Chennai and GAME in partnership with ICT Academy & Poornatha rolls out state wide Futurepreneur

Chennai, 27th August 2019: Further spreading its wings of Entrepreneurial education to the student community, TiE Chennai along with GAME (Global Alliance of Mass Entrepreneurship) today announced Futurepreneur: Grand Challenge, a first-of-its-kind, innovative initiative that aims to entice the youth towards entrepreneurship. Joining hands with ICT Academy, Poornatha based out of Madurai, the initiative will encourage students from across the state to study the network of entrepreneurs in their neighborhood regions and bring to forefront inspiring stories of micro/small-scale businesses.

A brain child of TiE Chennai & GAME, Futurepreneur is an initiative designed as an early start for students to get insights about the Entrepreneurial ecosystem, the challenges and learning in a tete-a-tete with micro/small-scale entrepreneurs. The initiative besides educating students about entrepreneurship will also further kindle their interest through an in-depth study and survey as part of the program. The survey will also further help TiE Chennai and GAME to understand the requirements of micro / tiny entrepreneurs across the State, using which interventions will be planned to empower new / existing entrepreneurs along with necessary skills to be successful. The best student entries will be shortlisted and announced as winners during the annual TiE CON 2019.

Speaking at launch, Madan Padaki – Co-Founder, GAME India, said “Mass Entrepreneurship is the next big step in the thriving entrepreneurial ecosystem of the state. Initiatives like Futurepreneur: Grand Challenge, that aims to bring together thousands of students will enable job-seeks to become job-providers and immensely contribute to the growth of our nation. A striking feature of this initiative is that it enables students from across remote corners of the state to play a catalytic role in identifying and presenting hidden businesses that have the potential to scale up to large extent.”

Commenting on the occasion, Akhila Rajeshwar, Executive Director, TiE Chennai said, “Futurepreneur is a milestone initiative that is relevant to our growing economy. Student community in Tamil Nadu has been a propelling force in bringing about innovative and refreshing changes across segment. Joining hands with them to further study and strengthen the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the state through this initiative is sure to be a great knowledge sharing platform and truly a first of its kind effort.”

Adding to this, Sivakumar M – CEO – ICT Academy said “The interest level about entrepreneurship among students has always been very high. This initiative by TiE Chennai and GAME will provide a strong foundation for the students to get an experience of entrepreneurial thinking while studying. ICT Academy if very excited to join hands with such esteemed partners for this initiative and we are confidents of making it a success.”

Bharath Krishna Sankar Founder & Chief Mentor, Poornatha, based out of Madurai said, “This study is being done to get an in depth understanding of the working and mind sets of entrepreneurs to ensure that a simplified version of financial formats can be done for them. This would enable their journey as job creators adding value to the economy and thereby nourishing the social fabric too.”

About TiE Chennai:

TiE Chennai is an active chapter with 175+ Charter Members and over 600 Associate Members. Based out of the South Indian city of Chennai, this chapter seeks to foster the spirit of entrepreneurship both within the city as well as the larger state of Tamil Nadu. Through independent events as well as partnerships, the chapter holds multiple events every month, looking to inspire, mentor and educate local entrepreneurs. Charter members, Entrepreneurs, Business Leaders, Venture capitalists and Government representatives often collaborate to present success stories and business opportunities as well as know-how on raising capital, networking, etc

TiE Chennai has been one of the top performing chapters globally since 2014. This recognition stands testimony to the consistent high performance of the chapter across parameters including regular high quality events and membership growth.

About GAME:

GAME aims to be the enabling platform that establishes a common understanding of what works and catalyzes change in the ecosystem to speed up the time to maturity. At GAME we believe that the youth, especially those between 14 and 29, and women will help deepen the roots of ME in India. It is the bedrock of stable economies as it meets the needs of communities, while providing employment at the local level.

About ICT Academy:

ICT Academy is an initiative of the Government of India in collaboration with the state Governments and Industries. ICT Academy is a not-for-profit society, the first of its kind pioneer venture under the Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) model that endeavours to train the higher education teachers and students thereby exercises on developing the next generation teachers and industry ready students.

ICT Academy is recently endorsed and recommended by NITI Aayog (National Institution for Transforming India Aayog), the National Planning body of Government of India as one of the unique organization for dissemination and replication, which is aligned to the Skill India Vision of the Government of India. Through its various initiatives, ICT Academy has been part of strengthening the India’s four important visions on Skill India, Digital India, Startup India and Make in India.

About Poornatha

Other than the infrastructure, enabling conditions and incentives, the ‘know-what and know-how’ on owning numbers and handling people is a major need of the MSME entrepreneurs. Poornatha aims to fill this gap by partnering with entrepreneurs in creating an overarching eco system to enable them gain confidence in decision making and create and maintain a culture of trust. Poornatha is a founding member of Michigan Academy for Developing Entrepreneurs along with William Davidson Institute and Zell Lurie Institute of Entrepreneurship which aims to bring best practices across the world for MSME entrepreneurs.