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| $5-m growth fund for entrepreneurs launched
Hyderabad: About 40-50 entrepreneur-driven ventures at the grassroots level would be financially supported with a $5-million growth fund launched recently by Bharat Yuva Shakthi Trust (BYST), a not-for-profit organisation.
The trust, supported by Indian corporates, will provide between Rs 50 lakh and Rs 2.5 crore to these ventures, said Lakshmi V. Venkatesan, Founding Trustee and Executive Vice-President.
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BYST has been focussing on promoting entrepreneurship at the basic level in the rural, unorganised set up. It focuses on people between 18 and 35 and having a sustainable business model.
The eight-year BYST Growth Fund would give a fillip to these entrepreneurs to visualise and achieve bigger, she told Business Line here.
"These entrepreneurs would be provided equity-like financing. BYST will have a sharing arrangement in the profits. It would be a long-term credit at very low interest rates. We will give the creditors a reasonable return," she added.
The fund is seeded by the International Finance Corporation, a World Bank arm. SIDBI is also an investor, as are some high net worth individuals from Hyderabad, Bangalore and overseas. Punjab National Bank has also evinced interest in the project, Venkatesan said.
BYST, launched in 1992, has forged partnerships with public sector banks such as Bank of Baroda and Indian Bank to encourage entrepreneurship.
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The best way ahead to promote entrepreneurship in rural areas and create assets, which produce goods and provide employment, is through large-scale public-private partnership, Venkatesan said. Creating incubators at grassroots and replicating successful models in different states is also another way forward in this movement.
Over 90 per cent of country's workforce is in the unorganised sector and mostly in rural areas. The economic slowdown has just added a bigger challenge to this large segment of population as its impact is trickling down to the informal sector, she added.
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