Premier management institute Indian School of Business (ISB), which has its campuses in Hyderabad and Mohali, is working to create a global corridor for startups.
This will allow Indian startups to pursue business opportunities in other countries and vice versa. It also is looking to draft its alumni members as mentors to nurture startup ideas into scalable businesses, said Prof Bhagwan Chowdhry, Faculty Director, I-Venture, which fosters entrepreneurship and nurtures startups at ISB. It administers business incubators and facilitates the conversion of startups into entrepreneurial ventures. It has various programmes that cater to ventures of all stages.
“We have stepped up activities related to nurturing the entrepreneurship ecosystem. We were doing them in pockets. Now, we are bringing them under one umbrella. We are engaging with alumni members asking them to don the hats of mentors,” he said. ISB has more than 13,000 alumni members in 60-plus countries.
“The success or the failure of the startups is not just decided by the idea but also by the team executing it. Our alumni members will nurture ideas into successful businesses. I think the alumni network is the biggest source of brain power. They will do the hand-holding,” he said. Depending on ideas, alumni members, who might be latent entrepreneurs, may opt to turn co-founders in the ventures. On the approach that ISB will take, he said ideas will be matched with the alumni members for taking it forward. It is also making efforts to work with other entrepreneurship ecosystem players and educational institutions. The focus is on hosting startup activities jointly and also bringing teams together,” said Chowdhry.
I-Venture “There might be students in India where they have an idea but see their use cases in Europe, the US or other countries. Many budding entrepreneurs may not be aware of the legal system in those countries, the startup ecosystem there or finding the right mentors there. Conversely, there might be ideas in other countries that can solve a problem in India. We will play a bridge to connect ideas with local players, policymakers and others,” he told Telangana Today. ISB will work with the venture capital funding community and external funding agencies. ISB has also been seeing some startups coming to the campus placement drives for recruitment.
“Business proliferations happen when the markets are hot. There will be some shocks when the economy is not doing good. That is the nature of entrepreneurship. All the startups will not succeed. However, we should continue to allow experimentation to happen. There will be upswings, shocks, and closures and those that survive will be more robust. There are some job losses happening now. They all are talented people. They will find work with other startups or companies,” he said about the recent job losses in the startups.
ISB is also doing an entrepreneurship programme under CM ST Entrepreneurship and Innovation (CMSTEI) scheme to support and promote entrepreneurs among scheduled tribes of Telangana. The Tribal Cooperative Finance Corporation (TRICOR) is the primary stakeholder in this programme. \I-Venture\ More than 170 startups graduated 70 raised funding Total funding raised by startups is about Rs 730 crore More than 2,000 jobs created by startups