RIL mentors 11 start-ups under programme with Microsoft

Reliance Industries Ltd today said it has mentored 11 start-ups from diverse sectors as part of an accelerator programme launched jointly with Microsoft Ventures late last year.

A total of 267 start-ups had applied for the programme launched last September, the company said in a statement.

The 11 selected start-ups are engaged in education,healthcare, transportation, retail and HR sectors and have undergone a four-month course at RIL’s facility in Navi Mumbai near here, it said.

Even though the Mukesh Ambani-led company and Microsoft had hinted at investing in some of the start-ups, the statement did not have any reference of any infusions done in the current round.

“We are proud to announce the graduation of these 11 start-ups, all of whom have developed a robust business strategy, which they will present to a community of venture capitalists, corporates and industry experts,” RIL said.

RIL already has a venture investing business called Gennext Ventures, and Microsoft Ventures was running an accelerator lab in Bengaluru when the announcement was made.

The graduating start-ups include companies in the enterprise space, offering solutions to businesses like CarIQ, which offers a collected car platform, as well as in the consumer category like Mocioun, which is a mobile application for organising group activities, it said.

“It helped us get rid of our ‘frog in the well’ mentality, allowing us to dream bigger and aim higher,” CarIQ founder and chief executive Sagar Apte said.

The selected start ups have won business deals from companies like Fortis, Flipkart, Raymond, Credit Suisse, DotCabs and Snapdeal, the RIL statement said.

The start-ups were guided by experts during the programme and taught market insights and dynamics, it said.

“We are happy to have many entrepreneurs in the batch who gave up lucrative careers in India and overseas to create companies to innovate and build businesses to address global needs,” RIL board member and chairman of Gennext Ventures RA Mashelkar said.

The start-ups were selected by a panel comprising of executives from RIL, Microsoft and venture capitalists.