Biju Patnaik Centre of Excellence to function at XIMB from April

With a view to meet the capacity building needs of the entrepreneurs, particularly those belonging to the small and the medium enterprises (SMEs), the Orissa government will set up the Biju Patnaik Centre of Excellence in the Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB).

The Centre will be in line with the Entrepreneurship Development Institute (EDI), Ahmadabad and is expected to start functioning from April 2009, a senior official of the state industry department said.

“Various entrepreneurship development programmes will be taken up by the proposed Biju Patnaik Centre of Excellence and this is expected to be functional from April next”, Hemanta Sharma, director of industries, said.

Talking to the media on the sidelines of a function organised by the Co-ordination Committee of Industries Association (CCIA), Sharma said, the Centre will function at the Team Orissa Project Advisory Centre, called as TOPAX, which has been functioning at XIMB at present.

This will be devoted to the promotion of SMEs and new enterprises in the form of identifying the entrepreneurial potential and helping the budding entrepreneurs to set up new ventures.

It will help the industry, both existing and the prospective ones including the self help groups (SHGs) with services like preparation of the company's project profile, providing need based advisory services, project evaluation, formulation training, training-counseling for investors, skill development and entrepreneurship development.

The state government will provide subsidised assistance to the Centre for carrying out various activities, he added. Since the entrepreneurs approaching the district industries centre (DIC) and the nodal agency like Industrial Promotion and Investment Corporation of Orissa Ltd. (Ipicol) were often found to be lacking in the capacity building measures like preparation of the detailed project report (DPR) and project profile, the Centre will come in handy to help the prospective entrepreneurs.