Women entrepreneurs ecosystem growing at a faster pace in India

NSRCEL is a leading startup incubator of IIM-Bangalore that is enabling entrepreneurs across India from starting a venture to scaling it up. The incubation centre is also doing significant work in terms of promoting women entrepreneurs across the country. In a conversation with Bizz Buzz, Anand Sri Ganesh, chief operating officer (COO) of NSRCEL, IIM-Bangalore, said that Indian women entrepreneurs' ecosystem is growing at a faster pace. He said, despite societal bias against women, many of its programmes are readying women entrepreneurs to successfully set up and scale up their ventures. It is also actively supporting entrepreneurship among rural women through its engagement with NGOs operating in various regions

We have seen many success stories in the women entrepreneurs' ecosystem in recent times. Is this ecosystem growing in India at a faster pace?

Yes. Definitely, the women entrepreneurs' ecosystem is growing at a faster pace at least what it was 2-3 years ago in terms of the sheer number of innovations that are led by women entrepreneurs and of course, the broader societal acceptance of women leaders in business and economy. From NSRCEL perspective, we think, there is a still a polarity in the country. There are a few who are extremely successful and we have come across those stories in the recent months. But, the number of hurdles and societal biases, women entrepreneurs face, is still considerable. We also see, therefore, a significant amount of drop. There are many innovations come from women entrepreneurs, but probably because of lack of family support and the biases, the dropout rates are much higher than we will otherwise expect from an entrepreneur. There is a huge economic opportunity in the country. In NSRCEL, we try to dissolve, keep away those hurdles to allow such innovation to thrive and become scalable.

NSRCEL of IIM Bangalore is one of the foremost startup incubation cells of India. Can you throw some light in terms of what kind of support NSRCEL provide to women entrepreneurs?

This year, we will probably touch upon around 1,000 women entrepreneurs. We run two kinds of programme. One is an early stage programme, which is applicable to entrepreneurs who have just an idea and have not yet commercialised their ventures, which we call as the women startup programme. Then, there is a late stage programme which we call as a '10,000 Women in India' programme for those women entrepreneurs who have commercialised their ventures and are now looking at ways to scale it up.

Across these programmes, though our programmes are designed to be sector agnostic, most ventures in some form or the other are tech-enabled. Today, technology plays a critical role in a venture at multiple levels. And women entrepreneurs, we deal today, are 90-95 per cent tech-enabled. They come in very diverse profiles. Large part of the entrepreneurs come from fashion and apparel sector, several entrepreneurs are in edtech space, and there are also entrepreneurs who are in the deep tech areas. So, the diversity in the entrepreneurial ventures of women is very exciting.

In NSRCEL, we help women entrepreneurs in three levels. On the first level, we help women entrepreneurs and their founding team to leverage their own capability, skill-sets and such things. So, the first investment we make is in the ability of the entrepreneurs itself. Secondly, we translate that into the ability of the founding team. Because the founding team, very often, is not only women. Therefore, it requires the right kind of leadership and personality traits to be able to manage all man investors, and all man customers among others. Through these two, we try to achieve the venture outcomes which is right kind of product fit, market fit, and many more. Also, there are many government-sponsored schemes which encourage women entrepreneurs. We see how they are able to leverage the existing ecosystem in the country to give themselves a fair advantage.

Raising money at the angel round is perceived to be the most difficult thing. NSRCEL ropes in many notable business leaders as mentors. How do you facilitate fund raising by women entrepreneurs?

While raising money in the seed and angel rounds is difficult for any entrepreneurs, it is more so for women entrepreneurs. Some investors feel that while women entrepreneurs may not lack in innovation, they may not stay the course. That is the unfortunate bias that women leaders face in the country. That is the reason that women leaders face difficulty in the early-stage fund raising. As they raise series A or B, fund raising becomes relatively easier because of the track record. NSRCEL connects women entrepreneurs to the investors through executive level mentors. Once they go through the NSRCEL's programmes, the reception from the investor community is far better than cold calling them.

IIM Bangalore itself has created many notable entrepreneurs. Do the women entrepreneurs have access to the alumni group of IIM Bangalore?

We are blessed in that sense. The IIMB alumni and NSRCEL alumni (over last 18 years), often come back and give back to the centre and foundation. There are three ways in which alumni engage. First is through mentorship. A lot of our alumni are entrepreneurs, former entrepreneurs, PE & venture capitalists, CXOs. CEOs and all of them come back in a pro bono manner to offer their time and expertise, which is a very powerful knowledge infusion. Second is the market access because of the alumni penetration across corporates in India and globally. A lot of our alumni also open up their corporate access in terms of market.

NSRCEL also has a Rural Entrepreneurship Cell. How is this programme helping rural women in boosting entrepreneurship?

Under the Rural Entrepreneurship programme, which includes rural entrepreneurs, we use two lenses. First is any form of productivity and income enhancement for agriculture and agri-related ventures. The second is rural livelihood. In terms of geography and product marketing, the rural market is very different. We have a lot of tie-ups with rural NGOs which operate in hinterland. There are very less scaled stories available now in rural landscape. But, this is just a matter of time before we start seeing those stories coming from rural areas.