Haryana to Set Up India’s First Integrated Startup Park

FARIDABAD: Haryana’s Minister for Industries & Commerce, Environment and Industrial Training, Mr Vipul Goel inaugurated the two-day Startup Jalsa at Manav Rachna International Universityin Faridabad this weekend. More than 1000 delegates are attending the event including over 500 startup founders. Hosted by The Ideaz Factory, presented by Rattan India and powered by Gionee, the startup festival offers entrepreneurs to pitch their business idea to the investors and raise up to Rs.10 crores in funds. More than 50 speakers and investors including some of the successful business leaders from Escorts, Gionee, YES Bank, Commonfloor.com, Scale Ventures, Knowlarity and Indo-European Business Forum are participating at the event. Haryana’s PWD Minister Rao Narbir Singh will be the guest of honour for the valedictory session of the event.

Minister Vipul Goel announced that Haryana is setting up India’s first integrated startup park. He said that his government is also evaluating finer aspects of the startup policy which will be announced soon for inviting feedback and inputs from the public. I and my government are fully committed to extend every support to startups in Haryana, assured Shri Vipul Goel. The Haryana Government has taken several initiatives to boost the entrepreneurship in the state. It is empowering industries through easy finance and investments and has established 19 clusters dedicated for small and medium businesses. Haryana has also announced a Rs.1000 crores fund for MSMEs and is providing collateral free loans of up to Rs.1 crore to startups. A 16-acre startup warehouse is being set up in Gurgaon in partnership with NASSCOM. The minimum land requirement for townships in Haryana has also been reduced from 100 acres to 25 acres, which will boost startups. Faridabad, a major industrial hub shortlisted for development as a Smart City, offers a lot of potential to emerge as the next hub for startups.

Welcoming the dignitaries, Nitin Narang, the festival director of Startup Jalsa and the Founder of The Ideaz Factory, said,“This year, the key focus of Startup Jalsa is around building profitable businesses rather than just attractive valuations. We have created a platform where India’s new generation entrepreneurs can interact with successful traditional business leaders who have a proven track record of creating and scaling businesses profitably. Ten years ago, people went to Silicon Valley to be able to really ‘startup’. However, with the mobile revolution, things have changed. The leading poster boy startup companies of India have created a critical mass of founders and startup employees who are setting the stage for the next wave of big enterprises.”

Sumit Jain, co-founder and CEO of commonfloor.com highlighted ten key pitfalls of running a startup and advised entrepreneurs to choose wisely before jumping in and to learn how to fail. Comparing entrepreneurship to a sweet and salted fresh lime soda, he said that startups should focus on building a good product and the money will follow automatically. Funding is never the reason for failure or success of a startup, he said.

Sumit Gupta, Group President and Country Head, Retail Banking Assets Group, YES Bank, emphasized on knowledge banking, and said that YES Bank wants to emerge as the preferred startup bank in the country. He said that YES Bank has identified ten hubs across India for opening dedicated startup branches, a few of which are already operational.

Rahul Narvekar, founder of IndianRoots.com and co-founder of Scale Ventures, urged young entrepreneurs not to get bogged down by what they don’t know. “Just startup. Market will teach you many things”, he said.

Dr Amit Bhalla, Vice President, Manav Rachna Educational Institutions, welcomed the participants to this mega event as the host University. Highlighting MREI’s commitment towards nation building and creating better human beings, he invited participants to create a structured ecosystem where new innovations and ideas gain ground.

More than 50 speakers and investors are participating at Startup Jalsa including Rajan Nanda, Managing Director, Escorts Group; Arvind R Vohra, CEO & MD, Gionee India;Vijay Goel, Founder, Indo European Business Forum; Neeraj K. Singal, CEO, SEMCO Group;Sarbvir Singh, Regional Advisor, JP Morgan; Ambarish Gupta, Founder and CEO, Knowlarity;Pranay Gupta, Co-Founder, 91Springboard; Anirudh Damani, Angel Investor and Serial Entrepreneur, Artha Ventures;Manish Kheterpal, Managing Director, WaterBridge Ventures; Somak Ghosh, Managing Partner, Contrarian Capital;Sujit Kanoria, Trustee, Kanoria Foundation; Pratyush Kukreja, Consultant, Unitus Seed Fund; and,Sanjay Singhal, Founder, Strategizers.

The first edition of Startup Jalsa in Chandigarh in June 2015 featured more than 700 entrepreneurs, over 30 speakers and 20 investors.More than 40 startups received investment commitments of a total of Rs.50 crores at Startup Jalsa 2015. Key speakers at Startup Jalsa last year included Ronnie Screwvala, Founder, UTV, Arunabh Kumar, Founder, The Viral Fever (TVF) and Pankaj Jain of 500 Startups. The startups showcased at Startup Jalsa 2015 also featured in Pitchers, an online series launched by TVF.

The Ideaz Factory is also known for having organized a plantation drive in Faridabad which entered the Limca Book of World Records. It also unfurled the world’s largesttiranga (Indian national flag) in Faridabad. Some of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rallies organized by The Ideaz Factory have seen participation of over a hundred thousand participants.