IIMB entrepreneurship cell gathers pace

The Nadathur S Raghavan Centre for Entrepreneurial Learning (NSRCEL), the entrepreneurial cell at IIM-Bangalore (IIMB), added another feather to its cap when two of the ventures incubated at NSRCEL found recognition in their respective fields. NSRCEL has incubated and groomed over 20 business ventures since its inception.

Recently, Mango Technologies, an NSRCEL-incubated company sold its mobile handset user interface software to Qualcomm, the world’s largest wireless semiconductor company. As part of the deal, the company, which was started by first generation technology entrepreneurs Sunil Maheshwari and Lekh Joshi, sold a PC-based UI customisation toolkit to Qualcomm.

Mango was seed-funded by angels and Ojas Venture Partners, an early stage Venture Capital firm. The company has developed an application framework for low and mid-end mobile phones.

“The Mango-Qualcomm deal is a significant milestone in showcasing the innovation capabilities of home-grown technologists. This deal proves beyond doubt the critical role of incubators like NSRCEL in enabling high impact technology entrepreneurship,” said K Kumar, professor and chairperson of NSRCEL, IIMB.

In February this year, NSRCEL-incubated Radifinity, a technology solutions provider in the field of RFID-based services model, was acquired by the Aditya Birla Minacs group (ABMIT). The promoters of Radiffinity will head a new division at ABMIT offering their GPRS/RFID-based asset management services.

The synergy between Radifinity and ABMIT was always thought to be good and brought with it several advantages, especially for Radifinity. The promoters of Radifinity were allowed to continue their interests in Wifinity (the new company floated by them for which NSRCEL offered incubation and seed funds under the DIT TIDE scheme).