N/Core partners with Mphasis in 3-year deal to incubate non-profit startups in India

N/Core also announced the 10 non-profit startups that they have selected for six-month incubation in their second batch of Open Cohort.
N/Core partners with Mphasis in 3-year deal to incubate non-profit startups in India
N/Core partners with Mphasis in 3-year deal to incubate non-profit startups in India
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N/Core, an incubator exclusively for non-profit startups, on Tuesday announced its three-year partnership with Mphasis, a leading IT services and solutions provider specializing in cloud and cognitive services, to incubate non-profit startups in India. With this partnership, Mphasis will invest over Rs 4.5 crore to incubate up to 26 non-profit startups over the three-year period. N/Core also announced the 10 non-profit startups that they have selected for six-month incubation in their second batch of Open Cohort. This cohort is supported by Mphasis, Omidyar Network and DE Shaw & Co.

Announcing the partnership, Meenu Bhambhani, Vice-President and Head – Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Mphasis said - “When talent meets funding, amazing things happen. The technology sector has benefited immensely by investing in top talent to drive innovation. At Mphasis, we believe that this way of thinking should apply to CSR too. This collaboration with N/Core helps us to make a meaningful difference in solving challenging problems in the social sector.”

The organisations selected for N/Core’s 2nd Open Cohort were picked from a pool of 1,177 applications at a 0.8% selection rate. The applicants include graduates from top educational institutions and 60% of the organizations selected for incubation have women co-founders.

One of the selected non-profits, BillionBricks which builds “PowerHYDE”, is the world’s first solar home for the homeless which finances itself by the energy it produces and sells. Anthill Creations, which won Social Business Champ award 2018 from Yunus Social Business, mobilizes communities to create low-cost and sustainable playscapes for children from scrap tyres and recycled material. Another non-profit, Mijini Research, is building an Urban Financial Intelligence Platform (UFIP) - a cloud-based reporting, analytics and scenario planning tool to assess financial performance of Urban Local Bodies.

Talking about the partnership with Mphasis, N/Core CEO Sudha Srinivasan said, “Mphasis CSR is known to make bold bets in their grant-making. This partnership with N/Core is an emphatic vote of their faith in non-profit entrepreneurship as a means to nurture innovation in the development sector. We are excited to make the most of this support and accelerate our cohort’s journey towards meaningful impact.”

Each select non-profit will receive an innovation grant of Rs 10 lakhs. These non-profits will work closely with dedicated mentors, viz. Sanjay Purohit, ex-Chairman of Infosys Consulting; KR Lakshminarayana (Lan), Chief Endowment Officer of Azim Premji Foundation and Ujwal Thakar, ex-CEO of Pratham and GiveIndia. Ms. Kamakshi Rao, Senior Investment Director at Capital Advisors and Dr. Madhav Chavan, Founder of Pratham have also joined as mentors. N/Core mentors invest their time and expertise to provide in-depth support to the startups throughout the six months of incubation, and beyond.

N/Core, started in January 2017, has already incubated nine startups and 18 more are now undergoing incubation, including this new cohort.

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