Page 89 - 8Days

what they never taught you in schoolat they never taught you in school
wh

How to

Invent

a Hit

Gadget

Who would have expected
a prata-making machine to
become all the rage? Meet
the couple who invented
the successful flatbread
‘robot’ Rotimatic.

WHO ARE THEY? RISHI ISRANI (left) and PRANOTI NAGARKAR ISRANI (right), both 35. The husband-and-wife
team are the brains behind Zimplistic, a $26.2mil company which makes the world’s first automated roti maker
called Rotimatic. Sounds random? Not exactly. The machine is prized by its customers for churning out flatbreads
like chapatis and pizza dough in half the time it takes to do it by hand. Over 25,000 units have been sold so far
worldwide, including Singapore, UK and the US. Both NUS graduates, Pranoti is a mechanical engineer by training,
while Rishi is a computer science specialist who co-founded mobile security software startup TenCube. The
company was acquired in 2010 by American software giant McAfee for a reported S$25mil.

8 DAYS: In 2008 you started working on the first What challenges did you face?
Rotimatic prototype. How did you get the idea for this PRANOTI NAGARKAR ISRANI: Challenge is a relative
invention? term (laughs). Rotimatic is complicated, but do-able.
RISHI ISRANI: We came up with the Rotimatic ’cos we We faced a lot of problems while making it, since
eat a lot of [handmade] rotis at home and Pranoti was it was something that nobody had done before.
spending a lot of time making them. We went through But it’s impossible to learn everything in school
11 prototypes, and made about 2mil rotis [during about producing a concept on paper for the market.
the research process]. Our R&D lab has Rotimatic So I worked for two and a half years at a product
test machines making rotis around the clock, ’cos engineering company, and got to see an
[it’s a waste] to have the gadgets entire cycle [of a product being
laying dormant. Our staff ate rotis for designed and built]. That gave me
breakfast, lunch and dinner the confidence to start my own
(laughs). Now we don’t give Breaking bread: company. I handle the hardware,
our son sandwiches; we The $1,300 Rotimatic and Rishi does the software [like
makes up to 20
feed him wraps made rotis in half an hour Rotimatic’s accompanying app].
with the Rotimatic. It’s using just flour, oil The Rotimatic had a two-year
healthier ’cos everything and water added waiting list. How did you build buzz
to its cylinder
is freshly made. compartments. like that?

88 8 DAYS