Nasscom launches programme to incubate 10,000 start-ups

Bangalore: To give a boost to the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the country, Nasscom has announced the launch of ‘10,000 start-ups’ programme.

This programme aims to incubate, fund and mentor start-ups in the next 10 years.

While Nasscom has been running such entrepreneurial activities in the past, this time it has sought to involve all the stakeholders – from venture capitalists to product companies that can help foster the start-up ecosystem. They will be provided with tools consisting of hosting credits and other technology and business tools valued at $25000.

As a part of this, Nasscom has partnered by Indian Angel Network, Google, Microsoft and Verisign.

Further, the industry body has ambitious plans of creating $15 billion firms in the next 10 years, which eventually would be a part of the $300-billion Indian IT industry.

Som Mittal, President, Nasscom, said this will create a significant national impact on employment, GDP, innovation, entrepreneurship and will be vital to realise the industry vision.

Tech events
“Start-ups need handholding in the initial stages in areas like monetising of business, especially in technology and mentorship helps,” said M.K. Sridhar, Member-Secretary and executive director, Karnataka Knowledge Commission.

In line with this, the programme will facilitate 7,000 start-up-related events such as hackathons, investor roadshows and best practices workshops across 30 cities. Tech talks and white space discussions will help young entrepreneurs identify global technology trends and needs, according to Mittal.

While these are noteworthy objectives, some start-ups still are sceptical and concerned that this does not turn into a lobby for start-ups affiliating with the key technology partners.

“We are concerned that we might get sidelined if we are not working in areas that Microsoft and Google have interests,” said an educational start-up which works on open source technologies.

Further, Nasscom plans to create awareness about technology entrepreneurship as a career option. India has 3 million professionals working in the IT sector.