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|In: Entrepreneurship|Last Updated:

SAP SE announced the launch of a Startup Accelerator Program in partnership with CIIE to strengthen the local entrepreneurship ecosystem and provide mentorship to early-stage entrepreneurs. Through this program, SAP & CIIE aim to catalyse assistance from several support organizations such as angel networks, co-working spaces, fabrication labs, incubators, industry associations, and, technology and academic institutions, which have been working towards creating a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem in Gujarat.

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Speaking about the association, Adaire Fox-Martin, President, SAP Asia Pacific Japan said

Entrepreneurs are the emerging leaders of the Digital Economy. They generate tremendous employment opportunities and contribute to the country’s growth. The program seeks to help entrepreneurs from tier II and tier III towns drive sustainable economic growth and innovation, and make Digital India real.

The program will be a significant catalyst of growth for entrepreneurs from emerging towns. Entrepreneurs will undergo a three-month, non-residential boot camp and monthly training workshops. They will be paired with domain experts from SAP Labs Bangalore to get insights into the latest technology innovations. The Startup Accelerator Program aims to create a pipeline of investable startups from this region by scouting for entrepreneurs from Gujarat and providing them with mentorship opportunities.

Kunal Upadhyay, CEO, CIIE at IIM – Ahmedabad added

Innovation and economic growth are directly linked to Gujarat’s ability to develop individuals with the skills to become a successful entrepreneur. We are pleased to collaborate with SAP on this initiative, and we will support this by leveraging our past experience and expertise to fast-track startup growth through operational guidance, mentoring and access to capital.

Believing in the power of small business and enterprises to drive innovation and job creation, SAP India is committed to finding unique ways to accelerate the growth of enterprises across the nation through training and technology consulting.

Apart from establishing best practices in the area of entrepreneurship, the Startup Accelerator Program will work towards building stronger collaboration between entrepreneurs and different stakeholders. In addition, this program will help develop a robust ecosystem and support entrepreneurs in areas such as Social Entrepreneurship, Healthcare, Education, Sports, Internet, Mobile, Internet of Things, Clean Technology, Smart City and Food & Agri Business by providing them with operational guidance and access to capital.

About CIIE

IIM Ahmedabad’s Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship [CIIE] helps entrepreneurs solve India’s most difficult problems in areas like energy, agriculture, healthcare and affordable technology. Set-up in collaboration with Government of India and Gujarat Government, CIIE is one of India’s leading entrepreneurship centre and operates different initiatives including incubators, accelerators and venture funds to support entrepreneurs. For more information, visit CIIE India

|In: Events|Last Updated:

Building on the creative energy that Startup Weekend 2014 brought to the city, global leader in online payments, PayPal, announced today that it will host Startup Weekend in Chennai for the second consecutive year at the PayPal India Technology Center, Chennai from June 5 – 7, 2015.

PayPal

What is Startup Weekend ?

Startup Weekend is a 54-hour event where aspiring entrepreneurs come together to form teams, build products and try to develop viable startup ideas. The global grass-roots movement, which promotes creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship, is the largest community of entrepreneurs in the world, with over 1,800 events organized in 120 countries in 2014.

At Startup Weekend, participants get to meet, brainstorm and form groups based on their interests. They will also have the chance to work with mentors from technology and business fields, as well as angel investors to discuss and get insights on coding, designing, business model creation and market validation to help their idea development. At the end of the weekend, the teams will present their final plans to a panel of expert judges from across the industry.

Speaking about the event, Anupam Pahuja, General Manager, Technology, PayPal Asia Pacific said

We are thrilled to be hosting Startup Weekend in India for a second time. Through such events, we hope to be able to create a community for technology and startup enthusiasts to come together and collaborate on great ideas. As a leader in online payments and one of the world’s largest startups, we hope that the technology mentorship PayPal can provide will help enable and drive innovation within the technology ecosystem in India.

Details about Startup Weekend Chennai

Startup Weekend Chennai will focus on solving challenges in the financial technology space, encompassing areas related to credit, payments, security, asset management, currencies, etc.

How to register for Startup Weekend Chennai

The contest is open to developers, designers, product managers, marketers and startup enthusiasts – anyone with a creative idea and the desire to learn. Interested applicants can register for this year’s Startup Weekend at the following link. The registration closes at 12 P.M on June 4, 2015.

Why should you attend Startup Weekend

Participants will have the opportunity to interact with technology leaders from PayPal, including Anupam Pahuja, General Manager, Technology, PayPal Asia Pacific, as well as renowned industry experts such as Deepak Krishnan, Associate Vice President of Growth, FreeCharge.in & Ashwini Asokan, CEO and Co-founder, Mad Street Den & Mad Street Labs, and Ramanan RV, CoFounder at Juspay.in who will be mentors and conduct workshops during the event.

