CHANDIGARH, 30 AUGUST: CII Northern Region organised the ‘Chandigarh Startups Session’ as part of its flagship initiative, ICONN 2022 today. The theme for the session was ‘Shaping a Vibrant Entrepreneurial Ecosystem’. Eminent speakers at the session shared government strategies and policies being undertaken to support entrepreneurs in the region, which enable startups to ensure more purposeful, productive, agile, and flexible ways of conducting business.
Speaking at the occasion, Mr Dharam Pal, Advisor to the Administrator, UT Chandigarh said, “We are keen to create a robust ecosystem for promoting innovation in businesses. Chandigarh will soon come up with its own startup policy, a dedicated startup hub, a seed fund with a corpus of ₹50 crores, and more. A draft scheme has already been published to invite comments and suggestions from stakeholders. We are looking at data from the economic census, private research platforms, ministerial press releases, Startup India’s official portal, industry reports, media articles, and views from the key stakeholders to come up with a better policy than before so that government efforts to transform the economy of Chandigarh through entrepreneurship policies do not fail to live up to the expectations of its startups.”
Delivering the keynote address, Mr Kris Gopalakrishnan, Chairman, CII Centre of Excellence on Start-Ups & Entrepreneurship and Co-Founder, Infosys Ltd said, “It is the collective responsibility of the industry, high net-worth individuals (angel investors), academic institutions, and the government to work together to build a robust startup ecosystem in any state or city. We need to nurture startups in new and innovative areas along with strengthening and growing the startup ecosystem in Chandigarh. The UT will also have to work with Punjab and Haryana to effectively utilise resources in the surrounding areas.”
“The success of young entrepreneurs today will be the key to India’s transformation. Startups, technology, and innovation are the three pillars on which Chandigarh will be focusing its efforts in building a startup ecosystem. Along with Startup India, we must give the slogan of Standup India, and therein lies our strength”, shared Ms Hargunjit Kaur, Secretary – Industries, Chandigarh Administration.
Highlighting CII’s role in promoting startups, Mr Rajiv Kaila, Chairman, CII Chandigarh UT & Director, Kaila Engineering Pvt Ltd said, “To enable the Corporate – Startup cooperation to flourish, CII has taken some specific initiatives, including setting up a dedicated Centre of Excellence (COE) for Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Startups in Hyderabad. CII is currently working with 90 start-ups directly and indirectly working towards helping start-ups with a 5x revenue growth. The COE shall also conduct Masterclasses for government officials on how to work with startups.”
The UT Administration and Industry need to work together in developing a startup ecosystem in Chandigarh for promoting startups in the UT and developing Chandigarh as Startup Shivalik Valley on the lines of Bengaluru and other southern states which are being developed as silicon valleys of India, he added.
Today’s session had two panel discussions, one on ‘Boosting Startup Ecosystem’ and the second on ‘Funding Options for Startups’. The first session deliberated on the factors important to boost the Startup ecosystem such as Mentoring, Legislation, Infrastructure, Coworking spaces, Branding, Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) etc and strive to find new avenues for the growth and development of Startups in the Chandigarh region. The second panel discussion touched upon touch upon funding avenues like Angel Investors, Venture Capital, Family Offices, Venture Debt Funds, Government Grants & Funds, Crowdfunding etc.
About Chandigarh’s Startup Ecosystem
Chandigarh has been ranked as an aspiring leader in developing a strong start-up ecosystem by the Department for the promotion of industry and internal trade (DPIIT) in its third edition of the States’ Startup Ranking. The Industries Department of Chandigarh Administration is the nodal agency responsible for the development of the start-up ecosystem. Chandigarh along with the neighbouring areas as part of the Greater Chandigarh Region has the potential to become the next hub of startups. This has been supported by the enabling ecosystem comprising Incubation Centres, Educational and Research Institutes of repute etc.
As stated by Mr Dharam Pal, Advisor to the Administrator, UT Chandigarh during the session,young minds of the city beautiful have tapped the entrepreneurial wave. Many entrepreneurs from Chandigarh have started successful startups like Flipkart, which became one of the early unicorns in the country. A small city of just 10 lakh people, Chandigarh is home to about 558 startups. In the past few years, several Chandigarh-based startups such as Jugnoo, Pumpkart, Edurev, Trideal, Paymart, among others have been backed by the likes of Kalaari Capital, Omnivore, Wipro Consumer Care Ventures, Indian Angel Network, etc. The success story of the Chandigarh-Panchkula-Mohali tricity came into the spotlight in July 2020 when PrepLadder was acquired by the Edutech giant Unacademy for $50 billion.
About ICONN 2022
To create a platform to facilitate the engagement between Corporates and Startups through a stakeholder engagement framework, CII has conceptualized a special initiative titled ICONN, the Industry Connect Platform for Startups. ICONN – the first of its kind virtual platform, an Industry-led 360-degree exercise that aims to catalyse strategic interactions between the Corporate Sector and Startups and other key stakeholders to create an integrated, inclusive, and vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem in the country. The key objectives of ICONN are to promote Corporate – Startup connect, strengthen the startup ecosystem in India, and strengthen international engagement.