Tier 2 & 3 cities see a surge of start-ups

India’s ranking in Global innovation index rises from 81st rank to 46th rank:

Union Minister of Commerce & Industry, Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution and Textiles Piyush Goyal has called upon the Global Venture Capital (VC) Funds to focus more on startups from tier 2 and 3 cities. Chairing the 4th Roundtable with Global Venture Capital Funds, organised by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) recently, Goyal invited the VCs to explore new sectors for investing, promote and protect the intellectual property created by the young Indian entrepreneurs, provide expertise to scale-up and explore greater capital infusion including risk capital. Over 75 VC fund investors from across the United States, Japan, Korea, Singapore, and some global funds domiciled in India, participated in the deliberations. These funds have a total Assets Under Management (AUM) of more than $30 billion in the Indian region. The Global VC funds made a number of suggestions, which they felt could further the investors’ sentiment in the sector.

Goyal pointed out in the meeting that India is home to over 61,000 recognised startups spread across 55 industries, with 45% of them emerging from tier 2 and 3 cities and 45% of startups having at least 1 woman director, a testimony of diversity, spread and inclusivity of the Indian startup ecosystem. The government has undertaken 49 regulatory reforms specifically for startup ecosystem to enhance ease of doing business, ease of raising capital and reduce compliance burden.