New partnership to help small town entrepreneurs floated

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Bangalore, Jan 7 : With India Inc taking rapid strides in competing with its global peers and the country's economy on an upward trajectory, it seems even the smaller towns have caught the entrepreneurial bug. Moving away from the big, glamourous cities like Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai, it is the tier-II and tier-III cities like Chandigarh, Jaipur, Indore, Bhopal and Coimbatore that are catching the eyes of the investing community.

It's neither the lack of entrepreneurship nor the money that is acting as a deterrent to new start-ups coming up from these towns, but it is a different set of issues that has acted as obstacles, say experts. These wannabe entrepreneurs from these small towns are not looking at those big cheques, but they require the basic capital, the strategic thought leadership and mentoring that will take them to the next level.

As a first step, the National Entrepreneurship Network (NEN), a not-for-profit initiative working to inspire, educate and support new and future entrepreneurs in India, and Indian Angel Network (IAN), India's first and leading angel investing network, have joined hands to build the entrepreneurial eco-system, creating awareness about infusing outside equity and developing entrepreneurship in thes tier-II and tier-III cities.

"Entrepreneurship is becoming a career. Employees are becoming employers, but they need advice. Wrong decisions can hamper growth," says IAN vice-president Padmaja Ruparel. Since its inception, nearly 20 months ago, IAN has had 65 members and had done 10 deals. "If you look at the international standards, the angel network has been there for 15-18 years, but with only 125 members. And on an average they do just four deals a year," she says pointing towards the increasing entrepreneurial activity in the country.

That is where NEN plans to bring in its expertise of teaching the budding entrepreneurs to make the right pitch. "Don't worry pitching about the deal, but get the basics right before you can go and access funds. While we educate more people in the secondary and tertiary towns about how to go about making the right pitch, IAN will invest their time and money on these deals," says NEN executive director Laura Parkin.