Frustration, like necessity, is the mother of invention. Chandra asked himself how convenient it would be if people had their business cards on the Internet, so that anyone who wanted their job title, address, phone and fax numbers, etc., could log into a web site to download the information. Intrigued, he called in a few engineers to discuss the idea. Within minutes, they dismissed it for being too simple. But the idea refused to die. It popped up repeatedly in Chandra’s mind, so he called the engineers again. This time, they grew excited and ended up working on it for four weeks. At the end of that process, Chandra and his crew were convinced that they were sitting on a gold-mine. If they wanted to mine and mint the gold, they had to act fast.

They have. After working on the technology for a year after that initial brainwave in 1997, Chandra nine months ago launched eCode, a company that provides free electronic business cards on the Web. "eCode is a universal identifier that is yours to keep for life," says Chandra, now the company’s CEO. "You can disclose as much or as little information about yourself as you like. My eCode is rohitc. That’s all anyone has to remember. They can go to the eCode web site to get other information about me and add it to their address books. You don’t have to type in 20 pieces of information. You can just type an eCode and have it all."

Lots of people apparently agree. Since its launch in late 1998, some 100,000 users in 120 countries have signed up on eCode’s web site — an impressive number though still distant from Chandra’s goal of eventually having 25 million to 30 million users. Chandra insists that this initial response has come about largely through word of mouth, with "zero advertising and PR." He did not want to attract the attention of large Internet companies and deliberately chose to grow stealthily until eCode had established a user base. "We flew under the radar until now, and now we are coming out," says Chandra. "We have a nine-month technology lead and market lead over anyone who wants to do this."

So far, eCode appears to have little competition. Chandra says two companies — Planet All and eWallet — offer similar but fewer services than eCode does. "We are creating an Internet identity company," he says. "Some 20 things make up an Internet identity, and we are attacking at least 15 of them. We are creating a unique niche."

After a couple of jobs with computer companies, he moved to Wells Fargo and then to Hewlett Packard, Informix and back to Hewlett Packard. His heart, however, was always set on going into business for himself. "I’ve always been very enterprising," he says. "Even when I was 17, I sold everything from tires and vacuum cleaners and bought my own motorcycle." After immigrating, he started a computer consulting firm called Tech People Net. "As soon as I got my green card, I started my business within days," he says. "I had too much energy and passion to work for anyone else."

Silicon Valley, it turned out was the right place at the right time for him. When he turned away from Tech People Net to start eCode, he initially funded his activities through consulting work. He also stayed away from trying to raise funding through venture capitalists, who typically take a large stake in companies in which they invest. Later, backing from private investors helped Chandra move eCode along. The investors include Raj Singh, founder of Cerent, a networking company that Chandra says will go public later this year.

While Chandra has high hopes for eCode’s growth, the company faces at least two major challenges. First, while the Internet has undoubtedly made finding information extremely convenient, it has also aroused enormous concerns about privacy. One of eCode’s biggest hurdles will be to convince potential users that putting their private information up on the Internet—including such things as addresses, phone numbers and even road directions—will be safe. eCode’s web site attempts to address these concerns by adopting a privacy policy.

The second challenge for eCode is finding a steady source of revenues — an uncertain exercise and a problem with many Internet firms. While Chandra speaks eloquently about the climbing number of hits on eCode’s web site, the company must become a viable and profitable business if it is to survive in the long run. "We are not looking to make money in the short term," Chandra says. He believes that in the future, eCode’s sources of revenue will include companies that pay to attach graphical business cards to e-mail messages as well as activities such as managing mailing lists. What will be the principal sources of revenues? "I don’t think there will be any one source," says Chandra. "We have identified at least two dozen sources of revenue, but I don’t know which ones will make money." In fairness, lots of Internet companies lose money, though no one would ever know that from their market capitalization at least at present.