(Part 3/n: Incubators/Accelerators) From Guidance to Funding to Infrastructure and What Not: The Flood of Enablers for Entrepreneurship In India!!!
About
- Money is not the only ensurer of success when you want to launch and run a business, you need help, be it market access or specialized consulting, or a network of people you can bank upon for guidance and help when the need arises
- A business incubator takes infant start-ups, often at just the ideation stage, and makes them ready enough to launch in the business world
- Most incubators/accelerators open calls for applications to their in-house programs periodically which can be easily accessed through their websites or by tracking their social media accounts
- You get the opportunity to be associated with other entrepreneurs going through the same process of building and creating, learning from their mistakes and at times also get potential customers for your products
I am back with another article in the series on the enablers for the development of entrepreneurship in India. This time I am going to talk about my home turf, incubators, and accelerators. Incubators and accelerators are typically entrepreneurship support organizations that handhold entrepreneurs through the various ups and downs of the start-up journey, help them course-correct when they go wrong, rejoice in their successes and make it possible for their ventures to survive and thrive.
For the first point of business, I want to clarify how an incubator and an accelerator are different. Just like a medical incubator helps struggling infants survive and makes them ready for the world, a business incubator takes infant start-ups, often at just the ideation stage, and makes them ready enough to launch in the business world. They help you go from idea to product to funding to business. Accelerators come in after incubators are done with you! While incubators help you establish, accelerators help you expand. Once you have a running business, have a revenue stream, and have been able to show some profits, an accelerator will help you create and implement a roadmap to take your venture to greater heights, get more funding, and/or expand to bigger markets.
Currently, we have well over hundreds of incubators helping start-ups and entrepreneurs operating in different specializations such as deep-tech, med-tech, AI, and also sector-agnostic business incubators for all other sectors. They provide mentoring, and guidance and get invested in the success of the start-ups they onboard.
Now, you must be thinking about what they get out of it. Well, to be straight about it, the idea of establishing incubators across India at a large scale that reach innovators and entrepreneurs at the grassroots level is one part of a larger initiative taken by the government to foster a culture of entrepreneurship in the country and give a support system to people who have ideas but not the means to make a business out of it. Colleges and universities have particularly been keen on taking up the challenge and establishing such centers on their campuses, which not only help their own students make use of the infrastructure and mentoring but also provide these services to ‘outside’ entrepreneurs and become a transformative part of the Indian growth story. Then there are corporates that establish incubators or accelerators to give a platform to nurture and fund and launch to market, the ideas of their own employees, their spin-offs, and other entrepreneurs.
How can you be associated with these organizations?
Most incubators/accelerators open calls for applications to their in-house programs periodically which can be easily accessed through their websites or by tracking their social media accounts like LinkedIn. Usually, when onboarded in this manner, you’ll go through a certain duration of pre-decided training and mentoring period and will be coached to make you pitch-ready for the investors. Then you’ll be given a chance to pitch your idea to the investors and get funds if they decide to see merit in your venture.
There is another way though, of being associated with these organizations, apply directly to the investment/funding schemes floated by the government like SISFS, SAMRIDH, BIRAC grant etc. through the government websites, get the government grant in place first and get associated with the incubators. You might ask why you need to be incubated when you’ve already got the grant to make the idea work.
Well, the government body has taken a bet on you and your idea and shared their revenue to ensure the success of your idea but everyone knows that money is not the only insurer of success when you want to launch and run a business, you need help, be it market access or specialized consulting, or a network of people you can bank upon for guidance and help when the need arises and that is why most of these government grant schemes only release funds to the entrepreneur when they are associated with the support organizations (incubators) that can provide them all of these things.
Being a part of an incubator, and having the option to work from their campus, you not only get all of the help stated above, but you also get access to a co-working space without the worries of managing an office in the initial stages of your venture development and you also get the opportunity to get associated with other entrepreneurs going through the same process of building and creating, learning from their mistakes and at times also get potential customers for your products.
With the failure rate of start-ups being over 99%, being incubated significantly raises your start-up’s chances of survival, and it’s an easily available support mechanism to guide you and help you grow, so why not utilize it?