30 July, 2015
July 24th 2015, Friday evening, in spite of the heavy monsoon downpour, the IIM C campus was buzzing with activities and excitement. Some of the most innovative minds flocked together with the mission to get ideas into action and launch their statups in 54hrs over the weekend.
Organized for the first time in Eastern India, the Startup Weekend was hosted by IIM Calcutta Innovation Park (IIMCIP) to promote entrepreneurship and innovation in the region. To ensure success of this event, IIMCIP roped in some of the key stakeholders in the startup ecosystem namely – TiE, Calcutta Angels, Nasscom, CII and Innokul.
The event attracted tremendous participation from young students and working professionals and long queue of participants eager to pitch their ideas was a sight to witness. Forty Eight participants presented their startup ideas through a 60 second pitch. Almost equal numbers of participants were waiting to join as cofounders and take these ideas forward. Based on popular choice fifteen teams were selected for the finals. The participants formed teams and worked on their ideas over the weekend to create an outline of the minimum viable product. Fun filled three days at the campus coupled with some serious brainstorming and non-stop activities was definitely to look out for. After idea generation and finalization on the first day, eminent mentors conducted one-on-one advisory sessions on the second day and helped the participants to structure the ideas and explore strategies and feasibility options.
The last day was the Grand Finale where one could see all ideas come alive. The event was judged by an eminent panel comprising of different stakeholders of the startup ecosystem. The ideas were evaluated with respect to the business model, customer validation and execution & design.
There emerged three winners – ComBuyN, Hephaestus Techno and Yello!. Two social enterprises received special recognition in the event – iJustice and Garbage to Gold
. The Entrepreneurship cell of IIM Calcutta will support all the teams to shape their ideas and firm up their business model and the top teams will also get an opportunity to pitch for incubation at IIMCIP.
The event ended with a bang, with smiles and great outcomes. It encouraged and inspired young people to bring their idea into action and take the first step towards their entrepreneurship journey. It was indeed an event to witness, to participate, to learn and to grow.
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