...Case-Study - INBV The Reluctant Entrepreneur By Max Chafkin | Jul 1, 2007 The Start-up: Nanda Home The Founder: Gauri Nanda Rochester Hills, Michigan The business proposition: Part iRobot (NASDAQ:IRBT) and part Kate Spade, Nanda Home creates cute, clever products that are intended, in the words of its founder, to "humanize technology." The company already has one hit: Consumers have snapped up more than 9,000 units of a $50 plastic alarm clock. Set the alarm for 6 a.m. When the time comes, the clock wheels itself off your bedside table and rolls around the room, emitting R2D2-like squeaks. Dubbed Clocky, the little robot is manufactured in China and sold online and in design boutiques. The company also has a line of handbags designed to accommodate laptops. The founder: Gauri Nanda designed Clocky as a graduate student in MIT's Media Lab. The daughter of entrepreneurs--her parents recently sold their small weekly newspaper in Detroit--she aspired to become a designer at a large technology company. "I was opposed to the idea of starting a company," says Nanda. "I saw the hours my parents worked." After presenting Clocky to her class in the fall of 2004, she threw it in the back of her closet. She'd almost forgotten about it until the next spring, when several tech bloggers stumbled upon a photo of her invention online. Suddenly, Nanda was getting contacted by reporters and TV producers. Good Morning America called. She scrambled to fix the buggy prototype...
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