History of RTBI

IITMS Rural Technology and Business Incubator (RTBI), a Society Registered under the Tamilnadu Societies Registration Act, 1975 is set up to design, pilot and incubate scalable business ventures with a rural / social inclusive focus.

RTBI has emerged from IITM’s informal incubator – The TeNet Group, with an inception fund from the World Bank’s Info Dev Project and the Government of India’s Dept.of Science and Technology and functions under the chairmanship of Prof Ashok Jhunjhunwala.

As an Incubator, RTBI leverage information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for social development, support young entrepreneurs aspiring to evolve rural inclusive business models, and mediate between urban enterprise and rural potential.

Established in the year 2006, RTBI with its proximity to IIT, also supports its entrepreneurs in terms of design, development and deployment of relevant and low cost technologies.

RTBI tries to use business incubation as a strategy and methodology for rural and social development towards imparting facilities for Capacity building, Income Generation and also Enablement of Services.

Significantly it provides leadership, funding, and an incubation eco-system suitable to entrepreneurs at any phase in their venture, including at the very early concept stage as well as linkages and mentorship.

Our Facilities & Services

Office Space

Air-conditioned office space (nearly 2000 sq.ft for RTBI plus nearly 1500 sq.ft for startup clients) including network access and connectivity and an un-interrupted electricity and water facility is provided by IITM.

The institution provides access to the academic library and other on-campus facilities and the Industrial Consultancy Division of the Institute as well as the professional expertise and other business and technical resources of senior faculty members at IITM as an in-kind contribution.

Student Interns are also available from different departments for various projects from time to time. Highly subsidized conference and guest house facilities are also available to RTBI through its host institution.

Formal interactions with IITM events such as with Genesis, the IITM business plan competition and informal interactions with other rural initiatives such as RuTAG (Rural Technology and Action Group), SRP (Socially Responsible Projects), LRAMP (Lemelson Foundation’s initiative to support grass roots innovation), etc have been initiated.

RTBI has also leveraged the host institution IIT Madras in jointly organizing an important workshop for assigning rural technology needs. IITM further provided a platform to show case RTBI and Incubation as well as some of our incubatees in the recent PAN-IIT Forum.

Advice and Mentoring

• RTBI surrounds you with incredibly proven mentors. Startups get great advice on their vision, products and strategy, ensuring the best possible start towards success.

Infrastructure

• RTBI is currently housed within IIT-Madras, so world-class technologists and academicians are mere footsteps away
• Air-conditioned office space, along with uninterrupted network access, electricity and water supply are provided
• Customised HRM tool
• Company structuring & Legal advising.
• Inhouse IPR services.

Connections

• Startups have unfettered access to top-notch resources (including seasoned entrepreneurs and investors)

Finance

• Seed capital
• Mobilizing finances through banks / venture capitalists / Angel Investors
• Linkages to other internal/external financiers

WHO CAN APPLY?

RTBI is not an IIT Alumni-only Incubator, and is open to all qualified candidates. Candidates with a keen entrepreneurial spirit who are interested in technological innovations and applications are encouraged to apply online or walk-in. We specifically look for candidates with a:

• commitment to social enterprise and development
• willingness to work with technology
• thirst to make a difference in the making of India a better place to live in

Around 5-7 meritorious ideas and entrepreneurs aligned to the goals of RTBI are usually selected every year.

SELECTION PROCESS

The entry of applications for incubation support at RTBI is majorly through online web applications received through our website, Walk-ins & Referrals through our network. After receipt in our online database, incubation applications are vetted by core team, if found fit as per RTBI selection criteria, goes through the following stages of review (shown as below), then presented to the incubation committee for final decision and approval.Post the committee approval a formal incubation agreement is executed.

The selection process is carried out in the following steps:

The RTBI Core Team meets with the candidate, and provides an overview as to the focus of RTBI and how the candidate could potentially fit in. The candidate then meets with current incubatees with RTBI to gain a better understanding of the environment. After an initial screening of the potential candidate by the Admin Council, the Chairman conducts a face-to-face interview. The Incubation Committee of RTBI is involved in the finalization process of selection of these candidates for incubation. The decision is based on the strength of the business plan and face-to-face interactions with the candidate regarding commitment and alignment to RTBI’s rural development initiatives. Finally, the Incubatee-Incubator relationship is formalized in the form of an MOU.

