A lot of good news are coming up for the startups in the Indian ecosystem from past few weeks. One after another we have been talking about how big cooperates have announced their plans to invest in incubating startups in the country. Here is one more, moving away from a physical set-up recently TiE Ahmedabad in association with Intellecap has announced an online incubation platform called StartupWave.
The world is moving online and the internet is a gateway to a world of opportunities available at your convenience. Then why should startup support not be available at your convenience? Why travel to Mumbai when your business is in Patna? Why wait for another 2 months for an acceleration program to start when you need it today? Can we rethink support for startups in India?
Keeping these things in mind and aim to democratize incubation, StartupWave has been conceptualised by Intellecap in partnership with Government of UK’s Department for International Development in India and GIZ on behalf of the German Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
According to TiE, 90% of the business ideas not fructify due to lack of incubation and mentoring support. It believes that the virtual incubation platform will help stimulating startup culture from unexpected geographies within the state.
StartupWave will provide services in two distinct phases – pre-incubation and incubation. Pre-incubation services are designed for idea to pilot stage startups and are designed to help them get accepted into incubators. Followed by by pitching opportunities to over 350 investors.
Anyone with a business idea can access these services for free.
“The idea is to take incubation to grass root levels through Startupwave.co. We have partnered with TiE to reach out to their entrepreneurial network in Gujarat and MICA is our official incubator partner. The aim is to reach beyond the brick and mortar model of an incubation centre,”said Ipshita Sinha, manager at Intellecap which runs the StartupWave.
At present, StartupWave has 25 incubators and 20 mentors on board.
Startups just need to create a profile and a business model canvas. Mentors will evaluate the business model to know the viability of business. After receiving approval from the mentor, the entrepreneur will be connected with one of the incubators on board.
Apart from TiE, the incubation centre of MICA has officially partnered for the platform, with this, incubators from IIM-A’s CIIE will render services as well.
Interested startups can apply here.
