Even as the start-up ecosystem is gaining momentum in Gujarat, experts see a growing need for focused attention towards incubation and acceleration.
At a workshop titled ‘Gujarat Start-up Ecosystem – Working towards creating synergies’ held recently in Ahmedabad, top advisors and angel investors underlined the need for monitoring and assessment mechanism for a robust start-up ecosystem in the State.
Focus on incubation
Sunil Parekh, a noted angel investor, said, “Although we have a very conducive environment for start-ups in the State, there are certain areas that need to be addressed. The need of the hour is to focus on incubation and acceleration. There is also a pressing need for monitoring and assessment of the start-up ecosystem. We need to continuously identify the challenges that start-ups face and report back with best practices that can be used by them for better performance.”
“One of our companies at GVFL is now being funded by Alibaba. Also PDPU has received a funding of ₹50 crore for one of its start-ups,” he added.
A senior government official said that in the past three years, the State has taken into its fold 33 institutes/incubators and over 200 innovative projects as start-ups. HJ Vyas, Additional Industries Commissioner, Government of Gujarat, said, “During the last three years, we received two major accolades from the Centre, including an award for the ‘best performer’ in State start-up ranking framework in 2018, introduced by DIPPT, and the Prime Minister’s Award for Excellence in Public Administration in 2017.”
Ranking framework
Organised by the Industries Commissionerate of the State government, the workshop was aimed at sensitising youth and share knowledge related to the Start-up Ranking 2019 framework released by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) last week. The workshop saw participation from start-ups, nodal institutes, incubation centres, angel investors, R&D institutions and government departments.
The Gujarat government currently, supports 206 start-ups and provides a total sustenance allowance of ₹1.24 crore, ₹2 crore towards mentoring assistance and ₹16.76 crore towards product development assistance. Apart from offering assistance the Government of Gujarat also gives preference to start-ups in public procurement.