Mumbai, September 06, 2014 – GenNext Ventures, a venture capital fund sponsored by Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), has signed an agreement with Microsoft India to incubate start-ups and set up innovation hubs in the country. The first hub will start operations in Mumbai, with the first batch expected to start on October 6.
“The idea is to create a platform for innovation. We are looking at creating the next generation of innovators and create global leaders from Indian start-ups,” said Raghunath A Mashelkar, Chairman of GenNext Ventures and a member of the RIL board.
The number of start-ups coming up in the country is a meagre 1,000 per year compared with about 60,000 in the US and 6,000 in China. “The industry is at a nascent stage. Here lies the opportunity,” said Mashelkar, former Director-General of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research.
After setting up the first hub in Mumbai, the companies will expand to seven or eight centres, Microsoft India Chairman Bhaskar Pramanik said, adding that the partnership is to create the next generation of start-ups.
Microsoft India will partner with GenNext Ventures through its investment arm, Microsoft Ventures.
“We will coach and mentor them. Help them to find funds, new business models and markets,” Pramanik added.
Microsoft Ventures will help GenNext identify, shortlist, on-board promising start-ups and power the accelerator programme.
It will also provide these start-ups access to software and technology advice. At the end of the accelerator programme, GenNext will invest strategically and selectively in some of these IT start-ups.
GenNext Ventures, however, did not reveal details about the corpus it has earmarked for investments or the amount it will invest in a venture. Business Line
