The Jamia Millia Islamia chapter of the Global Association of Economics Education (GAEE JMI) has launched an entrepreneurship incubation fest titled “Staroom,” which is co-organized by GAEE JMI, the Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and the Institution’s Innovation Council.
The fest will comprise two events:
- Piranha Tank, a startup investor pitching event
- Formentar, an interactive startup mentorship session
1. Piranha Tank
The motive of this event is to incubate early-stage startups by young entrepreneurs through funding and mentorship from seasoned investors. The event will test the business acumen of startup founders through two rounds (including the preliminaries), allowing them to showcase and hone their business ideation and projection as well as investment analysis.
a. Screening Round: (Sep 3, 2022)
In this round, participant teams will submit their startup pitch summary in the doc template provided in the attachment section of Unstop event page to give a level ground to all the participants.
b. Pitching Event: (Sep 12, 2022)
A total of 5 participant teams from Round 1 will be shortlisted for the second and final round of Piranha Tank. In this round, the finalist teams will pitch their startup to investors and mentors at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi.
During this round, investors will assess the potential revenue and profitability of the startup, evaluate the deal offered, and will make their investment accordingly. In addition, the judges will also act as mentors and will guide the teams in developing and improving their startups. Finally, the top three startups will be ranked and offered recognition and certificate by GAEE and the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
GAEE is pleased to have the attendance of these prestigious investors:
- Laxmi Datt Sharma, Co-Founder & Board Member, Optimise APAC/MEA
- Shaan Raza, CEO, Optimise Media
- Sandro Stephen, Vice-President, Indian Angel Network
- Tarun Kumar, CA, Founder and CEO, Kumar Tarun & Co.
2. Formentar
The final session will be held on 9th September at Jamia Millia Islamia and will also be premiered live on the YouTube handle of GAEE JMI. On the day of the event, the organizing team of GAEE JMI will ask questions sourcing from attendees to the mentors — Kapil Kaul (Founder and CEO, Indian Startup Factory) and Manish Johari (Senior Vice-President, Agility Ventures), who will offer insights into the budding entrepreneurs and providing mentorship to the students.
Kapil Kaul has more than a decade of leadership experience in vetting scalable and investable startups and SME opportunities. He possesses strong cross-border exposure and hands-on transaction experience in PE / VC, M&A Valuation Methodologies, Restructuring, Startup Advisory, Corporate Development & Strategy, and Business Management. He has an experience of more than 30 investments and over 300 evaluated deals at varying levels of the investment cycle ranging from seed investment to VC and Private Equity.
Manish Johari possesses over 32 years of experience in various firms as a top executive as well as an advisor covering the areas of Fundraising & Growth Strategy consulting for Tech Companies. He is currently the Senior Vice President at Agility Ventures- the corporate venture arm of Agility, a leader in supply chain services, innovation and investment, and has also served as the Vice President at Lead Angels.
With a firm belief that knowledge and opportunity should not be restricted from anyone, the fest will be open to all college students across India.
Updates: This article has been updated to include photos of the events. The event has also been reported in The Times of India in an article on August 17, 2022.
Reflections from the Core Organizing Teams:
Being an aspiring Economist, I have been aware of the vitality of a sound and developed startup ecosystem in India to eliminate the persisting unemployment crisis and ensure the development of the Indian economy as a whole. Being endowed with the position of President at GAEE JMI, with Entrepreneurship Incubation being one of its mission, I hoped to contribute my small share towards the development of the startup ecosystem. This was the inception of the idea of Staroom and the only thought that kept me going despite all the hardships and hurdles throughout the past few months. Now as Staroom is finally over, there exists an emptiness yet a sense of fulfilment that we brought many startups in touch with the mentorship and network they required. Further, it has induced us to keep working hard for the mission of GAEE.
– Zubiya Moin (President, GAEE JMI)
The journey of Staroom from its planning to execution has been really special and memorable. In between running around for sponsorships, permissions and collaborations, we learned our way around all the challenges. I can’t be proud enough of our team at GAEE JMI for making this event a reality, and we hope to keep contributing our share by facilitating bright young minds through more such events in the future.
– Wajeeha Ashfaq Hamdani (Secretary, GAEE JMI)
STAROOM was just another idea that emerged from a casual talk between several colleagues and friends a few months ago. But for us right now, it feels like a success, a sense of pride. Through STAROOM, we planned to make a modest contribution to the growth of the startup environment. So now that it’s truly over, all I can say is that STAROOM was a completely new experience for me. I also hope that all the student entrepreneurs who were also trying to advance their “ideas” received the support and advice we were able to provide. I could not be more proud of team GAEE JMI for making this happen. Looking forward to many more such events!
– Subia Syed (Director of Design and Marketing, GAEE JMI)
After putting in a lot of time, brainstorming sessions and beyond the call of duty effort by the team has truly helped to ensure that we come with this Amazing fest to encourage entrepreneurship by setting new benchmarks. I’m so happy to see the hard work and presenting STAROOM. Interacting with so many highly intellectual individuals helped me understand how different ideas can be moulded and the struggle of one is always bigger than the other. It was a highly knowledgeable session where so many dynamic startups were under one roof. If I had to explain it in one word, it would be “Prodigious.”
– Hammad Nadim (Entrepreneurship Head, GAEE JMI)