NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Indian Angel Network (IAN), a national network of angel investors that invests in startups and early-stage ventures, has launched an incubation programme to empower entrepreneurs in building sustainable and scalable businesses in the social impact space. For the same, it has partnered with Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) and Deutsche Gesellschaftfür Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, a German development company.

The focus of the ‘IAN-GIZ-SIDBI Incubation Programme for Social Enterprises’ is to help build and breed sustainable enterprises that will make positive impact on the lives of citizens as well as create wealth for the promoters and returns for the investors. As part of the programme, IAN aims to nurture and incubate over a 100 social enterprises serving the base of the economic pyramid.

“In a country of the size and scale of India, socially relevant startups that can make difference to the society are of great importance. IAN’s intention is to create a significant difference in creating social impact by helping and guiding passionate entrepreneurs scale up their ventures. IAN is delighted to partner with GIZ and SIDBI,” said Mohit Goyal, co-founder, IAN.

The incubation programme is open to all the social impact startups based in the country, and shortlisted applications will be assigned business mentors from the IAN mentor / investors pool. As part of the programme, all incubatee startups will undergo a 6 to 9 month incubation period, refining their business plan, sales strategy and some customer endorsement. The startups will also be provided access to angel investors and other funding sources.