UK’s ESpark, Viridian Ventures tie up, to invest $300 mn.

The UK-based Entrepreneurial Spark and India's Viridian Ventures recently announced a joint venture called Viridian ESpark Accelerator to create programmes for entrepreneurship development, for which the Viridian Venture-led consortium and its partners plan to invest about $300 million (Rs. 1,950 crore) in a phased manner.

Announcing this here, Murali Hariharan, Global Head (Venture Strategy), Viridian Group, said the accelerator had already given awards to 15 start-ups selected through a business plan contest launched during the Vibrant Gujarat Summit 2015. Of the over 140 entries received from across India, 23 applicants were also shortlisted to be a part of the Accelerator Programme, to be launched in Ahmedabad in August. Selected candidates would be considered for seed funding of around Rs. 1 crore from Viridian Ventures.

Similar accelerator programmes would be launched in Noida and Delhi-NCR by the year-end. In the next three years, these programmes would be expanded to Bengaluru, Pune, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Kochi, Chennai, Chandigarh and Kolkata.

Hariharan said the business plan contest aimed at encouraging grass-root level and women entrepreneurs who get little opportunity to showcase their innovative ideas. Among the start-ups selected are those that propose to make banana fibre-based sanitary pads for women, another to create alternative employment for slum dwellers, and a third on building a livelihood for tribals.

As compared to 400 accelerators in the UK, India currently has less than 100. In the six-year-period 2006-12, India’s venture capital doubled which, however, is still just 4 per cent of the world’s venture capital, he added.

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