Startups of the State will now have a proper office space for working and developing their ideas into full fledged business. Assessing the needs of entrepreneurs, an incubation centre for startups was inaugurated on Thursday by IT Secretary Vinay Choubey.
The centre, situated in Excise Building at Kanke Road is set up under Atal Bihari Vajpayee Innovation Lab (ABVIL), an initiative of State IT and E-Governance and Indian Institute of Management, Ahmadabad. The centre offers ‘plug and play’ space for two persons in each startup.
Choubey said, “Startup culture is needed for inclusive growth and development of our state. The department has undertaken a unique initiative of supporting and facilitating new ideas, plans, research and development and facilitates it with the various funds and incentives as mentioned in the Jharkhand Startup Policy 2016.”
He urged the startups to explore the opportunities in every area and assured government’s support. “The Government is focused on providing the Startup with state-of-art infrastructure embedded with the plug and play facility along with programme management capabilities,” Choubey said.
The innovation centre will focus on research and entrepreneurship with the aim of providing a plug and play platform that will strengthen startup ecosystem across Jharkhand. The selected startups will not just have an office space here but they will also get expert opinion on improving their projects. “Under the startup policy, once we get good ideas, we ideate them, incubate them and make them market worthy. In the incubation lab, the startups will not just get plug and play facility but will also get inputs from expert on how to register company, apply for patents and market their companies,” Choubey said.
The department will also provide the companies and initial handholding grants and reimburse them the patent cost if they apply for one.
In fist phase, 20 startups have been selected by the department which will be incubated at the centre. “We have 29 more startups lined up for the second phase for which we will require a bigger working space. We are renovating the building next to Jharcraft in Ratu Road where the incubation centre will be shifted within six months,” the IT secretary said.
The owners of startups selected under this scheme are excited about getting a proper workplace anda good mentorship. Satish Kumar, founder of the startup Freedko Agrocart, focused on eliminating middlemen from selling of farm produce said, “This is a wonderful initiative and will help us getting not just the financial support and a workplace but a good mentorship so we can expand our business.”