Bihar Sets Up Startup Policy To Offer Interest-Free Seed Fund, Coworking Space & More

To encourage entrepreneurship in Bihar, the state’s industry Minister Syed Shahnawaz Hussain has launched the Bihar Startup Policy on 29th July. 

Under the Bihar Startup Policy, the state government offers an interest-free seed fund of INR 10 Lakh to startups for a period of 10 years. It will also grant INR 3 Lakh for product development and training if a startup participates in an accelerator program.

Besides the Bihar Startup Policy, Hussain also launched a startup portal for young entrepreneurs that are interested in availing benefits offered by the platform. 

For startups that manage to secure angel investment, Hussain said that such startups will receive an additional 2% of the total investment as the success fee from the state government. 

“If a startup is successful in raising funds from an angel investor and still needs additional funds, then they seek government’s help as there is a provision of a matching loan set up under the Startup Fund Trust of Bihar’s industries department,” he said.

Further, to boost women entrepreneurship in Bihar, the state government will offer an additional 5% provisions to women entrepreneurs as compared to their male counterparts. Under 5% additional provisions, women will be granted a 5% extra funding under every initiative led by startup policy including a grant of INR 10.5 Lakh seed fund and an investment sum of INR 3.15 Lakh for product development if they participate in an accelerator program. 

Similarly, schedule caste (SC) and schedule tribe (ST) startup founders will be offered an additional 15% provisions under the startup policy such as a grant of INR 11.5 Lakh seed fund and an investment sum of INR 3.45 Lakh for participating in accelerator programs, the minister informed. 

Also, the Bihar government will invite applications for startup seed funds from the next month onwards, Sanjeev Kumar, technical director of Bihar’s Udyog Vibhag Department of Industries, informed.

The minister also noted that to increase startup participation in Bihar’s economy, the state government will also provide co-working space to the startups. To avail of all the above-cited facilities under the Bihar Startup Policy, the minister has asked startups to register on the newly launched startup portal of Bihar. 

In recent months, several state governments including Madhya Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, and Delhi have launched state-specific startup policies to boost the startup ecosystem. 

Besides, the Centre has also incentivised startups operating in India with a slew of initiatives such as Startup India Seed Fund, Startup India Initiative and Startup Leadership Program, among others. 

So far, the country’s unicorn club houses 105 startups working across diverse industries, with the latest addition of layer-1 blockchain network 5ire. 5ire gained the unicorn status after raising $100 Mn at a post-money valuation of $1.5 Bn.