The role of Universities in the startup eco system

Is it a co-incidence that Stanford University is right in the middle of Silicon Valley? Stanford is both geographically and figuratively at the heart of the silicon valley technology eco-system, and has been for a while. The connection between the two isn't apparent immediately, but if you talk with a few people and get a sense of what the roles of the various players are in the startup ecosystem, it becomes more and more apparent that the ecosystem in silicon valley has hugely benefited from the local universities in the area, who continue to play the role of a "central connector".

A university, although not a direct participant in the startup ecosystem in a critical part. A world-class university is great for bragging rights, but it's more than that. A University tends to be a melting pot of ideas - Research has shown that diversity of ideas leads to innovation and there's no better place to see diversity than at a University. It's not just the diversity in race or nationality, but also in background, value systems and priorities. These "frictional" interactions between individuals that have competing values who are trying to work together is the prime source of ideas and innovation. If you're lucky, this diversity carries over from your University into the workplace as well, as graduates stay back and get jobs, trying to build the next big thing.

The other important thing that Universities provide is resources - From incubators, funding, mentoring and support, there's a lot that a modern university has to offer to entrepreneurs. But the most important thing might be the Alumni network. If there's an easy way for a just-graduated entrepreneur to reach someone at the top of the industry and get some help, connections or even money from them, it's a really big deal. And nothing accomplishes this like an Alumni network. Alumni of a university usually have a soft corner for people from their own universities, and can go out of the way to help them out. This whole "Paying it forward" ethos tends to be strong among Alumni networks, and can be a tremendous source of disruptive jumps that an entrepreneur can do.

Lastly, but probably the most importantly, Universities allow a sneak peak into the future. All the cutting edge research and innovation that's happening in the Universities rubs off on the students. There's nothing more exciting than seeing the "Next Big Thing" early, probably in a university lab, for an ambitious student. Many companies have been built on this "peak-into-the-future" that Stanford students received. From SUN, which saw a great future in the networked world, to Google, who saw early the explosion of information on the internet and trying to understand the structure of the web.

It's become quite apparent to be over the last few weeks that Universities play a disproportionately large role in nurturing an ecosystem. When we look at the ecosystem in India, we're missing the central connector. Our Universities are playing the needed part to various degrees, but they really need to step up their game to help us raise the level of the ecosystem and help us all turn the Indian startup ecosystem into a world leader.