IITs, IIMs to mentor entrepreneurship cells

The premier Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) will mentor smaller entrepreneurship cells across engineering and management institutes.

The decision to this effect was taken at the Global Conference of e-cells (entrepreneurship cells) held at IIT-Bombay as part of recently-concluded Entrepreneurship Summit. The summit was attended by 55 e-Cells, including major e-cells not only from IITs and IIMs but also international institutes like UC Berkeley, MIT and Stanford.

The conference concluded that 10 developed or mature e-cells will mentor smaller e-cells and create an ecosystem to encourage entrepreneurship.

“We want to replicate what MIT and Stanford have achieved in terms of creating an entrepreneurial ecosystem. The international e-cells gave a perspective to their own growth story and also shared their insight on how to create one,” said Varun Bhalla, coordinator, e-cell, IIT-Bombay.

Under the mentorship programme, the mentors will guide e-cells of institutes about educating masses on entrepreneurship in terms of patents, intellectual property rights, the way to start new ventures and build their trust in these organisations; team building; sponsorship; and faculty advisors for the entrepreneurship cell.

Also, the cells will look at developing an entrepreneurial culture on the campus itself. This is a major problem most of such organisations have faced, considering the risk-averse nature of students, their peers and parents, who would not want their prospects to get marred by a risky affair.

“We will help new colleges in forming a board and structure any event. We will help them with ideas and on how to address the problems in formation of e-cells,” said Bharat Vijayvargiya, student vice-president, C-Tides, IIT-Madras.

A key issue which the mentors will address is helping the new institutes raise finances for funding their ventures.

Entrepreneurship is a growing area of interest for engineering and management institutes. Many institutes have tied up with Wadhwani Foundation-promoted National Entrepreneurship Network (NEN). NEN is promoted by Romesh Wadhwani, founder of Symphony Technology Group.

So far, around 500 institutes have tied up with NEN. NEN’s entrepreneurship programmes attract about 100,000 participants every year.