Microsoft India has announced the availability of BizSpark Plus, its global program designed to accelerate the growth of startups in the country. The program will be implemented through select incubators and accelerators to provide added value products and services to high potential startups. In India, The Morpheus and Accel, as part of the Global Accelerator Network, have been appointed as the accelerators. Working with the accelerators, the program will offer each of their startups up to $60,000 of Windows Azure compute and storage over a 24-month period, at no cost.
Talking about the new program, Shekhar Kirani, Founder Member, Accel said, “BizSpark Plus will provide the entrepreneurs we work with access to technologies like Windows Azure and other software and services from Microsoft should provide an impetus to our companies in the race to scale and succeed.”
The chosen accelerator partners have been appointed by Microsoft for their exceptional ability to impact their local markets, their influence in the entrepreneurial community and their proven success with early-stage startups.
Commenting on the extension of the program to India, Ludovic Ulrich, WW Program Manager for Microsoft BizSpark said, “With BizSpark Plus, we are moving to the next exciting stage: working with entrepreneurs on the forefront of the cloud revolution. Windows Azure is a powerful, integrated platform, making it easy for startups to get their services up and running quickly with minimal overhead.”
BizSpark Plus is a ‘by invitation only’ program, and a startup in addition to being eligible for the foundational BizSpark program, must be nominated by a BizSpark Plus partner.