Three tribal companies among startups backed by Tamil Nadu government

CHENNAI: In a bid to ensure inclusive development of the state's startup ecosystem, the Tamil Nadu government on Friday invested Rs 9.75 crore in eight startups founded by entrepreneurs from the SC/ST community. The investment was made in the form of Compulsorily Convertible Debentures (CCD), offering the state government an equity stake in these companies.
Among the eight startups are three companies led by entrepreneurs belonging to the scheduled tribes in Hasanoor and Tamarakarai in Erode district and Kotagiri in The Nilgiris. TN CM MK Stalin handed over sanction orders to the eight startups on Friday in the presence of MSME minister TM Anbarasan, MSME secretary Arun Roy, and other officials. "These startups will play a pivotal role in achieving Tamil Nadu's US $1 Trillion economy goal by 2030," the state said in a statement.
The investments were made from the Tamil Nadu SC/ST Startup Fund, a Rs 50 crore fund floated by the state government. This the second batch of SC/ST startups to be backed by the fund, taking the total investment to Rs 17.25 crore in 13 startups. The investment will be used by the startups to strengthen the business model and scale operations. The government backing also helps bring more credibility to the ventures, helping them acquire new clients and expand to more markets.

The eight startups that secured investment on Friday work in sectors including advanced manufacturing, artificial intelligence, health tech, architecture, clean energy. The three tribal ventures are TAMS Tribal Green Fuel, a biomass briquettes manufacturing facility; Namsanthai Kotagiri, a firm producing and trading in coffee and honey, and Sholakar Tribal Creations, a firm trading honey, seemar brooms and furniture. The preliminary shortlisting of applications was carried out by StartupTN with support of experts, followed by due diligence, interviewing and mentoring of the founders.
The CM on Friday also handed over the Tamil Nadu Seed Fund (TANSEED) grant to 25 startups, taking the total number of TANSEED beneficiaries in the state to 109. TANSEED is a flagship initiative of StartupTN and was launched by the Tamil Nadu government to support early-stage startups with a seed grant of up to '10 lakh each. These startups hail from various parts of TN including Chennai, Thanjavur, Namakkal, Coimbatore, Tenkasi and other districts, and were shortlisted in a multi-stage screening process. These include assistive technologies startup dVerse Technologies, robotics startup Imrobonix, social commerce firm Live Box and EV startup Zealev DC-Tech.