INCUBATION PROCESS

A startup at RTBI goes through 3 phases, once inducted: the Exploratory Phase, the Venture-in-the-Making Phase and the Startup Phase. In all the three phases of incubation, it is the leadership at RTBI that supports individual entrepreneurs to not only explore their innovations but also prove the commercial viability of their product or service. The average time since the first contact to induction of an entrepreneur (on meeting all the requirements) ranges from a month to two months. The total incubation period for an entrepreneur is typically 18-24 months.

Exploratory Phase
While demographics and raw statistics state that the Rural market is quite large and is untapped, there is a lot of gap in the knowledge and understanding in terms of understanding needs, demands, affordability and the local dynamics which can play a major role in building or breaking a business. For entrepreneurs who show a strong commitment towards building rural-centric businesses, posess deep domain knowledge in some vertical but need to understand the market, the dynamics and have a better understanding of how their future customers currently address their pain points, the exploratory phase is their point of induction. At the end of the Exploratory phase, the entrepreneur has a market-validated concept note which briefs the service/product to be built, and the potential user base they can target.

Venture-in-the-Making Phase
A pilot is initiated for validation of the business model and for testing the prototype. The decision to incubate the candidate is taken by the Incubation Committee on the basis of the proof of concept as well as upon the candidates’ commitment and alignment to RTBI's mission. The Incubatee-Incubator relationship is formalized in the form of an MOU and seed funding is provided to the newly formed company, which now moves on to the next phase. While pilots are innately designed to be successful, the next step is to look at various processes of the organization to build them for scalability and for ways to leverage technology to improve their current processes and to get a visibility to enhance profitability margins in the future.

Early Stage Venture Phase
With the market opportunity identified, the pilot run and the learning documented, and with a team and corporate identity being formed, the key at this point is to merge all of that info into a realistic business plan, with the components of scalability. This is where institutional funding is looked at to grow the company, core team strengthened, a board of advisors and directors setup to govern the company – with strong linkages established with potential partners for the long run.
RTBI stays involved with the company with monthly review meetings and continued support till the board becomes active and starts to steer the company.

Graduation from the Incubator
Incubator would exit from the companies under the following circumstances:

• When the annual revenues of the company exceeds Rs. 5 crores or when a company achieves Profit before Tax of Rs.1crore.
• Institutional investment of Rs.5 crores or more.
• When the company enters into a merger or acquisition, or when a company plans for an IPO
• RTBI would continue to hold a board observer seat until exit period.
• Underperformance or un-viability of the business proposition: criteria for the same will be decided and applied by RTBI on the case to case basis.
• Any illecit or illegal usage of IITM/ RTBI or other reasons which the incubator may find necessary for an incubatee company to leave.
• Completion of maximum of stay for 4 –5 years.

Startups Incubated at RTBI

 

DesiCrew is a rural BPO initiative that outsources work to a distributed workforce across small towns and rural areas. DesiCrew focuses on IT skills training and the use of innovative solutions for a distributed workforce management.

Go

ROPE manufactures environment friendly home décor and life style products of unique designs. Sustainability and Responsibility are its core values. ROPE production facilities are controlled by latest technology aides and management systems.

Go

Intelizon designs solar-based energy-efficient products. The company uses state-of-the-art optical, electronic and firmware technology to create affordable products for rural and semi-urban markets. Intelizon aims to provide reliable and quality electricity through products and solutions that offer productivity gains for people living in rural areas worldwide.

Go

Uniphore provides interactive voice response systems with multi-language voice recognition support for applications in health, agriculture advisory and banking in rural India. Uniphore is also working on a voice-based biometric authentication system aimed at extending banking services to illiterate and un-banked populations in rural India.

