Focus on impact creation, employment generation: KTR urges startup community

On Telangana’s approach, Rama Rao said the State through its T-Hub successfully built a robust startup ecosystem.

Hyderabad: IT and Industries Minister KT Rama Rao urged the startup community to focus on impact creation and employment generation and not just the general business metrics like valuations, funding and users. This approach will deepen the startup ecosystem.

Speaking at an event organised at T-Hub to announce the partnership of T-Hub with Dallas Venture Capital (DVC), a venture capital firm based in Dallas and Hyderabad, he said there is a new found confidence among the newage startups that raising capital is not a challenge. It is the potential of their idea that they are banking, Rama Rao said.

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The world is looking for viable opportunities to invest. Several pension and sovereign funds are also looking up at India to invest. Many are convinced that investing in the growing Indian economy will be a good business proposition. However, it is the ideas that will matter to attract these investments, he said.

Citing the success of city-based Skyroot Aerospace, which recently successfully launched India’s first private rocket into the space, he said it was incubated at the State supported startup enabler T-Hub. Elon Musk’s SpaceX succeeded in launching its rocket in its third attempt but Skyroot succeeded in its first attempt. Another city based startup, Dhruva, also successfully launched nano satellites. While they are not yet to become unicorns, the successes will open up new opportunities with many players from other countries willing to give assignments to these players. “We should look at creating such kind of impact,” he said.

While there are opportunities to raise funds, the startups should ensure that they have complementary systems in place to ensure they grow without burning cash.

On Telangana’s approach, Rama Rao said the State through its T-Hub successfully built a robust startup ecosystem. There are more than 6,000 startups in the State and the number is about 60,000 across the country. However, only about10,000 angel investors are investing in the startups across the country. This number has to increase, he said welcoming Dallas Venture Capital to Hyderabad, which has set up a Rs 350-crore India Fund.

DVC and T-Hub will mentor startups that are based in Hyderabad. “The best of the B2B software-as-a-service startups are being minted in India. As a cross-border venture capital firm, DVC is positioned to help startups scale and grow globally through the DVC Advantage Programme,”said Dayakar Puskoor, Managing Director of DVC.

“T-Hub is committed to enhancing the investment capacity of Telangana State in startups based out of Hyderabad,” said Srinivas Rao Mahankali, CEO, T-hub.

DVC India Fund has invested in five startups.