Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), an organization under the IT ministry, has signed six memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with Bank of Baroda, YES Bank, Mathworks, YourStory, Freshworks and Pontaq, as it looks to strengthen the collaborative startup ecosystem in the country.

STPI has been working for the startup ecosystem in the country and creating 28 Centres of Excellence (CoEs) in emerging technologies.

The MoUs are intended to promote entrepreneurship and create a nurturing ecosystem for STPI CoEs in areas such as digital and mobile payments, blockchain, IoT, big data, and other emerging technologies.

In order to deliver an all-embracing service to the incubated startups, STPI has been constantly exploring associations with various partners from industry, academia, financial institutions, advisory bodies and experts to leverage their services, knowledge and expertise for bringing comprehensiveness to the service portfolio of the CoEs.

Over the three-past decades, Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), Bhubaneswar has made a long way and opened new gateways and milestones in the IT exports of the country, churning out of IT professionals, creating employment, boosting Innovation as well as providing the right ecosystem and overall growth of IT sector of the State.  STPI-Bhubaneswar which is headed by Shri Manas Panda, Director is relentlessly working for the promotion of the IT Industry under the guidance of Dr Omkar Rai, Director General, STPI who is instrumental in spearheading the success of STPI through many new initiatives pan India. Starting as a regulator for Software Industry and the Incubation service provided to support fledgling start-ups in their entrepreneurial journey, STPIs have trekked a long road to innovation, IPR creation & Product development Today, STPIs don’t function in isolation. They actively partner with Governments, Academia and industry to create groundbreaking innovation ecosystems.

Under this program, 15 dedicated startup branches are operational across the major startup hubs 

Bank of Baroda, one of the country’s largest public sector banks, signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) and AIC STPINEXT Initiatives to support startups across India under its Baroda Startup Banking program.

Under this program, 15 dedicated startup branches are operational across the major startup hubs viz. Gurugram, Delhi, Noida, Bengaluru, Chennai, Mumbai, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Pune, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Lucknow, Kolkata, Indore and Kochi.

Key offerings under Baroda Startup Banking are as follows:

a) Dedicated and trained bank officials viz Startup Champs and Relationship Managers who will be a single touch point
b) Bouquet of tailored made banking products designed exclusively for startups
c) Array of services provided at preferential rates by marquee service providers in the field of cloud computation, co-working spaces, taxation, accounting, legal, etc.

Speaking on the MoU, Akhil Handa, Chief Digital Officer, Bank of Baroda said “2020s is the decade of startups and as a leading financial institution, we are continuously working towards designing innovative banking products and services, which meets the unique and specialized banking requirements of startups. This has led to our partnership with STPI & STPINEXT, which have emerged as one-of-their-kind enabler for innovative startups pan India. Through this partnership, we will together fuel the growth of startup ecosystem in India.”

TechGig Exclusive: In conversation with Dr Omkar Rai, Director General, STPI

The Five CoEs will come up in North East, one each in 5 north-east capital cities -- Gangtok (IT Applications in Healthcare and AgriTech), Itanagar (GIS Applications including Drone Tech), Kohima (IT Applications in Graphic Design)