BANGALORE: Fly or fail - those were the only consequences for Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay students who took the entrepreneurial plunge after graduating. There was no safety net to fall back on if their start-up ideas failed.
Such failures are not uncommon and, in these cases, IIT graduates were left to fend for themselves. That was a huge deterrent to entrepreneurs being birthed in the campus. But now, select graduates are being given the option of taking a shot at a start-up idea, with the assurance they can come back for campus placements two years later if the idea fails.
This is a first-of-its kind initiative in any IIT. The Mumbai-based engineering institute is also creating a panel of faculty members and industry experts who will select the students, go through their ideas and help them get seed funding as well.
The institute is planning to put the panel in place early 2012, but since the final placements have already started for the Class of 2012, the panel and deferred placements will be effective next year. An advisory board will act as a reference point to get the initial investment as well.
"If I knew that a student has been mentored by an expert it will become easier to do the first round of seed funding," says Kanwaljit Singh, senior MD at Helion Advisors. For Singh, advisory bodies like this will also provide an ecosystem that is otherwise underdeveloped in India.
The move is both an incentive for entrepreneurship and some sort of an insurance against failure in it; is aimed at creating and nurturing more entrepreneurs from the campus. This has been done after students requested they be given an option similar to that in some of the Indian Institutes of Management, says Ravi Sinha, placement head for IIT Bombay.
Till now the institute's graduates whose ventures failed did not get a second chance at placement which is about to change, says the placement head. Deferred placement is an option where a student who had opted out of the process is allowed to sit for interviews after a stipulated number of years.
Start-up biz: IIT-B graduates get 'cover' if venture fails - The Times of India
---------- Post added at 01:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:43 PM ----------
West should get ready for some serious competition from INDIA....way o go...this is kind of thing i had been waiting for so long
Such failures are not uncommon and, in these cases, IIT graduates were left to fend for themselves. That was a huge deterrent to entrepreneurs being birthed in the campus. But now, select graduates are being given the option of taking a shot at a start-up idea, with the assurance they can come back for campus placements two years later if the idea fails.
This is a first-of-its kind initiative in any IIT. The Mumbai-based engineering institute is also creating a panel of faculty members and industry experts who will select the students, go through their ideas and help them get seed funding as well.
The institute is planning to put the panel in place early 2012, but since the final placements have already started for the Class of 2012, the panel and deferred placements will be effective next year. An advisory board will act as a reference point to get the initial investment as well.
"If I knew that a student has been mentored by an expert it will become easier to do the first round of seed funding," says Kanwaljit Singh, senior MD at Helion Advisors. For Singh, advisory bodies like this will also provide an ecosystem that is otherwise underdeveloped in India.
The move is both an incentive for entrepreneurship and some sort of an insurance against failure in it; is aimed at creating and nurturing more entrepreneurs from the campus. This has been done after students requested they be given an option similar to that in some of the Indian Institutes of Management, says Ravi Sinha, placement head for IIT Bombay.
Till now the institute's graduates whose ventures failed did not get a second chance at placement which is about to change, says the placement head. Deferred placement is an option where a student who had opted out of the process is allowed to sit for interviews after a stipulated number of years.
Start-up biz: IIT-B graduates get 'cover' if venture fails - The Times of India
---------- Post added at 01:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:43 PM ----------
West should get ready for some serious competition from INDIA....way o go...this is kind of thing i had been waiting for so long
