MoS Jitendra Singh Asks Industry To Invest In Startups

Minister of State (MoS) for Science and Technology Jitendra Singh on Sunday called the industry to invest in startups.

Addressing the 37th Foundation day of the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) National Institute of Immunology, NII, Delhi, Singh called for “equal stake with equal partnership” and asked the industry to take the responsibility to sustain the startup boom.

He said that the government is looking to promote industry-driven startups for wealth and job creation.

Singh said that startups will be sustainable if industry from the very beginning identifies the theme/ subject/ product and invests matching equity with the government. He assured that funding will not be a constraint for promoting the “innovation ecosystem” in the country.

Highlighting the Biological Research Regulatory Approval Portal (BioRRAP), a national portal launched last year for providing single window clearance to startups and researchers seeking regulatory approval for biological research and development in the country, Singh said that India is poised to become a global bio-manufacturing hub and will figure among the top five countries of the world by 2025

He said that biotech startups have grown 100 times in the last 8 years from 52 startups in 2014 to over 5,300 in 2022. He said that three biotech startups were incorporated every day in 2021 and a total of 1,128 biotech startups were set up in 2021 alone, signaling the rapid growth of the sector in India.

According to a report, the Indian biotechnology industry was pegged at $63 Bn in 2019 and is expected to cross the $150 Bn mark by 2025, expanding at a CAGR of 16.4%.

The Covid-19 pandemic provided a boost to the biotechnology sector. The space is led by major players such as Biocon and Serum Institute of India as well as startups like MedGenome.

The Centre has been promoting startups for the last two years and has come out with a number of schemes like ‘Startup India’ to assist startups. Besides, various state governments have also been promoting startups for job creation. However, the ongoing funding winter has marred the sentiment, with startups struggling to raise funds. Consequently, Indian startups have laid off over 22,000 employees since last year, as per Inc42’s layoff tracker.

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