Startup Cities (Bangalore Vs Gurgaon)

Recently, I made a move from Delhi’s satellite city of Gurgaon to the tech hub of India: Bangalore(both of them fairly related to startup cities). The change has been fairly dramatic for me, given that I largely lived my life in India’s northern hemisphere. The fact that I’m a South Indian brought up in Delhi, this was going to be an interesting switch.

Many of my friends post-college made a move to Bangalore, while I decided to stick around Gurgaon because my parents were put up in South Delhi and I can live off the place.

After a roller coaster journey of a data science consulting job and a failed startup, I spoke to my mates and some of the juniors in Bangalore. A couple of them, are on the verge of being quite big names in India’s business community. A couple of things were very apparent: no city matches Bangalore in the tech and general startup ecosystem. Most of my college connections were based out of Bangalore.

So, I eventually moved out to the hallowed street of RMV 2nd Stage, Bangalore. Currently, back in an ML/Data Science role. Still getting to terms with the change. I have tried my best to establish the differences and what clicks for each place.

Weather

• It’s been largely pleasant with persistent rain throughout the week. This was May 2018 when I moved. Gurgaon/Delhi feel like a greenhouse during this period.
• You can pretty much live a life sans AC and winter clothes.

Commute

• Delhi/Gurgaon’s best card against any other place in the country is the quality of infrastructure. The metro is easily the cheapest and fastest means of transport. Unfortunately, Bangalore has no such substitute.
• A trip from my friend’s place in Bellandur to Ashwath Nagar, near IISc (where I currently live) cost me 600+ on Monday morning. I used to travel a similar distance in Delhi for half the price. While price is indeed a function of demand & supply, the commute is a big pain in Bangalore.

• Given, the lack of long-distance travelling means, one of the ways to really ease your life here is to live close to your workplace.
• But, all is not lost. I live 2 km from my workplace and found a really interesting means to commute. Pedl by Zoomcar is available in two areas in Bangalore and the IISc area happens to be one of them.

• While not completely hassle-free, the cycles are a pretty cheap means to commute. If Pedl is able to sort out the in-accuracy with GPS locations and battery life of their locks.
• Bangalore has a pretty tech-savvy populace, willing to adopt something like this on large scale. I remember similar cycles by Ola in Gurgaon in really poor condition.

Food & Living Space 

• Gurgaon has a better infrastructure which translates to more gated community-type options at reasonable rates.
• Bangalore has decent places too but I found good ones to come by difficult. There are far fewer good options in the area where I live.
• The difference in food type is well known: North India vs South India. However, decent & hygienic places are plenty around Bangalore. Chetty’s coffee is a favourite.

Edit: I moved on from Bangalore to Mumbai (LMAO) !! It was a fun ride but I guess, the traffic was a bit too much and I also wanted to reach out to some friends in Mumbai (India’s Financial Capital)