Gurbaksh Chahal - The Dream: How I Learned the Risks and Rewards of Entrepreneurship and Made Millions

How I Learned the
Risks and Rewards
of Entrepreneurship
and Made Millions

Gurbaksh Chahal

THE DREAM
Copyright Gurbaksh Chahal, 2008.
All rights reserved.

First published in 2008 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN in the United Statesa division of St. Martins Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS.

Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world.

Palgrave and Macmillan are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.

ISBN-13: 978-0-230-61095-8

ISBN-10: 0-230-61095-1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Chahal, Gurbaksh.

The dream : how I learned the risks and rewards of entrepreneurship and made millions / Gurbaksh Chahal.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN-13: 978-0-230-61095-8

ISBN-10: 0-230-61095-1

1. Success in business. 2. Entrepreneurship. 3. Internet advertising. 4. Market segmentation. I. Title.

HF5386.C466 2009

338.04092dc22

2008040123

A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.

Design by Letra Libre.

First edition: November 2008

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This book is for my father,
who taught me the importance of perseverance;

for my mother and grandmother,
who showed me the true meaning of love;

and for my three siblings,
who have been there for me every step of the way.

I would like to thank, first and foremost, my brother Taj, who was there when it all began; my sisters, Nirmal and Kamal, whose love and support have always meant the world to me; my agent, Mel Berger, my publisher, Airi Stuart, and my cowriter, Pablo Fenjves, who subjected me to the most humbling and best therapy session of my life; and of course God, for giving me the willpower to reach my dreams so early in life.

W hen I was sixteen years old I started a company in my bedroom, and within a few months I knew exactly what I wanted to do with my life: I would become an entrepreneur. There was one thing standing in my way, however: school. If I was going to pursue my goal, I would have to do it full time, and I needed my fathers permission to drop out. This wasnt going to be easy. More than a decade earlier, my family had come to America from India, settling in a one-bedroom apartment in a marginal section of San Jose, California. My father had arrived with $25 in his pocket, but his heart was full of dreams. Education, education, education! he would say, repeating it as if it were a mantra. Education is the key that opens all the locks to all the doors in the world. My four children will become doctors and engineers. Maybe even both!

I realized I couldnt bear another day of school, and I was ready to take the biggest risk of my life. It was the defining moment that every entrepreneur eventually faces in one form or another. I had to have The Talk with my father. I was terrified about approaching him. He was a man who valued education above almost everything else. How could I tell him I wanted to drop out of high school? Then again, if I was to pursue my dreams, how could I not?

Finally, one night after dinner, I braced myself and plunged in. Dad, theres something we need to talk about, I said. I had a hard time meeting his eyes, so I focused on his turban.

What? he snapped.

You know that stuff Ive been doing in my room?

No, he said. Not really.

Well, its turning out pretty well.

As long as its not interfering with school, he said.

Man, was I in trouble. But I felt compelled to press on.

Take a look at this, I said.

Hesitantly I showed him my bank statementthe balance had edged north of $100,000. My fathers hand flew to his chest, like a man on the verge of a heart attack. W-what is this? W-where did you get all this money? He turned toward the kitchen and hollered for my mother. Gurbaksh is going to jail!

My mother came running from the kitchen, eyes wide with alarm. What did you say? To jail? Who is going to jail?

No one is going to jail! I said.

When they were somewhat calmer, I proceeded to explain how Id spent the past six months studying the dot-com market, watching young companies grow very rich, very quickly, and trying to figure out how they did it. One of them, DoubleClick, had piqued my interest, primarily because it was among the first companies to put advertising on the World Wide Web. People were spending more and more time on the Internet and less time reading newspapers and magazines or parked in front of their television sets, and traditional advertising was rapidly losing ground. The Web was fast becoming the next big sales tool.

But my parents werent really listening. I had hoped you would become a doctor, my father said, looking at me balefully.

Dad, this is better. I promise.

Two days later, my father agreed to drive me to school to talk to the principal, and I was so grateful that I was near tears, but we Chahals are not emotional men, so I simply thanked him for believing in me.

I believe in you because I can see you believe in yourself, he said. And obviously youre doing something right.

I wont let you down, I said.

You better not, he said. Because Im giving you exactly one year to prove yourself.

One year?

Yes. One year. If this Internet business doesnt work out, youre going right back to school.

When we reached the campus, we parked and I led my father to the principals office. He got to the point without wasting any time. My son is dropping out, he said.

Why?

He has never liked school. He is going to do bigger things.

By midsummer, after barely six months in business, I was posting revenues of $300,000 per month. And two years later, shortly after my eighteenth birthdayin what turned out to be one of the very first things I did as an adultI sold my company for $40 million.

That was only the beginning.

I was born in Tarn Taran, near Amritsar, in Punjab, India, on July 17, 1982, the youngest of four children, into a traditional Sikh family. My father studied hard and went to college, hoping to become an engineer, but when he graduated he couldnt find a satisfying job and joined the police academy. He and my mother met in 1971, a match arranged by their families, and were married that same year. She was a nurse and enjoyed a modicum of independence, but in most ways she was a traditional Indian woman. She had been taught that life revolves around the head of the household, the man, and she believed this to her core. When my father made a decision, she followed it without question. I would later find myself struck by this because her own family had actually pushed her to become independent, which in Indiafor people of a certain classcan only mean one of two careers: medicine or engineering. My mother wasnt interested in engineering, and she didnt think she had the patience or the stamina to become a doctor, so she settled for nursing, and she continued to work after she was married. In reality, though, after marriage her life was no longer her own. From that day forth, she did as she was told.