6th edition of empoWer2021 concludes

Hyderabad empoWer, program for women entrepreneurs has completed its 6th edition with a two-day intensive workshop for 56 women entrepreneurs from all over India in Bengaluru.

Eminent speakers from India and abroad, founders of successful startups, investor community and corporate leaders were present.

The two days highlights starting on November 26 which was a day where a break-out intro session for the cohort was followed by the welcome address by the hosts from BRSTIF (Zone Startups India), TiE Women and TiE Bangalore. BJ Arun (Vice Chairman TiE Global) a serial entrepreneur from the Bay Area gave the keynote address. The informative session and workshop from Startup India by Oishika Ghosh (Associate-Invest India) and Gowtama HS (Master trainer, Karnataka and Goa, GeM introduced various policy benefits as well as B2G connects to the founders.

The Investor Panel consisted of Parag Dhol, MD, Inventus Capital India; Rema Subramanium, Co-founder and Managing Partner; Ankur Capital; Mahavir Sharma, etc had a discussion which covered nuances of early stage investing and the insights from the distinguished panelists were like pots of gold for the startups.

Abhay Hanjura (Co-founder – Licious) inspired the attendees with his keynote speech where he traced his phenomenal journey as an entrepreneur. Ankit Ratan (Co-founder - Signzy) and Sagar Saxena (Founding Team - Razorpay) surprised the audience with their inspiring tales of building successful startups.

Open Mic Night was another highlight of the day where investors and attendees had enthralling experience .

Second day November 27 began with workshop by Vikrant Potnis, (Founder-FundEnable); on Financial Projections and Valuations, a critical aspect of any venture with a focus to make it simple and easy to practice by women entrepreneurs without the fear of numbers.

Daisy Chittilapilly (President Cisco India & South Asia) delivered her Keynote with aplomb and goaded the women entrepreneurs to embrace the focus on team building from the very start. The session on How to Refine your Pitch by Anjali Sosale, Partner, Waterbridge Ventures; helped founders to know about ways to make an impression using the soft and technical aspects of pitching via story telling. Praveen Tailam (Chair – TiE Global) who travelled all the way from Boston to participate gave the closing remarks.

Hemant Gupta, MD, BRTSIF (Zone Startups India) said, "This sixth edition of empoWer being conducted in partnership with TiE Women has reached new heights by extending our program offering to 74 participants this year and we aim to make it even bigger next year."

This year it has attracted over 600 applications from across the country and noticed a significant traction coming from Tier II and Tier III cities. A total of 74 women entrepreneurs were shortlisted and given an opportunity to undergo 12-week accelerator program by Indian and Global mentors that comprised over 30 hours of coaching sessions, workshops, case studies of successful women-led startups, industry and investor connects.