Gear Up Healthtech Startups! Unitus Seed Fund Launches Starthealth Competition

Seattle and Bangalore-based, Unitus Seed Fund has announced the StartHealth Competition for healthtech startups in India. The deadline for submission of application is June 17, 2015. The 10 finalists will be selected to pitch to the jury on June 23, 2015.

It is a nationwide challenge to identify promising early-stage health-tech startups focused on serving India’s 20 Cr families living on under INR 20,000 per month.

The program provides up to INR 10 Cr. (US$1.6M) in grants and investments to every early stage startup seeking to enhance access to affordable technology driven healthcare products and services for the low-income masses in India.

The startups serving in sectors like medical devices, diagnostics and therapeutics, mobile monitoring, online marketplaces, app-based services and enterprise management and healthcare service delivery may apply for the StartHealth Competition.

Commenting on the move, Dave Richards, Managing Partner of Unitus Seed Fund said, “Technology innovation is a key factor to making better healthcare services accessible and affordable for the masses in India. This competition is intended to strengthen dozens of promising healthtech startups and to gleam a spotlight on some of the best.”

The startups will be judged on various parameters including impact on India’s masses, leadership and team, innovation, business model and presentation quality.

The winner will receive a cash prize of INR 10 lakh. Besides, the winner and the runner-up will get an opportunity to pitch for a direct entry to the StartHealth program which includes receiving up to INR 50 lakhs of non-dilutive fund, support from StartHealth program partners PATH, Pfizer, Manipal Hospitals and Narayana Health and a potential seed investment of upto INR 1 Cr.

The interested startups can apply here to participate in the program. Additional details of the program can be obtained from the website.

Unitus Seed Fund is a $23 Mn seed stage India venture fund that invests in startups innovating for the masses in India. Prior to this, the seed fund along with Sylvant had announced StartEdu, a nationwide program to identify, support, and invest in the most promising early-stage education startups. The seed fund had also received funding from Pramod Bhasin and Vikram Gandhi just last month to invest in startups, which have potential to reduce poverty. So far, it has invested in startups like Jiffstore, Curiositi and Cue Learn Pvt. Ltd.