It’s been over a year since Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled the Startup India, Stand Up India initiative in a bid to encourage innovation, entrepreneurship and investment into the startup ecosystem.
When the startup India initiative was launched, it was planned that seven new research parks would be set up with an initial investment of about $15.4 million each. The idea was to boost innovation through incubation and joint efforts between academia and the industry, as per a report by Inc42. The proposed parks will be set up at IIT Guwahati, IIT Hyderabad, IIT Kanpur, IIT Kharagpur, IISc Bangalore, IIT Gandhinagar, and IIT Delhi.
Inc42 reports that as per the most recent Startup India status report, of these seven, IIT Kharagpur is already under construction. The DST has sanctioned about Rs 90 crore to set up a research park at IIT Gandhinagar and has initially disbursed Rs 40 crore. The Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and DST are setting up the remaining research parks at IIT Guwahati, IIT Hyderabad, IIT Kanpur, IIT Delhi, and IISc Bangalore.
Startups in the biotechnology sector also are being given an impetus by the government. In this regard, the government will be setting up five new bio-clusters, 50 new bio-incubators, 150 technology transfer offices and 20 Bio-Connect offices will be set up in research institutes and universities across India.
A fund has also been set up to provide financial assistance to new biotech startups. The fund called the BIRAC AcE Fund has been set up in partnership with National and Global Equity Funds (Bharat Fund, India Aspiration Fund amongst others).
As per Inc42, the Startup India Status report dated April 15, 2017 says that three Bio-incubators have been selected for the Equity Fund. A total of 20 bio-incubators have been supported by the DBT.
Image: Narendra Modi official Flickr page