Go

eJeevika provides rural youth with vocational, etiquette and language skills that are necessary for employment within the security, retail sales and IT sectors. The candidates are put through a psychometric test which allows for a more focused placement without them having to leave their villages in search of employment.

Go

AAUM is an emerging provider of advanced analytics solutions to businesses, policy makers and planning authorities who target rural India. AAUM’s capability in rural analytics stems from its expertise to extract insights from data sources with the ability to develop analytical models aided by the strong rural understanding of its resources.

Go

Arogyam Organics markets high quality, certified organic foods across India at affordable prices. Arogyam offers easy access to organic products for consumers, as well as a consistent demand of the products for organic farmers, which are certified organic by IMO through a rigorous process ensuring quality and authenticity.

Go

Invention Labs designs and develops products catered to various industries in rural India. Products include the Soil Testing Kit, an automated testing kit for providing accurate and localized soil advisory information to farmers that could improve agricultural productivity, and AVAZ, a communications aid for children with cerebral palsy.

Go

Vastra is a garment outsourcing venture that manufactures and supplies high-end institutional wear and furnishings. Vastra's use of ICT for pattern making, manufacturing and finishing, along with highly-skilled workers belonging to various Self Help Groups in rural villages of Tamil Nadu ensure high-quality uniforms at unbeatable prices.

Go

Augur systems, a firm with a specialization in embedded systems and designs, aims to provide services for organizations looking to build systems and solutions that target the rural markets.

Go

ét is a design and sourcing consultancy, a business of design thinking. ét undertakes an immersive role in a client's business to formulate design and brand strategies that are both fiscally viable and consumer relevant.

Go

Trayi Educational Services is engaged in research, design and development of learning products. Languagementor.in is the flagship product which facilitates mentor-assisted English language acquisition for students in rural India. Languagementor offers four course levels cumulating to 320-416 hours over a period of two years.

Go

AYZH is a new social venture serving the needs of impoverished women worldwide by providing affordable appropriate technologies that improve health and increase income. In 2010, AYZH launched its first product, JANMA, a "green and clean birth kit," to help rural and semi-urban women deliver in clean and sterile conditions.

Go

Microspin is a start-up company born out of the vision to radically transform what is arguably the oldest industry of India – Textiles. Armed with a slew of innovative and patent-pending technologies, Microspin has forged a transformative architecture of textile production and marketing that is simultaneously inclusive, eco-friendly and profitable.

Go

MobilTrain is a Knowledge Services company that specializes in providing mobile based training to people in various sectors. MobilTrain’s USP is “concise, smart parcels of content” called “QuickLearnsTM” accessible through the participant's mobile phone.

Go

Newdigm Healthcare technologies was Founded by Saurav Das, Gurlivleen Grewal, Satya Sidhartha Parija, Srinivasan Ramchandran, a team of doctors and engineers. It is a social enterprise that aims to provide accessible, affordable and quality healthcare to the 3 billion living in rural and remote locations of India through Technology and community participation.

Go

Phoenix Online Services provides services in the field of SEO, Web Designing, Logo Designing, Banner Designing, Photo Editing, 3d animation walk throughs etc by operating out of the remote village in Thiruvarur district of Tamil Nadu. The company has now the privilege to introduce itself as a growinggrowing IT Company.

Go

Stellapps aims to enable innovative value added services and solutions that enhance the quality of life of its customers from all walks of life, in a wide variety of domains like Dairy, Agriculture, Logistics and Healthcare to start with.

Go

Learning Solutions Company aims to leverage the generic table platform including Akash to design a learning platform for a variety of work including class room and at home leveraging the cloud as an enabler.

Go

Unclassroom Learning Private ltd offers an online learning opportunity. It enables learning of HTML, CSS, the basics of the PHP programming language and also how to build mini-apps and websites. It also helps to build a Facebook app called the wall of friends and aids how to retrieve tweets that match a search term using Twitter's search API.

Go

Supporting farmers with value added technology services such as microbial Intervention technique for compost of press mud and extending technology support to agro industries in terms of solid waste management and other environmental issues.

Go