Innovation Blog

How Old Do You Need to Be To Become an Entrepreneur?

By Shlomo Maital 

 

Suhas Gopinath

 

How old do you need to be to become an entrepreneur and launch a successful global company?   Would you believe – 14?   That’s how old Suhas Gopinath was, when he launched Globals Inc in Bengaluru, India, ten years ago,  from an internet café.   Here is the story, relayed to me by my close friend and co-author D.V.R.  Seshadri:

When 14-year-old Suhas Gopinath started Globals Inc ten years ago from a cyber cafe in Bangalore, he didn’t know that he had become the youngest CEO in the world.  Today, Globals is a multi-million dollar company with offices in the United States, India, Canada, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, Spain, Australia, Singapore and the Middle East and has 100 employees in India and 56 abroad.  Among the several honors that have been bestowed upon this young man, the most prestigious is the invitation to be a member of the Board of the ICT Advisory Council of the World Bank. He is also recognised as one of the ‘Young Global Leaders’ for 2008-2009 by the prestigious World Economic Forum.  Suhas is the youngest member ever in the World Economic Forum’s history. The other members include the Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal, Hollywood star Leonardo Di Caprio, musician A R Rahman, Prince of Brunei, etc.

      Globals Inc. has grown rapidly from a small home office to a globally recognized multinational company offering world class quality solutions in Web, e-Commerce, and Mobile. Today “Globals develops mission critical applications on the web for various industries including Education, Finance, and Governments”.

     Gopinath taught himself how to build websites and sold portals to bricks-and-mortar firms in the US. He was the youngest certified website-builder in the world.   He originally called his company CoolHindustan.