Meet 10 startups that impressed investors at RBL's Big Pitch series

Private sector bank RBL, in association with Amity Innovation Incubator, shortlists 10 winning startups with the potential for large-scale disruption in their sectors for the finale of the second edition of The Big Pitch series.

Last year, RBL Bank, one of the oldest private-sector banks in India, launched The Big Pitch series to provide holistic support, including incubation and funding, to startups.

This year, RBL Bank partnered with Amity Innovation Incubator for the startup incubation and funding contest. Held at Amity University, Noida, the event brought together some of the biggest industry players from finance, technology, banking and others.

Contestants of Big Pitch 2.0 got an opportunity to present their ideas to industry experts and a panel of venture capitalist firms. The competition included mentoring sessions by The Big Pitch’s knowledge partners, including Grant Thornton, Luthra & Luthra, NPCI, RBL Bank BAAS (Banking as a Service), IndiaFilings and SalezShark.

The startups presented their business models and were rated by the mentors on their ideas, presentation and scalability. They also received fundraising insights from industry veterans, including Indian Angel Network, Amity Capital and Matrix Partners.

Post-evaluation, the mentors chose 10 startups, who took home a range of benefits including free consultation with Grant Thornton and Luthra & Luthra, free cloud credits from Digital Ocean, a one-year ledger software licence from India Filings, a three-month CRM licence from SalezShark, Alpha Cards from F6S with deals worth $1 million and preferred pricing on APIs by RBL Bank.

Also read: Winners of Next Big Idea 2017 to make their presence felt in North American market

Meet the finalists

The 10 finalists - FullTank Technologies, LittlePixi, SocioGraph Solutions, Team Rentezee, Tnine, GalaxyCard, ilove9months, NDAX, Loktra and Veda Labs - were selected for funding and incubation opportunities.

These companies demonstrated innovative solutions, including unique business models like use of AI in improving sales, app-based credit cards and Blockchain-based asset exchange. Here’s a closer look at the 10 startups:

FullTank Technologies: This online platform offers a range of car maintenance services, including breakdown assistance, insurance and repairs among others.

LittlePixi: Available on Google Play, the LittlePixi mobile app is a coupon finder that curates coupons and best offers from 4000-plus websites, stores and restaurants.

SocioGraph Solutions: This firm has developed an AI-based tool to help professionals in field sales. The core offering, Dave.AI, is an AI platform that helps sales teams understand customer behaviour and increase sales effectiveness.

Team Rentezee: This online platform lets you rent in or rent out products across a range of categories, including apparel, sports and electronics.

Tnine: The company develops websites, applications and designs, and offers tech consulting and analytics services. It claims to be the one-stop solution for anything tech to business.

GalaxyCard: The startup has made India’s first digital credit card, aimed at providing benefits like safety, exclusive offers and big savings, among others.

ilove9months: A one-stop shop for maternity care, ilove9months offers services to women planning a baby, pregnant women and for the post-partum period.

NDAX: The National Digital Asset Exchange (NDAX) is a multi-asset, real-time automated trading platform for the emerging class of digital assets such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Loktra: A field workforce automation software, Loktra is helping Banking and Financial Services Industry to manage and automate teams involved in customer visits, acquisition and support activities. Most field teams rely on spreadsheets and paper-based systems for managing their tasks and Loktra aims to reduce time spent in managing field task to less than 5 mins.

Veda Labs: This AI-based platform enables enterprises to analyse their data efficiently and extracts real business insights.

What happened last year?

Last year, of the 10 finalists, three startups - Booksbeka (an online book store), Aspartika Biotech (a bio-technological startup for supplementary products) and Codeister Technologies (a fintech startup) – were incubated at Inspire, 1Crowd’s first state-of-the-art incubation centre at Christ University’s Faculty of Engineering.

The three winners of the funding competition - Denovo Biolabs (a provider of pharmacovigilance solutions), Doctors’ Circle (a healthtech platform) and Fourth Ambit (a social networking platform) - got priority listing on 1Crowd’s equity crowdfunding platform for raising funds of up to Rs 2 crore.

Also read: Jain organisation steps forward to back tech-enabled startups from within the community

RBL Bank’s efforts to support the startup ecosystem

RBL Bank India Startup Club (ISC) initiative aims to provide much-needed services and assistance to early-stage startups across India.

RBL Bank had launched an exclusive branch for startups in Bangalore last year to assist and provide all services a startup would need under one umbrella.

Surinder Chawla, Head - Geography, Branch and Business Banking, RBL Bank, highlighted the private sector bank’s commitment and strong focus on serving the dynamic needs of the startup ecosystem from “seed and development” to “maturity”.

“The Big Pitch 2.0, a one-of-a-kind start-up incubation event held for the second year in succession, gave potential startups a robust platform to seek advice from professionals, articulate ideas behind their business models and gain access to funding for their proposed ventures. I am delighted that RBL Bank’s The Big Pitch 2.0 and India Startup Club (ISC) have been catalytic in introducing startups to reputed mentors and encouraging them to achieve their entrepreneurial goals,” Surinder said.