Complying with company laws easy as pie’

Little did Shankar Jaganathan, 55, realize that a tryst with possible non-compliance in company law early last year would goad him to set up a startup, CimplyFive, which helps ventures with corporate governance.Early in 2014, when Shankar was on the board of directors of a company run by his friend, the CFO was replaced with a person whose pay package was half of what they paid out earlier. An expert in company law, Shankar felt something was amiss. The manner in which it was done bothered him and he was sure company law procedures had not been complied with entirely. He told his friend about it and resigned. Despite assurances from his friend, Shankar stood his ground. The incident lent direction to his ambitions. Shankar’s career in corporate India — a chartered accountant with nearly three decades of experience, including a 10-year stint as corporate treasurer at Wipro — would come in handy. “Large organizations have a battery of associates to ensure that they comply with legislation related to company law and corporate governance. I was keen to implement technology to help small and medium-scale enterprises comply with corporate governance laws,” he says.The objective was nothing short of ambitious. The hundreds of sections, subsections and schedules in just one of the legislations pertaining to corporate governance — The Companies Act, 2013 — is a labyrinth. “Practitioners need to stay abreast of the notifications and updates from the ministry of corporate affairs, which come at regular intervals,” adds Shankar.When he put forth the idea of floating a venture, five of his associates asked whether he was up to it. They highlighted the difficulties of starting a venture, especially as age was not on his side. Shankar’s family was flabber gasted. “I had it all, why was I pursuing this, was their question,” says Shankar, who was teaching at leading management institutions, including IIM-B. “Everytime someone questioned my intent, it only strengthened my resolve to achieve something,” he says.The company’s focus is on leveraging technology to make compliance simple. Simply Five’s first cloud-based software tool, BLISS (Board Leaders Integrated Software Solution), automates routine tasks and offers an easy-to-read dashboard-like functionality for sending alerts on risk management.It’s work that has won admirers and consequently, funding. Earlier this year, CimplyFive received funding from Wipro veteran Suresh Senapaty and former