The top three teams who will be crowned at the end of the 54-hours will have a chance to enter the Start Tank Incubation Challenge organized by PayPal, which provides early-stage startups a world-class incubation space and access to global mentors, angel investors and venture capitalists.

In 2014, the Startup Weekend witnessed participation from over 100 startup enthusiasts, well-established CEOs, and a network of angel investors.

About Startup Weekend

Startup Weekend is a global movement to promote entrepreneurship, which takes place in over 550 cities. Many existing companies have also raised angel funding as well as gone onto accelerators like The Morpheus, 500 Startups, Y Combinator, Microsoft Accelerator etc. They are supported in their efforts by Google for Entrepreneurs, NASSCOM & 500 Startups.

In the past 3 years, 500+ startups have started & 15,000+ entrepreneurs have been inspired. Teams have even started to generate revenue during the 54 hour event & others have even gone on to raise funds from Business Angels or Venture Capitalists.

|In: startups|Last Updated:

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A month after the first StartEdu competition, Unitus Seed Fund held its second online event, called StartEdu 1B. After receiving record number of applications for the startup competition, only ten made the finals.

Get Set Sorted emerged as the winner securing 5 Lakhs, while Classalyze bagged the runner up title. Both the winner & runner-up get introduced to angel investors who are interested in early stage education companies. The companies were assessed based on factors including Impact on the masses, Team, Innovation, Business Model, and Presentation after hours of reviews and deliberations.

More about the Winner & Runner-Up

Get Set Sorted based out of Pune is a career guidance platform offering end-to-end guidance to high school students through online and offline channels. They suggest top 3 career options based on: Aptitude, Interest, Personality, Career motivations as well as connect them to counselors along with providing career content. 

Classalyze, located in Gurgaon is an online tool that helps teachers check for & improve understanding using formative tests. Besides creating high quality formative tests, which can be conducted both offline and online they also provide meaningful and actionable feedback through online dashboards to teachers and principals.

Speaking about the event, Will Poole, managing partner & co-founder, Unitus Seed Fund said

We extend huge congratulations to the competition winners. The prize money, as well as receiving the benefit of training and mentoring from our Speed2Seed incubator and accelerator partner is sure to secure a bright future for these innovative startups.

The quality of the projects presented by all of the entrants proves that India is brimming with innovation and energy from a growing community of visionary entrepreneurs focused on the opportunities in the education sector

The 2nd edition of the StartEdu competition was held over a 4.5 hour marathon online pitch-fest, with viewers in Seattle and Boston USA, Bangalore, Jaipur, Goa, Hyderabad and Noida. The StartEdu program is presented jointly by Unitus Seed Fund & Sylvant Advisors.

Announcement of 3rd edition of StartEdu

Applications for the third & final edition of StartEdu competition for 2015 would open from July 1st, 2015. For more information, please refer the official StartEdu Page

About Unitus Seed Fund

Unitus Seed Fund is a new $23 million seed-stage investment fund based in Bangalore and Seattle that invests in startups innovating for the masses in India. More information here

About Sylvant Advisors

Sylvant Advisors works with entrepreneurs and early stage companies to accelerate their growth. Beginning with critical investment or fund raising effort, drafting business strategies, providing operational support and being a part of an entire growth lifecycle are the key levers to accelerate the growth of these entrepreneurial ventures. Sylvant is based in Bangalore. More information here

Image Credit – UnitusImpact.com

|In: Business|Last Updated: | 2 Comments

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Following the global launch of the Student Entrepreneurship Program of SAP University Alliances earlier this year, SAP introduced the initiative in India at the BMS College of Engineering [BMSCE] in Bangalore. The program encourages student entrepreneurs and early start-ups to use SAP’s technology platform to develop new applications and launch successful start-up ventures.

Under this program, it is expected that there will be development of new solutions across SAP’s platform technologies, leveraging on the company’s in-memory platform SAP HANA®, the SAP Mobile Platform & SAP Analytics capabilities. Through BMSCE and the Student Entrepreneurship Program, students of the institute will gain access to these technologies, SAP experts, mentors, and an entrepreneurship curriculum.”

