Connecting India with the East

Following WHub’s expansion into India in order to connect our respective Startup, Talent & Innovation Ecosystems, WHub is currently on a roadshow across India including major hubs Bangalore and Delhi. 

India’s Tech and Startup scene has grown and developed fast, giving birth to estimated 30 unicorns (privately held companies worth over 1 billion USD) since 2010,  of which 5  have already successfully exited. Over the last year, the scene has shown a value creation of 140 billion USD, fuelled by 50 billion investment, of which 10% came from domestic investors. Time to connect our respective ecosystems.

This roadshow is the first step in building exposure and connect Indian Startups and Talent to the East, for them to explore market opportunities and benefit from WHub’s network, know how and Soft Landing Program. Vice versa, HK and GBA based companies looking to expand into India can equally benefit from privileged access through WHub’s partner network in India.

A Thriving Ecosystem in Bangalore

Labelled the heart of India’s tech and innovation scene, Bangalore’s startup ecosystem is on fire. Half of the country’s startup activity happens in Bangalore. The city has fostered the macro forces that in return created opportunities for innovation, entrepreneurship and digitalisation to blossom.

Bangalore has the highest number of engineering colleges driving its technical prosperity and is continuously growing its engineering institutions (estimated 20% every year!) to accommodate the explosive demand for technical talent. With Infosys and Wipro setting up camp in 1983, the city was already ascending as the cradle of India’s high-tech sector. Government initiatives and institutions have also come into play to foster the growth of the ecosystem: Startup India Hub has mentored more than 400 startups since its inception in June 2016 and NASSCOM’s multi-faceted approach has sparked several initiatives, assisting over 10.000 product-ready startups gain a foothold among investors, mentors and corporations in order to help them scale.

Co-working spaces have mushroomed and are all over town. India is the second-largest market for flexible workspaces in APAC, second only to China, and over 4.1 million sq. ft. of flexible space is available in Bangalore alone (compared to 2.9 and 2.8 in Delhi and Mumbai respectively). Consolidations start taking place, Oyo just recently acquired Innov8. Privately backed incubation programs and acceleration programs have shown great track record and Bangalore is home to an active and prominent VC scene supporting its growth. 

Establishing partnerships to build bridges between Bangalore and Hong Kong / GBA

The WHub team was thrilled to be welcomed with open arms and happy to impress key ecosystem builders in Bangalore with the opportunities our thriving ecosystem in Hong Kong and Greater Bay Area has to offer. The team gave presentations and met with Investors, Incubators, Accelerators, Co-Working Spaces and Community builders such as Kstart Capital, the Seed Capital Fund by Kalaari Capital, ideaspring Capital, Axilor, Excubator, Innov8 and Startups Club.

Already in collaboration with Entrepreneur First (EF), WHub also met their India and APAC team in their offices in Bangalore. EF is an international Talent Investor, which supports individuals to build technology companies and runs activities at regional level.

In addition, the team was honoured to be invited to the final pitch day of Google’s Launchpad Accelerator. The program, running in over 40 countries around the world, is always tailored to the local market and provides access to the best of Google - its people, network, and advanced technologies - helping startups build great products. Amazing to see the solutions 8 startups have developed to specifically cater to India’s most important problem statements, be it in the area of Smart City, GreenTech, FinTech, HealthTech and SocialTech.  

Finally, WHub also leveraged the opportunity to reconnect face-to-face with the Indo - German Chamber of Commerce (IGCC). IGCC has been very instrumental in providing support to Indian companies, including startups, planning to expand their business, including programs to drive startup and corporate co-innovation. 

Let’s Ignite - Fuelling the investment scene

This year’s startup investing conference “Let’s Ignite” was under the theme of “Organising India’s Private Market”. Let’s Ignite, which started as a part of India’s angel investing platform Let’s Venture’s activities to boost startup investing, became a brand in itself and is by now India’s largest Angel investor conference: Uniting key players, from investors, over government institutions, Media, corporate stakeholders, accelerators up to of course startup founders and their teams. 

Building on the strategic partnership signed between Let’s Venture and WHub’s sister company AngelHub (AngelHub is HK’s first SFC regulated startup investment platform for professional investors and worldwide startups scaling in Asia), the AngelHub team was invited to actively participate and help bring the perspective of its respective ecosystem to the conference. AngelHub’s Co-Founder/COO Karena Belin, also Co-Founder and CEO of WHub, opened the session of “The Future of FinTech” with a keynote on FinTech trends and opportunities in Asia, with a focus on Hong Kong and the Greater Bay Area. 

“Let’s Ignite was once again a key event in the Indian startup investing scene. It allowed us to meet and exchange with major actors in the investment and startup acceleration space, like for example Mohandas Pai and Suniti Nanda” confirms Pritish Sanyal, Head of Strategic Partnerships at AngelHub.

Mohandas Pai is a Padma Shri Award holder and is most famously known as the Chairman of Manipal Global Education, former CFO of Infosys, one of India’s top start-up evangelists and angel investors.  Suniti Nanda is Fintech Head of the Government of Maharashtra (GoM) and leads the “Mumbai FinTech Hub” that has been established in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region as a focal point for FinTech activity within the State of Maharashtra. 

"We thank Shanti and her team for having us at Let's Ignite and look forward to deepen our collaboration to the benefit of our respective ecosystems" said Karena Belin in a joint interview together with Shanti Mohan, Co-Founder and CEO of Let's Venture, given in front of media.

More partnerships ahead with the visit to the capital

The second part of the roadshow will bring the WHub team to Delhi, the national capital and policy hub of India. Meetings are taking place with key government entities such as Invest India, Startup India, Niti Aayog and associations including Nasscom. The team will also connect with family offices, Indian Angel Network (IAN), visit and present at incubations cells of key universities and other partners such as Co-working space Awfis and Techstars India. 

The vision and mission of the institutions the team is looking forward to deepen collaboration with resonate the vision and passion of WHub, consisting of helping startups unleash their full potential, on not only local scale, but regional and global one. 

Fruitful connections to help startups scale cross border

Please do not hesitate to reach out to us to learn more about the collaboration with our partners and how we can help you scale cross border. You can also find details on our Soft Landing Program on our dedicated page or please just reach out to us under jessie@whub.io. The team will be happy to assist you to bring your venture to the next level!