How This Tech Startup by an IITian is building a global community of artists – Edgenus

• BySheetal Sidhu     |    June 15, 2021

“Entrepreneurship can subject you to trying times, persistent work and nurturing your team will help you move up in the business world.” Jalaj Garg, Founder and CEO, Edgenus while involved in an engaging interview with Startup story.

On his path of following a conventional career path Jalaj found a balance in continuing extra circulars that he was deeply passionate about, but his observation led him to think that not everyone had the liberty to do what he could and there were only a limited number of people who had a proper roadmap, guidance about artistic careers when there were multifarious platforms involving these talents. Jalaj an alumnus of IIT Guwahati pursued engineering followed by a job in the 9-5 setup until he stepped into the world of entrepreneurship and pursued the idea of Edgenus in 2020.

Idea development for Edgenus

Back in 2019, Jalaj was working and attending dance classes to pursue his passion but what he observed was that not everyone enjoyed the same facility as him living in a top-tier city. People had to travel just to pursue their passion and the lack of career clarity and visibility in artistic paths forced them to switch into taking more conventional career paths. Jalaj told Startup story that youth is continuously trying to balance career and passion. Furthering his research on the subject he talked to different people in different stages of following their passion, ones who had gained success others who were still struggling and the rest who were trying to figure out and were in the thinking stage, he tried to analyse the problems these people were facing and started a ‘genus’, meaning community on social media just to talk about unrecognized career paths, he thus lay the groundwork for his venture, Edgenus which was followed by creating an impactful vision where he collaborated organizing resources for domains giving a launch pad to talented enthusiasts to make more informed decisions with the right guidance.

Delivery of service

Edgenus, a digital platform in its entirety, was set up in 2020. Jalaj told Startup story that he spent a lot of time tracking down artists who could become mentors and building a network. He has divided the service within three categories, Domain exploration; wherein the artist was trying to explore, they answer queries, help through explanatory videos and understand a detailed roadmap of the journey. Upscaling options is the second category under which there are in depth course modules and delivery, further they also add assessments and feedback to help the participant track his growth. The third category that they are currently working on is the Talent showcase opportunity; here the individuals will be allowed a chance to present their skills to relevant stakeholders. This will help artists to widen their reach and help along landing career opportunities.

When asked about his future plans by Startup story, Jalaj said that they will be launching their app in near future. Global expansion is also in the picture starting with Italy and the United Kingdom as there is a huge demand for their service in these places.“Boundary is not a barrier,” Jalaj Garg, Founder and CEO, Edgenus said while discussing expansion plans with Startup story he also added that being a digital platform automatically widens the reach. Edgenus being a platform helping nurture artists is trying to work progressively but surely in domains they are providing including makeup, dance, acting, singing etc. They will scale up growth and widen domains step by step with certainty. They will also be addressing talents and engaging with foreign artists. It is an avid plan of their expansion.

Jalaj told the Startup story that he was looking for funding. He was gaining immense support from various incubators and accelerators, Meteor venture had been one such venture that had helped him with support, guidance and other resources. Edgenus will be using the raised funds on up scaling and welcoming fresh and quality trainers onto the team.

Setbacks

Startup story asked Jalaj about any setbacks that the company had faced to this Jalaj replied that starting without a network proved to be difficult for them, finding a like minded people and retaining such a team also proved to be a challenge further the pandemic did prove to be challenging but evidently it was a blessing in disguise. At the start they had trouble meeting up with dance academies for collaborations on the flip side it helped them spot and land mentors who were quite approachable because they were on a lookout for a platform to further their talent as well considering the blow of pandemic had shut down almost all kind of public activities.

Jalaj told Startup Story that he was running Edgenus with his Co-founder and they had 3 members on the core team along with some interns they were also outsourcing. As for their customers they had an active customer base of 2000+ people on the platform out of which 20% were foreign customers. Despite converting free sessions into paid they were able to retain their customers who have been leaving amazing feedback!

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