SUMMARY
• India Accelerator has successfully conducted acceleration programmes for two cohorts
• It will use the funds to diversify its offerings, enable global reach, and engage with growth-stage startups
• It will also offer mentorship and peripheral services, including financial and legal assistance
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Gurugram-based India Accelerator has raised an undisclosed amount of funding in a round led by InvestMind Solutions and Singapore-based HotStar ventures.
Founded by Ashish Bhatia and Abhay Chawla in 2017, India Accelerator is a coworking space and accelerator that assists startups in becoming sustainable and leverage technology.
India Accelerator is also a member of the Global Accelerator Network (GAN), a consortium of more than 85 leading accelerators in the world, including SparkLabs in South Korea and Techstars in the US. It claims to have expanded its portfolio and has come up with a second co-working space as a separate LOB to help promote community building and collaboration among the startup ecosystem.
The accelerator plans to use the raised funding to further diversify its offerings, enable global reach, and engage more with growth-stage startups while also offering mentorship and peripheral services such as financial and legal assistance.
Bhatia said, “The investors bring a huge network and connections to India Accelerator, which will help us progress with our original vision of using the resources to continue helping entrepreneurs.”
The development comes at a time when India Accelerator has successfully completed acceleration programmes for its two cohorts.
Ankit Airon, partner, Hotstart Ventures, said, “We see the investment in India Accelerator as a step towards backing the budding talents of one of the biggest Asian economies and the company aims to provide them with a springboard into the Asian start-up scene.”
The acceleration programme for the first cohort took place in 2017, in which $150K was invested in six selected startups — Kuants, an algorithm trading company; EValk, software developer for deaf/ASL language; CabBazar; Voko, a home furnishing rental startup, Wish-a-mitr; and Square1, a creative online and mobile software development company.
The accelerator had announced that these startups would benefit from its Co Work, Co Live and Startup Academy during the course of the three-month programme.
Recently, India Accelerator had announced the list of six startups selected for its second cohort, including Galaxy Card, Insurance Samadhan, Lawyered, NullPointer, Queued, and EGA.
It had announced an investment of $150K as seed funding in these startups, which were to receive $25K each to nurture their startup plan.
The accelerator will help the selected startups in the ideation phase and in building a model around their idea. It will also help startups connect with the top technologists, entrepreneurs, investors, and mentors to help put them on the growth track.
Recently, the Startup Academia Alliance Programme was launched by Startup India for academic scholars and startups with the aim of bridging the gap and increasing the efficacy of technologies for wide impact.
The first phase of the programme was hosted at India Startup Hub and more 133 applications were received from startups, of which 43 were selected.
Other acceleration programmes running for startups in India are the GSF Fintech Accelerator 2018, with a focus on fintech startups; Microsoft Scaleup Accelerator Programme, with a focus on late B2B startups; Shell E4 Accelerator Programme, and Scalerator Programme, among others.
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