CIIE-IIMA and Economic Times Launch Power Of Ideas 2012
The Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE), Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Ahmedabad,is aiming at creating an entrepreneurial ecosystem in the country. With this goal, CIIE has once again launched The Power of Ideas 2012 in collaboration with Department of Science and Technology, Govt. of India and The Economic Times.
CIIE is today a leading entrepreneurship facilitator and incubator in India, with experience in mentoring, hand-holding and making entrepreneurs investor-ready. CIIE has a very strong and single largest mentoring network through MentorEdge comprising of mentors across sectors. It also has a strong network of evaluators, potential investors and mentors who are supporting the Program. The application deadline is June 25th, 6 PM.
The Power of Ideas is an initiative that seeks to provide a launch-pad for entrepreneurs to accelerate the growth of their early stage start-ups through mentoring, validation and seed funding. The program in 2010 was immensely successful, providing mentoring support to more than 800 entrepreneurs, cash awards to more than 40 start-ups, seed funding to 15 start-ups. The program also helped start-ups raise more than 20 crore in external funding.
The Program is divided into multiple phases, each designed to ensure significant value addition to the participating start-ups:
Phase 1: Awareness generation through Start up session and business model crystallization (June-July): In order to encourage as many aspiring entrepreneurs to take the first step, and to motivate early stage entrepreneurs, a series of start-up sessions are being organized across the country where successful business leaders, entrepreneurs and investors would share their experiences. Applications are invited through an online application system .These applications would be evaluated by a panel of industry and domain experts carefully chosen to select the best for the next phase.
Phase 2: One on one mentoring to strengthen the business (July-August): Personalized mentoring support through mentors of India’s largest mentoring network – MentorEdge who would spend time with the applicant teams to help them improve their businesses and prepare their business pitch for the next round of evaluation. These teams would then present in person to a panel of jury members consisting of experts, mentors and investors.
Phase 3: Core team capacity building (September): A select group of teams would then be chosen for a 10 day capacity building workshop at IIM Ahmedabad, with a curriculum designed to ensure that the entrepreneurs are well equipped to grow their businesses and to make them ready for investments.
Phase 4: Seed funding and incubation support (October onwards): The entrepreneurs would pitch to an investment committee for a seed funding worth INR 4 Crore and cash awards worth INR 2.2 crore. The entrepreneurs would be connected to incubators and investors across the country to ensure that they get ongoing support to sustain their start-ups.
For more details, check here.
