I heard you are the CEO of a company called Inventeurs, can you tell us a little more about this company and group? What inspired you to do it and how was your experience with it?
Our start-up is called “Inventeurs”, and the over-aching idea behind Inventeurs is “Curae”. Curae is a concept pertaining to the digital healthcare system. We in Inventeurs have currently ventured out to different software systems such as web and app development, machine learning and artificial intelligence services along with Chatbots. During Pandemic (COVID-19 rise), we realised that there is a sudden boom in requirement to develop apps and websites. Our team includes me, along with three co-founders and eight employees.
At Inventeurs, we develop different software tools for people and we are launching our own products soon too! All of the co-founders are from different engineering backgrounds and bring in diversity amongst skills.
We are currently developing and prototyping our startup idea, making appointments at doctor’s clinics and dashboards for patients and a system that allows for patients to get medical records, medicine schedules and provides an easy interface for all of their medical assistance. We are adding machine learning and artificial intelligence in order to provide a seamless experience to all our customers.
How did you raise seed funding? How does one successfully raise funding?
For Inventeurs, I raised seed funding via SRM’s New Generation Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Centre (New-Gen IEDC SRM). This initiative promotes young entrepreneurs with funds for prototype development.
I believe in working on different ideas at a time to ensure diversification since the Indian government is funding us. This way, at least one of these ideas will successfully become a start-up and grow into a valuable company. It is relatively easy to get fundings at this given point in time in India. There are many Venture Capitalists and Y-combinators coming to India. On top of that, there are different foundations.
I would say we have so many different incubators and accelerators in India because the Indian government is looking at the ecosystem for start-ups. There have been 900 agencies with 75 million dollars for young entrepreneurs to work on their ideas. Startup India initiative, private startup accelerators, incubators and collaborating spaces are all part of these agencies. Therefore, you can relatively easily get fundings within six months of applying. The government is really supportive of new start-up initiatives.
Did you have some start-up ideas during your education here or in SRM? What inspired you to do it? Any challenges you faced during this process?
At SRM, I was a part of another Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Centre funded start-up called Plasma Push that aims to develop the next generation electric arc propulsion engine. The environmental impacts of excessive usage of fuels currently in the aviation industry inclined us to take up this project. One of the major challenges was to fund this project initially due to the requirement of high capital investment. The product is however still under development.