As per Dr. Ravishankar, Dean, Placements, BMS College of Engineering

Blessed with smart students, a diligent and result oriented staff, the challenge for BMSCE is to nurture students to learn the art of delivering swift and accurate engineering solutions expected by the industry. With solutions and mentoring from SAP, our students are poised to learn and adapt themselves to the constantly changing scenarios posed by the industry

The SAP University Alliances program opens up the world of SAP to more than 1,800 universities in more than 80 countries worldwide, and aims to develop highly qualified graduates with critical skills for the 21st century workforce. Through a community of over 8,000 faculty members as well as engagement at over 750 events annually, SAP University Alliances has inspired students around the world about SAP.

|In: Accelerator|Last Updated:

Pitney Bowes has named eight start-up companies in India who will join Pitney Bowes Accelerator program in India. The program is a part of the NASSCOM’s 10,000 Start-ups initiative.

The eight start-ups selected for the program are:

  1. RetailNav : Solution for retail shopping with unique in-store location-based analytics.
  2. Audianz : Location-based advertising platform.
  3. Heuristics : GPS-based vehicle tracking system [VTS] and mobile-based personnel tracking solutions.
  4. Yo-app : App that integrates social circles with a discovery platform.
  5. Ideata Analytics : Integrated data intelligence platform to help users perform information discovery.
  6. Teritree  : Customer experience management platform.
  7. BrownTape : Single-click multi-platform solution for e-commerce management.
  8. Tagalys :  Solution that provides intelligent heuristic search.

More about the program

The program focuses on start-ups that leverage software for mobile, data analytics, location-based services, and e-commerce management.

Selected start-ups will have access to Pitney Bowes’ software, Application Programming Interfaces (API’s) & data for the duration of the program. Training, technical and business guidance and mentoring will be provided to the start-ups from Pitney Bowes engineering and innovation leaders & from software industry experts.

In addition to these strategic connections, start-ups in the Pitney Bowes Accelerator program will also be networking with prospective investors.

You can find more about Pitney Bowes & their accelerator program here & here.

|In: Accelerator|Last Updated:

Deshpande Foundation and Microsoft Ventures,India announced a partnership to launch Sandbox Startups, an incubator focused on nurturing startups in tier-II & tier-III cities of India. The three-year collaboration was formalized with the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding [MOU] on August 23, in the presence of Dr Gururaj ‘Desh’ Deshpande [Founder, Deshpande Foundation], Mr Jairam Ramesh [Former Minister, Government of India], Mr Rajinish Menon [Director, Microsoft Ventures in India], Mr Naveen Jha [CEO, Deshpande Foundation] & other industry leaders.

As per their Press Release, the main reason for co-launching this initiative as per Naveen Jha [CEO, Deshpande Foundation] is below:

Unlike tier-I cities, most small cities lack adequate support system to nurture startups. Consequently, startups and startup potentials in these regions do not have access to requisite training, mentoring and a sandbag to try out their entrepreneurial stints. Sandbox Startups is aimed at providing a launch pad for aspiring entrepreneurs in tier-II & tier-III cities so that they can validate their business ideas, sharpen business acumen, develop products & launch solutions to the market.

 

Innovations by startups groomed under the program will add vibrancy to the ecosystem from those at the bottom of the pyramid.

 

The objective of this partnership is to work in an inclusive manner to ensure that all relevant stakeholders, such as early stage entrepreneurs, academia, students, venture capital community, mentors, advisors, HNI’s & corporates, are active participants in the innovation ecosystem.

Support for entrepreneurs in Tier-II & Tier-II cities

Rajinish Menon [Director, Microsoft Ventures in India] mentions that such an initiative was the need of the hour.

As the culture of innovation spreads, it’s fascinating to see the kind of problems that startups from smaller towns are trying to solve. Microsoft Venture’s partnership with Deshpande Foundation aims to engage with entrepreneurs from smaller towns at every stage of their journey from ideation to maturity.

 

At Microsoft, we are extremely excited to help incubators roll out products and raise capital to fund their growth, eventually benefiting India’s budding entrepreneurial ecosystem. And this specific endeavor is aimed at entrepreneurs from smaller towns which have a less mature ecosystem to nurture them.

 

Startups can call Microsoft’s Jumpstart hotline on 1800 200 2114 to know more about the program and how to be a part of this program.

About the Partnership

Deshpande Foundation in India actively nurtures innovation and entrepreneurship through various programs in its three sandbox regions – North Karnataka, Nizamabad in Telangana & Uttar Pradesh.

Partnering with Microsoft Ventures is a key step to support and nurture incubators, moving them to the next level by providing them an opportunity to get exposed to high end technology, get trained & mentored by professionals.

Both Microsoft Ventures and Deshpande Foundation will play a significant role to mentor the startups under this incubator.

Please visit Microsoft Ventures, India & Deshpande Foundation for any further information or leave a comment and we would get it clarified from the Microsoft Ventures team.

Image Credit : Deshpande Foundation & Microsoft