Since March 2012, the Centre for Incubation and Business Acceleration (CIBA), has been nursing young and budding entrepreneurs in the State. More than 400 business ideas have been reviewed by about 42 incubatees of which 23 have graduated. Yes, its all happening in Goa, the State, which is normally equated by people in India as a fun and frolic destination for beach tourism.
With the growing need, CIBA expanded itself from Verna in the south to Assagaon in the north. Both these centres which were created under Section 25, not for profit organisation, are playing an integral role in developing entrepreneurship along with related stakeholders.
The thrust area of operations are (a) IT enabled services (b) Food processing (c) Solid waste management (d) Electronic – products and designing (e) Mixed technologies and (f) Clean technologies. “Solid waste management never took off, however, now mixed technologies is the hot spot and it is becoming global,” said Jose Manuel Noronha the CEO of CIBA.
Mr Noronha explained that during the three stages of support, which is pre-incubation, incubation and post-incubation provides add-on benefits like seed funding, mentoring, training, product ideation etc. “Since we are under the Ministry of Science and Technology, we have a budget of Rs 10 crore for this project of which Rs two crore has been sanctioned. This money is used to handhold the incubatees,” added Mr Noronha.
CIBA, which can provide space for at least 20 young companies in each of its centres, normally gives a working space to new entrepreneurs for a period of 18 months at a nominate rent, which is hiked if there is a request for extension. “Normally, all the companies succeed within a period of 18 months of incubation. In Silicon Valley the success rate may be one tenth but here in Goa, the success rate is much higher. There is no dearth of talent,” added Mr Noronha.
Herald talked to several incubatees at their Assagaon centre and found that there are several companies from outside of Goa have also been using the services of CIBA. “We are not from Goa, but we came to know about CIBA through net and we applied for its membership as an incubatee and we were lucky to get it. It is a great space to have a foothold in the industry of fashion,” said Amit Bhardwaj, Co-founder and COO of fashion company, 6Degree.
Similarly, Karan Manral Co-founder of Open Seeds is of the opinion that, “I think CIBA provides a great sandbag for fledgling businesses to test their ideas and find the exposure they need to grow. It has been set up to provide the basic infrastructure and also the early linkages to other entrepreneurs, mentors and funding opportunities which are very valuable when things are at a nascent stage in terms of setting up of business.”
Raghunath Lohar, who now works in the R&D wing of the National Innovation Foundation at Ahmedabad in Gujarat and who also won the award from National Innovation Council, Delhi for innovating “Vajra” a patented device for safe weight lifting by labourers is of the opinion that, “I joined CIBA in 2012 and basic support was provided to me. In fact CIBA helped me design modification of my innovation and my 6 to 7 month stay was very pleasant and helpful.”
CIBA’s plan for the coming year is to spread out in more areas, make themselves more visible and strengthen focus on making Goa as a next and most viable innovation centres in the
country.
