ET BureauBENGALURU: Zone Startups India, Dentsu Aegis Network and Nasscom are increasingly focusing on launching women-driven accelerator programmes and similar such initiatives, a move aimed at bringing in more women entrepreneurs in the startup ecosystem. Programmes focus on long-term prospects for entrepreneurs to raise seed rounds for research and creating prototypes within techand finance-oriented domains. “Networking is one of the major hurdles we face as women entrepreneurs, accelerator programmes can especially help with that.
Some of the people we met through Zone Startup’s accelerator programmes are individuals we are currently forging partnerships with. It also helps to raise seed rounds to sustain operations or develop prototypes,” said Shivani Mohan, co-founder of Saral Designs, which has created a proprietary tech enabled machine that can produce up to 15,000 sanitary napkins a day, largely for women in rural India. Saral Designs won the first place at Zone Startup’s women accelerator programme ‘Empower’.
Empower is considered to be the first of its kind in the country, along with Google and the department of science and technology partnering with the organisation.
The six-week programme received about 180 applications, a majority of which came from women with business and technology backgrounds. The top 15 were selected, of which eight managed to raise seed rounds ranging from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 10 lakh. “A six-week programme is not long enough, so we provide the top 15 one year-long support including provision of office space if they plan to be headquartered out of Mumbai. This is in addition to any required mentorship or networking,” said Ajay Ramasubramaniam, director of Zone Startups India.
Majority of the applications they received included women in business or finance, many of whom had up to 10 years of work experience. “There are difficulties prevalent in the startup ecosystem too. There were many of whom we wanted to put in the top 15, but we could not find appropriate mentors for them in terms of their domain expertise or knowledge they possessed within deep technology and other such areas,” said Ramasubramaniam.
According to a Nasscom report, the number of women entrepreneurs in India has gone up from 6% in 2014 to 9% in 2015. “We will be coming out with another report in October to see what kind of growth has happened in 2016. We have the WomenTechship programme that enables entrepreneurs to make use of Nasscom warehouse facilities for highly subsidised rates, as well as connect them to mentors besides conducting coding meetups and hackathons.
The end result is for them to network well and raise seed rounds,” said Rajat Tandon, senior director at Nasscom. “. However, more comprehensive women-centered accelerator programmes like Zone Startups are needed.” Nasscom has partnered with BlackBox Connect and Google to focus on women entrepreneuroriented initiatives.
Similarly, Dentsu Aegis Network has recently announced a female foundry accelerator programme, where any female-founded startup with a focus on technology based in any part of south or Southeast Asia can send in their applications till early October.
However, the programme looks beyond seed stage support as it’s necessary for the startup to have secured a seed round of funding in order to apply. Venture capitalists, including Dentsu Ventures, Monk’s Hill Ventures, amongst others, are likely to provide a second round of funding.
Some of the people we met through Zone Startup’s accelerator programmes are individuals we are currently forging partnerships with. It also helps to raise seed rounds to sustain operations or develop prototypes,” said Shivani Mohan, co-founder of Saral Designs, which has created a proprietary tech enabled machine that can produce up to 15,000 sanitary napkins a day, largely for women in rural India. Saral Designs won the first place at Zone Startup’s women accelerator programme ‘Empower’.
Empower is considered to be the first of its kind in the country, along with Google and the department of science and technology partnering with the organisation.
The six-week programme received about 180 applications, a majority of which came from women with business and technology backgrounds. The top 15 were selected, of which eight managed to raise seed rounds ranging from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 10 lakh. “A six-week programme is not long enough, so we provide the top 15 one year-long support including provision of office space if they plan to be headquartered out of Mumbai. This is in addition to any required mentorship or networking,” said Ajay Ramasubramaniam, director of Zone Startups India.
Majority of the applications they received included women in business or finance, many of whom had up to 10 years of work experience. “There are difficulties prevalent in the startup ecosystem too. There were many of whom we wanted to put in the top 15, but we could not find appropriate mentors for them in terms of their domain expertise or knowledge they possessed within deep technology and other such areas,” said Ramasubramaniam.
According to a Nasscom report, the number of women entrepreneurs in India has gone up from 6% in 2014 to 9% in 2015. “We will be coming out with another report in October to see what kind of growth has happened in 2016. We have the WomenTechship programme that enables entrepreneurs to make use of Nasscom warehouse facilities for highly subsidised rates, as well as connect them to mentors besides conducting coding meetups and hackathons.
The end result is for them to network well and raise seed rounds,” said Rajat Tandon, senior director at Nasscom. “. However, more comprehensive women-centered accelerator programmes like Zone Startups are needed.” Nasscom has partnered with BlackBox Connect and Google to focus on women entrepreneuroriented initiatives.
Similarly, Dentsu Aegis Network has recently announced a female foundry accelerator programme, where any female-founded startup with a focus on technology based in any part of south or Southeast Asia can send in their applications till early October.
However, the programme looks beyond seed stage support as it’s necessary for the startup to have secured a seed round of funding in order to apply. Venture capitalists, including Dentsu Ventures, Monk’s Hill Ventures, amongst others, are likely to provide a second round of funding.
Get Unlimited Access to The Economic Times
