B.Incube: Helping start ups to find their feet

aRTICLE | Incubation B.Incube: Helping start-ups to find their feet

B.

Incube (Bilaspur Incubation Centre), founded by the All Indian Institute of Local Self-Government (AIILSG), has become a shining example of private and public sector collaboration to promote innovation. It has collaborated with Amazon Web Services (AWS), Zoho, and many other partners, to create a first-class start-up accelerator in India. AIILSG By combining the efforts of industries, the government, academia, research organizations, and corporate groups, the Government of India seeks to introduce international cloud services, empower venture capital funds, and link industry counselling resources to create a comprehensive ecosystem to facilitate new start-ups.

Since its inception in 2021, the centre has successfully incubated a total of 105 start-ups, out of which more than 47 per cent have already graduated. Vision of the centre is to nurture cloud talent, accelerate the growth of India’s new start-ups, help teams break into the global stage, and support the upgradion and transformation of local industries to export more successful Indian models.

VIrtuAL ACCeLerAtIon ProGrAmme

Virtual Acceleration Programme, a 14week acceleration programme, held on December 14-15 and implemented by B.Incube in collaboration with Wadhwani Foundation, wherein 40 startups went through a structured process to refine their problem statement, customers and market segments, business plans and creating financial strategies. the Virtual Acceleration Program, following community epidemic prevention measures, was the first in this year’s events to be held virtually. the event was also broadcast online, where participating teams showcased India’s strength in innovation to the world. During the event, a ‘Best new Innovation Award’ was awarded to start-up ‘Cargar’ Founder raj Anupam from the Clean tech sector, by a panel of judges. Apart from that, an ‘Audience Choice Award’ was also given to start-up ‘Agri Career’ founder Yuvraj manishwinner from the edtech sector.

As part of our ongoing 360 degrees support to help early-stage entrepreneurs to continue their entrepreneurial journey, B.Incube organized a Startup Demo Day, wherein 15 start-ups were given the opportunity to make their pitches before a panel of investors. Besides product pitches from start-up teams, special panel discussions and keynote speeches also took place during this event.

Group Captain Y Srinivas (retd), retired IAF officer, delivered the keynote address said, “the CoVID-19 pandemic has not only accelerated the digital transformation of various industries but has notably attracted global attention to Indian industries’ potential.” Srinivas said that Smart City Bilaspur is fully committed to facilitate start-up incubation and digital transformation, besides playing a part in the establishment of the Incubation Centre, Bilaspur City. B.Incube is also the first accelerator program to be established by a local government in Chhattisgarh. the Smart City Bilaspur will continue to help match start-ups with willing corporate partners, with the help of which new start-ups can obtain resources from enterprises, and on the other hand, enterprises can benefit from accelerated digital transformation. through a comprehensive entrepreneurial acceleration program that encompasses team mentor training, community relations management, local industry resources development in Bilaspur, and capital matching, the centre also wants to accelerate the marketisation, scaling, and internationalization of creative ideas to help them create a market value. out of a total of 105 start-up teams who have completed the program, 60 have attained recognition and acquired a venture capital investment.