Scorpio Service & Costs

Owning a Mahindra Scorpio is a dream and you will not only need a bit of money, but also passion to maintain the car. It is no doubt a hazzle free SUV, but it sure needs your attention a bit. But, as long as you adhere to the service schedules, trust me, you can rock with your Beast.

Here is the schedule I followed for my Scorpio and amount paid:

Date At KM Service Type Amount Paid

10-06-2006 715 Free Rs. 0

01-09-2006 4704 Free Rs. 3,100

04-12-2006 9791 Free Rs. 620

29-01-2007 14,861 Free Rs. 1,160

08-06-2007 19,553 Free Rs. 2,900

29-08-2007 24,870 Paid Rs. 4,402

01-12-2007 29,695 Paid Rs.5,994

14-04-2008 35,149 Paid Rs. 7,482

17-06-2008 41,262 Paid Rs.8,495

11-08-2008 44,650 Paid Rs. 7,200

02-01-2009 49,785 Paid Rs.11,554 (Brakpad’s replaced and all oil’s topped)

07-07-2009 55,348 Paid Rs.3,885 (All Oil’s topped up)

The first one is the PDI performed before the car is delivered.

I changed break pads during 24,870 Service.

30,000 / 60,000 / 90,000 (every 30,000 KM) service is going to be the most expensive taking the bill close to Rs.8,000.

Please remember, that this is a Diesel Vehicle and the Free service implies that routine checks are free and any replacements (Oil etc) and labour are chargeable. Do not compare this vehicle to a C/B segment petrol Cars.

Normally, we have a mis-conception that diesel cars are cheaper to maintain (cost of Diesel is less and petrol is almost 50% more), but when it comes to long range maintenance, both costs run parallel.

WEF Tech Pioneers 2007

Recently, i was going through the World Economic Forum’s Technology Pioneers 2007 list which has been published. This list is published every year recognizing the most innovative enterprises around the world. The list is very interesting and gives us an overview of the organization selected and the reason as to why the organization is listed.

I am very happy, impressed and also sad to see only 1 organization from India made it to the list – Drishtee. Now, what does Drishtee do and why are they different?

Dristee is a rural network for delivering information services to Villages, using an electronic information kiosk, known as Drishtee Soochnalaya. These kiosks are run by local entrepreneurs who charge residents for access.

Changing lives in rural India is no small Vision and it needs loads of dedication to be able to achieve it. Drishtee is very strong in its Vision and has gone past various milestones in the last Seven Years of inception.

What Does Drishtee do?

The organization has categorized itself into various aspects, but the punch-line is that it is concentrating in providing self-employment to rural entrepreneurs and also providing opportunity for the rural population to have access to the latest information.

Drishtee’s initiation spreads into Education, HealthCare, Employment Generation, Women Empowerment and Micro-Finance.

KickStart.In

Off-late, “Entrepreneurship” has received a lot of attention. Not that this was non-existent earlier, it is just getting the correct momentum in countries like India.

Recently, a young and self-motivated team has stepped up to create a platform for showcasing entrepreneurial ideas and promoting Entrepreneurship – KickStart.In

KickStart is a not-for-profit organization aimed at promoting Entrepreneurship. The team is young, energetic and comprised of Entrepreneurs, Professionals, Academicians and Entrepreneur-wannabe’s.

What does KickStart do?

Interesting question – we search for ways and avenues to show-case entrepreneurship and provide as much support as we can, to help people with Entrepreneurial spirit show-case themselves to the world.

In this regard, KickStart is organizing HeadStart, a mega event on the 18th, 19th and 20th January 2008 at Indian Institute of Science (IISc) Bangalore in association with Association for Computing Machinery, (ACM) a world renowned organization.

HeadStart

Imagine this – you have a great idea and have been working on it for quite some time. You went around trying to get the best of the feedback before you put in your life time into it. Getting a genuine feedback and commendable recognition is the most difficult part. You have questions on the integrity of people whom you approach and also the knowledge they might have in understanding what you would want to do. You also would like to share your idea with people just incase if anyone would want to fund you in anyway to get your idea rolling.

All the above are thoughts of a entrepreneur in making and wishing for a miracle to happen. We went through all these in our lives (if not all, most of the team members) and do understand that there needs to be a honest platform which needs to be created. KickStart was born with this thought in mind. With our experiences, we wanted to at least help people around us and want to ensure that you do not go through the same pain again and again, instead work on refining your idea.

HeadStart is a three day conference where we are inviting Entrepreneurs, Academicians, Industry Leaders, Venture Capitalists and Students.

During the conference, you will have opportunity to showcase your “working model” and share your idea with people around.

How do you show-case your “working model”?

The process is easy – Visit our website – www.HeadStart.in, and Nominate Your Product; It’s that simple. We have an eminent panel who are ready to share their valuable time to go through your nomination. The panel is the ultimate authority to short list nominations which will be allowed to show case during the event.

So, what are you waiting for? Go ahead and be part of HeadStart.

Apply for Incubation

If you are an Entrepreneur, looking for Incubation, The National Entrepreneur Network (NEN) is providing you the flexibility to apply to 6 Incubation Cell’s at one go. Visit the Apply for Business Incubation page on NEN website and submit your business plan. 

This should be a good start… Good Luck

List of Incubation Centers in India

Here is a list of Incubation Centers in India. Hope this helps to give you a starting point if you intend to start your own company…

NS Raghavan Center for Entrepreneurship Learning (NSRCEL), IIM Bangalore.

Technology Business Incubator, Birla Institute of Technology, Pilani

Center for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship, IIM Ahmedabad

Entrepreneurship Cell, IIT Kharagpur

Center for Entrepreneurship, SP Jain Institute of Management & Research

C-TIDES, IIT Madras

TeNeT, IIT Madras

Society for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, IIT Bombay

Nirma Labs

SIDBI Innovation and Incubation Center, IIT Kanpur

Entrepreneurial Development Cell, IIT Guwahati

Entrepreneurship Development Cell, IIT Delhi

Entrepreneurship Cell, FMS Delhi

Abhiyan, IIM Lucknow

E-Cell, IIM Kozhikode

Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, IIM Calcutta

Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India, Ahmedabad

ICFAI Center for Entrepreneurship Development, Hyderabad

MICA Entrepreneurship Development Center, Ahmedabad

Wadhwani Center for Entrepreneurship Development, Hyderabad

TIME IS, Delhi

Science & Technology Entrepreneurs Park, JSS Academy of Technical Education, NOIDA

National Institute of Industrial Engineering, Mumbai
Entrepreneurship Development Cell, IIT Roorkee

Over a period of time, I will try to explore more into each of the above institutes and provide more information of their process.

NOMAD for MAC

If you have a MAC and a Creative NOMAD range of Music player , then you must be wondering how you would get to connect your music player to the computer. You can download XNJB and install on your MAC which can help you to synchronize the player with MAC. Visit www.wentnet.com for more information. Thank you Richard. You really helped people like me