VC Firm IvyCap is going into IITs, IIMs and ISB to fund startups. Yes, Christmas just came early this year

One of the biggest Venture Capital Firms IvyCap Ventures, through a new wing called IvyCamp, is trying to engage with IITs, IIMs, BITs and ISB as well as industry experts at multiple levels to foster a startup ecosystem in India.

It is connecting alumni across educational institutions to build a network of mentors, investors, and experts, but at the same time also making connections to ensure the guidance and money are pouring into the right startups and innovations arising out of the campuses. For this, the company has been going to Indian B-schools for the past few years now, trying to make relationships with incubators here and helping startups or innovations (from colleges as well as outside) find the right match and resources.

So basically, the potential ideas or entrepreneurs are linked to IvyCamp's startups/investors/mentors network or corporations so that innovations from campuses are more visible, they can be commercialized and startups can leap onto the next level.

While on a tour to IIM Bangalore, we interviewed the Vice President of IvyCamp who is driving this objective in India and globally:



Here are some more insights from the interview on IvyCamp's work so far:

Holding Events On Campus

Adhiraj Banerjee told Business Insider - "We are doing continuous events at IITs and IIMs and now we are headed to couple of other institutions as well. The idea here is to give the right direction to early stage entrepreneurs who need lot of mentoring in basic areas like how to build your B-plan, how to do your valuation and a sounding board for them."

Setting up incubators

As a part of their objective to help young innovators and entrepreneurs, IvyCamp is conducting education programmes with colleges and also setting up its own incubators.

"Just in the last two weeks, we have signed 14 incubators. We are setting incubators in Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka and the idea is to not restrict the ecosystem to just the campuses. That means we will be doing the exact same things we are doing in colleges outside as well like pitch events, mentor events, education programmes etc," said Adhiraj.

Tie-up with Nasscom 10k Startups Programme

IvyCamp felt the success of IoT startups coming out of India needed a consolidated boost. Adhiraj said – “This tie-up was therefore done to evangelize IoT and to help startups in this space in India get access to manufacturing units, connect with the industry who may use their applications and also connect them to the foreign governments.”

Efforts to bring angel investors onboard

Another way IvyCamp is trying to help startups is by roping in angel investors along with IvyCap Ventures investing in IvyCamp startups.
“Sometimes we find startups during events or through our outreach programmes which we can be invested in. We have invested in two such startups recently and we are looking to increase that by bringing higher number of investors on the platform.”

It seems like B-school students who wish to become entrepreneurs now have a big reason to smile!