Meet the 10 shortlisted Extreme Entrepreneurs of Lightspeed India Partners
The second edition of Extreme Entrepreneurs, a business training series by Lightspeed India Partner, saw participation from more than 870 startups across 102 cities. The shortlisted startups will be attending Masterclasses led by industry leaders and receive one-to-one mentorship by Lightspeed India
Lightspeed India Partners launched the second edition of its business training programme Extreme Entrepreneurs, which saw a 90 percent surge in participation. Over 870 startups applied to it across 102 cities. The business training series started on September 3 and will run for six weeks.
The top 10 selected startups will get an opportunity to attend masterclasses led by startup leaders, which includes Max Levchin – Co-founder and CEO of Affirm and former Co-founder of PayPal; Anu Hariharan – Partner at Y Combinator; Ritesh Agarwal – CEO and Founder of OYO Rooms; and Sriharsha Majety – CEO and Cofounder of Swiggy; among others.
Vaibhav Agrawal, Partner at Lightspeed said:
“We are amazed by the founders we met – a small towner from Bihar who lived through college under $2 a day, a founder who started a college coding competition that attracted 20,000 plus developers, and a person who rose from debilitating sports injury to run a half marathon. I am quite hopeful that these few weeks will ignite new ideas, pull founders out of their day-to-day work and shift their trajectory completely.”
Lightspeed India Partners set up a rigorous process for selection, where startups were judged by their ambition, leadership in moments of adversity and a track record of making most of the opportunities.
Besides the masterclasses, shortlisted startups will receive a one-to-one mentorship by a Lightspeed Partner.
YourStory lists the shortlisted startups of Lightspeed Extreme Entrepreneurs Partners:
Openapp
An integrated security and access control platform for enterprises using smart locks, Openapp aims to provide tech-enabled security that is not just affordable but also convenient, at the same time. Starting with automating security for verticals such as logistics and retail, the startup is now scaling its distribution capabilities by onboarding partners, pan India.
Blackboard Radio
The startup aims to solve the problem of ‘Silent English’ (The inability to converse in English while being able to read and write in the language) in Tier-II and III cities in India. The platform wants to improve conversational English of school students, for which they have developed a mobile application to provide constructive feedback on speech.
Gratitude
Targeting individuals with anxiety and depression, Gratitude seeks to provide everyday self-help tools and meditation exercises to its customers.
GroMo
GroMo, a platform for micro-entrepreneurs from the traditional sectors such as mutual fund, aims to offer financial products including loans, insurances and investments within their network.
Bakbuck
Bakbuck is a social gaming network, and an assisted Indian language shopping platform for the housewives from non-metro cities. It provides its users with a ‘Kitty Party on-demand’ like experience, allowing them to discover their interest-based community, play social games and experience assisted online shopping during their short breaks throughout the day.
Womaniya
Womaniya, a women-only community platform, helps women share their daily life issues in Hindi language and get support. The startup aims to end psychological issues, including anxiety and depression among the 330 million non-English speaking women in India, who otherwise do not get to share much about their mental state.
Xeno
An Artificial Intelligence (AI) driven marketing platform for large enterprises to increase their repeat sales by up to 50 percent. They provide solutions to solve operational problems, make POS data useful and help make automatic creatives to execute campaigns using one click. Their customers include enterprise retailers like Forest Essentials.
Deepsync Technologies
Deepsync is making voice recording as easy as typing. The startup provides an AI-based voice-cloning technology that enhances the audio experience by improving the production process by 10 times. Deepsync’s technology works for both English and Hindi languages.
Ithaka
Ithaka, a travel planning startup connects travellers to a matching travel influencer from its community for a one-on-one conversation, enabling the entire trip being planned with more efficiency and in a personalised approach.
EazyPG
An application automating tenant verification, complaints and rent collection for hostel and PG (Paying Guest) operators. Thus, providing operators with round the clock control over their rental business.
(Edited by Suman Singh)