Government of India announced the winners of “National Start-up Awards 2021” and felicitated 46 start-ups for their contribution in their respective sectors.
Key Facts
- Government also conferred an incubator and an accelerator with the award during this ceremony.
- This marked the second edition of National Start-up Awards.
- Applications were invited from 15 sectors and 49 sub-sectors, ranging from agriculture to animal husbandry and from enterprise technology to fintech.
National Start-up Awards 2021
National Start-up awards seek to recognise start-ups contributing towards economic dynamism by encouraging innovation and injecting competition. It focuses on following start-ups:
- That build innovative products or solutions
- That are scalable enterprises, with high potential of wealth creation or employment generation
- That demonstrates measurable social impact.
Number of applications
Ministry received 2,177 applications from start-ups across 49 sub-sectors. There were applications from 53 incubators and 6 accelerators as well, for the ecosystem enablers categories. Out of these, 863 were women-led start-ups and 253 were start-ups, which were working in rural areas of India.
What parameters were used to decide winners?
Six parameters were used to decide the winners:
- Innovation
- Scalability
- Economic impact
- Social impact
- Environmental impact, and
- inclusiveness and diversity.
Who are the winners?
- In fintech category’s financial inclusion sub-sector, Bengaluru-based Naffa Innovations Private Limited was declared the winner. The start-up, also called ToneTag, was founded in 2013. It provides for mobile payments using sound and near-field communication (NFC), without using internet.