Million dollar challenge awaits startups at Vizag Fintech Festival
The Vizag Fintech Festival is looking to attract startups from the globe to create partnerships which will provide them the platform to tap into the opportunity of the country
Startups across the world can compete for the million dollar challenge competition at the forthcoming Vizag Fintech Festival with a select few eligible for $1 million of equity free funding. The government of Andhra Pradesh has laid out the roadmap to establish the city of Visakhapatnam as the fintech hub of the country.
It will be held from October 24 - 26 where the Million Dollar Challenge will be the key highlight as a select few startups vie for recognition.
To attract the interest of startups to participate in the Million Dollar Challenge, roadshows have already been held in global destinations such as Tel Aviv, Hong Kong, Paris and London. They will be conducting their roadshow in Bengaluru on October 10.
Lakshmi Potluri, CEO, DCF Ventures, says, “We are actively wooing global startups with a message about how their solutions would be relevant to India.” DCF Venture, an organisation with a strong connect to the entrepreneurial ecosystem to foster innovation is a partner of the Vizag Fintech Festival.
Around three to five selected startups from different regions will be invited to Vizag to present their technology at the Challenge Final. These startups will be selected from the segments of agritech, fintech and emergetech.
According to Lakshmi, it has received around 150-200 applications from overseas locations and expects three times this number from India. She felt that the global startups could tap into the vast untapped potential in the country.
The Vizag Valley is a venture to create a self-sustainable global startup ecosystem, which focuses on converging finance and technology through industry enablers, infrastructure set up, entrepreneurship and innovation. There are multiple stakeholders in this plan, which include corporates, universities, financial institutions, technology service providers, startups and accelerators.
