Sri

We quit our jobs. There were six of us — Shiv Nadar, Arjun Malhotra, Yogesh Vaidya, Subhash Arora, D.S. Puri and me. It was 1976. Startups were not really a thing in India. Venture capital did not exist. Banks were not exactly lining up to lend money to six young men with an idea and no collateral. And computers? Most people had barely heard of them. But we believed the microprocessor was going to change the world. So we took the plunge. Between the six of us, we managed to put together ₹1.87 lakh. We borrowed, pooled our savings and, in one case, even sold a car. Our first office was a small barsati in Golf Links, Delhi. We called ourselves Microcomp. We wanted to build an Indian computer. There was just one problem. We didn’t have a manufacturing licence. That eventually led us to UP Electronics Corporation. They had the licence. We had the technology. And that partnership gave birth to Hindustan Computers Limited — HCL. But perhaps the most audacious part of the story was what happened next. We started selling a computer that was still being designed. We had a brochure and a mock-up of the machine. That was it. Our sales teams went across India, knocking on doors and convincing businesses to buy into a technology they had never used before. The first orders came from IIT Kharagpur and IIT Madras. Then came the harder part — convincing businesses. In Coimbatore, we were up against DCM DP, a much bigger and more established name. I still remember sitting in the reception area of Premier Mills while the DCM team made its pitch. We went in second. And we won. That one order gave us five more. Then ten. That was HCL in those early years: not having the biggest balance sheet, the biggest brand or the easiest path — but finding a way. We were restless. We looked for gaps. We hired people who had what we called a “cowboy” spirit. We believed that technology had to be made useful and accessible, not intimidating. And we kept moving. From building India’s early indigenous computers to taking our business to Singapore when HCL was just four years old. From a small room in Delhi to a global technology company. When I look back at 50 years, I think about six people sitting together in 1976, wondering if this crazy idea could actually work. I think about a barsati. A brochure for a computer that did not yet exist. And the courage to knock on the next door. That, to me, is the real HCL story. 50 years later, the technology has changed beyond anything we could have imagined. But the spirit remains the same: Dream big. Take the risk. And above all, Just Aspire. Happy 50th, HCL. What a journey it has been. #AjaiChowdhry #JustAspire #HCL #50yearsofHCL #Nostalgic #Founders