Singapore gains faster access to India's thriving startup scene

This is made possible by a deal inked by Enterprise Singapore and The Indus Entrepreneurs.

Enterprise Singapore has signed a memorandum of understanding with global entrepreneurship organisation, The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) Singapore, enabling homegrown startups to gain faster entry to India’s thriving startup ecosystem.

India’s startup scene ranks third in the world, having produced over 4,750 startups largely in consumer tech verticals like e-commerce, edutech, healthtech and fintech.

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The MOU kickstarts the Singapore-India incubation programme which aims to foster closer collaboration between startups from the two countries through jointly-organised networking events, workshops and mentoring sessions.

“The Singapore - India Incubation Programme aims to introduce ideas and concepts between the ecosystems of both countries and foster collaboration between companies in each other’s markets and in Southeast Asia,” said Enterprise Singapore assistant CEO Tan Soon Kim.

“Over time, we aim to establish a series of key innovation nodes within India to form an innovation network for Singapore companies to tap on,” he added.

Also read: Singapore needs to push its startups beyond seed funding

Enterprise Singapore will also be signing an MOU with the National Skills Development Corporation (NSDC) India which aims to streamline the entry of local vocational training companies into India to support the skills needs of the beauty and wellness, F&B, and construction and facilities management sectors.

Singapore vocational training companies will be able to tap several of NSDC's financing schemes, such as soft loan for equipment and equity injection for joint-venture projects with Indian training companies.

Startups that have successfully established tapped on India’s booming market include AI image recognition solutions provider ViSenze who has forged a partnership with Indian retailer Myntra and e-commerce platform Shopmatic which owes three quarters of its global business to India.

Photo from Rangan Datta Wiki - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0