Helping Green Companies Spread the Message

by Hiral Dholakia-Dave | Times of India, Nov. 13, 2007

The Idea

“Dharma” fulled their ambition and a Gujarati enterprise got them cracking with a novel business concept. Since 2001, a group of 20 something NRGs [Non Resident Gujaratis] — including a college dropout — have been helping green, socially-responsible and nonprofit organizations spread their mantra through the web.

Most of their clients are what they call “Future 500″ companies”, small businesses that have revolutionary products and the potential to impact the future in a big way. But their portfolio has also grown to include working on projects for Fortune 500 clients like Cisco Systems, Microsoft and HP.

The web development company, DharmaBoost, is a brainchild of Dhrumil Purohit, 25, who with the consent of his parents, dropped out of school to start a business. Since he understood the Internet well, he started creating websites for local clients.

It was then that he realized that often the people and organizations that have the best ideas, ideas that could transform the world, are often the worst at understanding technology and how to leverage it.

Becoming a Team

Even though Dhrumil Purohit, 25, Mihir Kothari, 24 and Nirav Sheth, 23, knew each other growing up, from Garba and Gujarati Samaj, it wasn’t until college that they became great friends.

“It was in our second year of college that we realized that all of us had gone through our own spiritual transformations and awakened to our relationship with Dharma. We not only became good friends but spiritual brothers. We would go on adventures, spend time learning from monks, host lectures on nutrition , etc. We would talk of Gandhiji’s work and ask ourselves, how could we can make an impact with the skills we have?” says Dhrumil.

When it came to think about their professional futures, they began discussing the idea of working together. Mihir and Nirav joined Dhrumil after graduation. “Every project that we take on, we ask ourselves, “How is this project going to better the world,” says Mihir. Raised in Delaware, Mihir decided to get into the family tradition of entrepreneurship after a brief stint in the corporate sector.

Purpose

“Dharma means nature, essence and purpose, and Boost means bringing you closer to something. So we chose the name because we are a company that provides consulting services that bring organizations closer to their individual purpose - using the Internet,” says Dhrumil. Apart from using spiritual principals and meditation to govern business and make work fun, they also take time off from work to volunteer. “It isn’t uncommon for us to spend time of things we care about. We took off between March and July to help plan the 2007 Jaina Convention in New Jersey. A very rewarding experience,” he adds.

The Future

The group has a development team that works with them in New Delhi. “We want to create a meaningful, fun and fruitful work environment for young people, especially talented young Indians. There are so many young Indians that are working in jobs that they don’t enjoy because of the prestige and the money. If we could match both [prestige and money] and add purpose, we would become a great company,” sums up Dhrumil.