Testing
• Pricing based on Surveys
• Interviewing and signing on my partner (a fellow MIT student, he is extremely skilled and a trusted friend)
• Reading entrepreneurship books
• Going to a student entrepreneurship conference at Harvard
• Setting up ~10-15+ meetings with Professors at MIT and local entrepreneurs to discuss the idea and implementation
• One of our design mentors was even nice enough to take the cards to a design conference in Korea with him to get feedback.
• Hiring a designer to do contract work on the cards (the initial design above shown is my design entirely with the help of surveys - it's version 3.1)
• Finding a supplier (it's not as easy as it looks; the one we've found is excellent)
• Asking for funding from friends and family (we've been very fortunate to have supportive people close to us that are willing to let us take risks and learn in this hands-on fashion)
• Incorporating - LaserKard LLC and setting up a business account - Mr. Rustagi (haha, that's my dad - call me Kevin)
• Designing the packaging for our product (a huge part of branding)
• Exploring other innovative cards to offer
• Calling Chinese factories (they speak decent English, but it's fun to practice my Chinese anyway) to explore sourcing unique materials that I cannot find in the United States.
• And most of all - having FUN!

I've already learned so much from this adventure.  The joy and thrill of providing value has never been this real.  I'm concurrently taking MIT's Design and Manufacturing II class (ie. the Yoyo class written about below) as well as the capstone product design course, 2.009 (http://web.mit.edu/2.009/www). 

I can't wait to ship our first orders and understanding exactly how to create a truly lean manufacturing system that will offer more than a product, but rather, an experience.

I mentioned the word thrill earlier.  Because, even though there are ups and downs, starts and stops, I'm realizing more and more that this kind of stuff is the most fun.  Challenging norms and established methods to actively provide value to those who can benefit.

I think I'm finally starting to realize what MIT's motto really means, Mens et Manus - latin for Mind and Hand.