While you are looking for that next great idea, get the skills so an investor believes that you can execute on that great idea.

The fact is the gkjin evidently doesn't have any actual problems in his/her life. Being intelligent enough to go to a top university, wealthy enough to study abroad and then not need a job afterwards, and capable enough to try to start something ... that all adds up to a nice, comfortable life. There aren't any real pains to find solutions for. And seeing pains to find solutions for is where the spark of entrepreneurial inspiration comes from - startups are about seeing a pain and building a solution to it.

Getting a job, regardless of the industry, will expose you to problems that need solving. Most people try to solve them within the limited confines of their job so they can look great to their manager, but the trick to building a startup is to work with the problem long enough to see a solution, and then leave your job to build the solution and sell it back to the industry you worked in. Lots of great, successful startups begin this way.

http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html

i.e. as a developer, you will be able to talk to sales people, or customer support people.

You will learn to talk and interact with people who think very different than you.

A big company rewards extreme specialization. A startup rewards versatility.

I think at the core of your approach for starting a startup is to make money. Apologize if that's not the case but from one of your comments,

> It seemed like local startups are getting funded with half baked ideas or clones and I thought that I could do just as well as them so I was pretty hesitant to find a job

This. maybe the reason, and anyway, I wish you the best.

2. Publish it to the world and get it in front of as many likely users as possible.

3. Based on the feedback of users, give up or push ahead. Don't spend more than a few months on any project unless you're 100% sure it's awesome. Just do something new.

4. Repeat until you've found something both you and users agree is great.

You only have to be right once to have a big impact.

Uber was created because Travis Kalanick wanted to be able to order Lincoln Towncars from his iPhone. He expected it to be used by rich people for airport and nightclub rides. A niche service for the elite. He had no idea they would be recruiting regular people to drive other people around. Now they're on course to change transportation across the world for everyone. They may eventually spare millions of people from drunk driven accidents.

- follow your passion, not the money. when you work on your startup, do you truly enjoy at least some part of it, or just following the hype or hoping to become millionaires?

- are you well off where money is not an issue? if money is an issue, get a job; you can choose to work with well-off Malaysian startup like GrabTaxi.

- rather than keep thinking about money making startup, just work on small projects which you found interesting. e.g. https://levels.io/12-startups-12-months/

2) Fortunately, money is not an issue. I am very privilege to be in this position. With that being said, I can't just sit down and do nothing. I need to find some source of income.

3) I was messing around with Arduino, 3D printers and Raspberry Pi while I as still working in my friend's startup. Ever since then, I felt like I needed to do something more "serious" to make some money as I am out of job at the moment.

- Since money is not an issue, we can cross out the need to get a job to make ends meet and start thinking about fun things to do.

- I believe Idea is not a light-bulb moment after meditation for 6 months in your room; it sort of require you try doing different things in order to bump into the light-bulb moment.

More random advices:

- Do u like Hardware or Software? Assuming you are into tech ideas.

- Unless you have partners and funding, the scope of your project need to be within your own capabilities in order to reach mediocre success in terms of user adoptions.

- You don't need the best idea, just good enuf idea which interest you. Why passion/interest in important? So that you will work on it even though there is no money and users for 6 months, and you use/like your own product.

- Discipline. Build/Ship something every month is an interesting idea.

You won't stumble upon ideas locked in your room. You must get a job, any job, and look at all the problems surrounding you.

Think about timing, luck, skill, and opportunity.

luck = preparation + opportunity opportunity=get out there

Just my 2c, not knowing exactly how feasible this is for you.

> Just a bit of background. I'm 23 years old this year.

You're still young, don't worry, the sun is still rising in your life, but don't just sit back and watch it.

> Graduated last year from a top university in UK with a Bachelors(Hons) Chemical Engineering. Right after I graduated, I went back to my home country Malaysia. I always knew I wanted to start a startup.

Congratulations, with an engineering degree from a top UK university, apart from whatever you learned and whoever you met, migration to other countries is easier for you.

> In fact, I did try to start a couple of startups -Tripadvisor-ish for students, Groupon clone and some small 'projects' during the summers like trying to sell "pure fruit juice" during carnivals and stuff like that. None worked out.

You've failed several times early, that's good, failure is a good teacher and failing is much harder when you have a spouse and two kids. The important thing is to know why you failed and learn what you should and shouldn't do next time. Hopefully there were people to give you feedback. You also need to look at your ideas in a more fundamental and original way. The desire to solve a problem and a way to the solution should come first, not the startup. Describing startups as "Tripadvisor for students" , "Hackernews for ballet dancers" , "Mixpanel for paper trails" betrays a wrong mindset. An example of doing it the right way would be "I have an idea for a case that allows you to use electronics with magnetic storage in places that have strong passive magnetic fields, I should start a company to sell this to the several industries in my state"

> Last year when I came back, tried to start an online grocery startup but within 2 months, I just knew it wasn't feasible unless I had some decent funding or some sort.

Be glad you didn't have enough money to spend to setup an online grocery.

> For the next 6 months, I literally just stayed in my room trying to come up with ideas, but none came up.

You should've expected that, isolating yourself in your room isn't the place to come up with ideas. You need to go out, look at what people are doing, talk to them, do things, be busy, go to events. Maybe some people have the ability to generate ideas upon request, but for me, it happens when you're not looking, like at a party, in the shower, when driving. You don't 'come up' with ideas, you 'get' ideas.

> Ever since then, I’ve been trying to sell an animal feed called rumen bypass fat(dad’s idea), but no customers so far.

Did you study the market? Were animals hungry and farmers broke and was your feed cheaper and better?

> If you asked me what I really want in life, I’d say I want to make a difference on a large scale.

Why so grandiose? Anyway, a lot of people seem to want that. What you want in life shouldn't be what you want in a startup. In life, I hope I become a good father, a good husband, spread joy, reduce suffering. I could do that if I made sure my neighbor never went hungry, or by solving world hunger - win, win.

> I’d like to start a startup that solves hard engineering/science problem.

Good, so find the problem and the startup will follow.

> The local startup scene is still playing catch up at the moment. The hot stuffs are ecommerce, on demand startups etc...

You gotta catch up before you can lead, so are you bold enough to get into the local startup scene and move it forward?

> Hence, I’m not particularly excited about joining the startups in the local scene and I would like to avoid joining big corporate companies. Any advice?

See above.