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Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.
Every employee who dreams of owning a business takes inspiration from this quote. This collective vision has propelled the growth of startups.
Rewind 50 years and the concept of startups was as alien as the probability of finding a virgin mojito on Mars. We are talking on a global scale level, leave alone India, one of the fastest growing economies in the world with a talent pool in innovation and diversity. Today the Asian subcontinent boasts of 105 unicorns as per a report dated 19th July 2022.
Earlier this year, the PM declared 16th January as National Startup Day energizing the whole startup ecosystem. PM Narendra Modi stated, “Today, India is rapidly moving towards hitting the century of the unicorns. I believe the golden era of India’s startups is starting now,” It is worth mentioning that under the Start-up India scheme, every start-up has the opportunity to get recognized by simply clicking a button and getting to know about tax benefits, easier compliance, and IPR fast-tracking as well.
Startups in India that sprung in the last few years reached scalable heights in verticals like:
The government initiated The Start-up India Action Plan on 16th January 2016, for startups facilitating easy funding through venture capitalists, angel investors, pension funds, and institutional investors.
Massive investments have buoyed their growth resulting in substantial employment of the talented pool of young and energetic Indian youth. Currently, India is the third-largest unicorn hub behind the US (865) and China (323) and ahead of the UK (43).
Six years since the Start-up India Action Plan, the programme has propelled investments worth over INR 8,085 Cr ($1.08 Bn) in 550 startup funds. Indian startups have also attracted impressive funding worth $63 billion from 2016 to 2020 from Venture Capital Associations, Indian Private Equity, and Praxis Global Alliance. In 2022, about 528 startups raised heavy funding of $12 billion in the first quarter. Many of these startups eventually grew into Unicorns like Flipkart, BYJU’s, OLA, OYO, Swiggy, and Cred and raised a substantial amount in the first quarter of 2022.
These hefty outlays have facilitated a superlative revenue stream for these startups and paved the way for the golden era for the Indian business.
Indian startups are developing innovative solutions, technologies, and large-scale employment. Fintech, E-commerce, and SaaS have seen the maximum number of unicorns, with health-tech, ed-tech, D2C, gaming, and crypto not far behind.
According to official records, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) has recognized over 75,000 startups. With 14 unicorns (companies with $1 billion valuations) in the first half of 2022, India surpassed China in the highest number of Unicorns for this year on 8th September 2022. Unicorns like ShareChat, Cred, Meesho, Nazara, Moglix, MPL, Grofers (now Blinkit), upgrade, Mamaearth, GlobalBees, Acko, Spinny, and Urban Company are at the top of their startup game.
An interesting study compiled by Ilya A. Strebulaev, professor of finance at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business, showed that out of 1,078 founders across 500 US unicorns, 90 entrepreneurs were born in India, highlighting the significant presence of Indian Americans in the country’s startup and tech landscape. Indian founders were followed by Israeli and Canadian. Finally, with this leveraged pool of policies and systems, India might overtake the other giants in this bootstrap race. The recipe to success includes an abundance of talent, innovative mindsets, and the correct attitude and the country seems to be on the right track.
