[rudimk]

That's the thing - there's no "product" as such. Or, to be more precise, the product is purely consultative, the kind of work that, say, a think-tank does. The use case is, that a governmental agency needs help with analyzing a large dataset. We write the code, we do the heavy-lifting, and then present them with the final analysis.

[grumps]

He's not that far off. You'll have to build your relationship off your first client. The relationship will be your product.

What's your consulting experience?

[rudimk]

Okay. Yes, that sounds about right. About 2 years of consulting gigs, with IBM and Cvent(event-management software) - but I've also worked with a think-tank, so I have a bit of insight into policy analyses and so on.

[grumps]

Are you going for a developer type role?

[rudimk]

From a personal standpoint, no - I'll be working towards building relationships with mandarins. But at first, I would be writing code myself, as well as writing up reports and stuff. Eventually, I'm looking at a scenario where we have coders, and we have people interfacing with governments, reporting on our findings.

[grumps]

You're just going to have to land your first gig, then expand your way from there. You'll have to knock them dead, and slowly bring in more people.

Sidenote - Sounds like you're in the DC area, and if you're going for government work, I hope you have a lot of solid connections because 2-3 years of experience isn't always enough to land much more that a contract workerbee position.

[rudimk]

Okay. That sounds a little daunting, but hey, not going back now.

Actually..I'm not in DC. I'm based out of New Delhi right now. My take is, that the lack of such a consultancy in South Asia and the Middle East would mean, that my thing could really work here. Is that being naive, or am I actually on to something? Thanks a lot for the offer, though!