Startup Village sets sights on being largest telecom incubator

The Startup Village at Infopark Kochi has scaled up its ambitions to become the world’s largest telecom incubator.

In the first phase, the village is all set to have 25,000 sft of space by May 2013 and the remaining 75,000 sft by January, 2014.

“This will make the Startup Village the world’s largest telecom incubator. We will further strengthen the entrepreneurial ecosystem to accelerate this transformation by providing infrastructure in the form of a technology innovation zone (TIZ) in about 10 acres in Kochi with an initial investment of Rs 100 crore,” chief minister Oommen Chandy said.

He also assured to put in place “a landmark Student Entrepreneurship Policy” within 30 days, showing his government’s commitment to encourage entrepreneurs at the college level.

 

The policy provides 20 per cent attendance and 4 per cent grace marks to students engaged in entrepreneurship during their study.

Sanjay Vijayakumar, chairman of the Governing Board of Startup Village, said it would give a huge fillip to the state for tapping its vast human resource potential.

Of the Nasscom Top 10 Emerge Product Companies, he said, four had founders from Kerala.

Since its inauguration by Infosys co-founder Kris Gopalakrishnan five months ago, the Startup Village had received over 250 applications. It is now aiming to cross 900-1,200 applications in the next 9-12 months.

TIZ is proposed to host more initiatives like the Startup Village in a public-private partnership mode in other technology areas and verticals like telecom, data analytics, animation and gaming, nanotechnology and biotechnology.

The zone will provide space to startup companies, which would have to pay only the operational cost. The government will manage the infrastructure and the innovator units will have 100 per cent operational freedom to pursue their ideas and graduate into independent businesses.