Reliance Ind arm set to invest in 5 start-ups

Reliance Industries is all set to invest in at least five tech start-ups through its venture arm GenNext Ventures, a top executive said.

The investments will be made in at least five of the companies that were part of RIL's start-up incubator GenNext Hub. The GenNext Hub works with entrepreneurs to build their companies through a four-month-long programme.

“Our purpose is to build a digital platforms,” Vivek Rai Gupta, managing partner at RIL-controlled venture capital arm GenNext Ventures, told BusinessLine . “A single platform can accommodate many companies. For example, within Energy, start-ups can work in many areas such algorithms, data storage. We are developing a connected car and start-ups can be a part of multiple aspects of that such as creating an app that can give you details about the performance of the car, an app that can send signals to doctors in case of an accident, an entertainment app, navigation app etc.”

Without naming the companies that will receive the funding from Reliance, Gupta said at least five of the 11 start-ups that graduated from GenNext Hub's second batch will receive investments. “We would look at taking anywhere between 20 per cent and 40 per cent equity in the companies and would integrate their technology in multiple digital platforms we are creating,” Gupta said. Companies that were part of the second batch include a tech start-up called Algo Engines, which provides operational intelligence for wind turbines and solar power plants, a credit analysis company Creditseva, a remote healthcare app Curefy, a procurement solution provider Efficient Bazaar and a P2P lending platform from Israel called eLoan.

Other start-ups include an app for managing on-ground sales staff called Fieldomobify, FiTicket, which offers integrated fitness membership for gyms across the country, an offline payment platform Noroc Solutions, Pickcel, a hyper-local advertising platform, Playfiks – a social network for fitness enthusiasts and VDeliver, which provides intra city, point-to-point logistics.

Reliance has partnered with Microsoft to offer free IT infrastructure to these start-ups. But more such partnerships are in the works for the next set of companies that will be incubated.

Gupta said Reliance could partner with the likes of Intel and Cisco to help get IT hardware start-ups and technologies that it can then invest into.

“We are talking to companies in the technology infrastructure and software space, cyber security etc. We also have several key partnerships including with Tel Aviv University and Stanford University. They are working on areas that are of interest to us such as nanotech, advanced materials and storage systems. We look at how to take some of these technologies, bring them to India and integrate them with what we are doing,” Gupta said.

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