The 'Social Enterprise' award fetes the firm that offers solutions to pressing issues.
"I am looking for founders who have vision and ambition to disrupt a large industry or make it more efficient," says Rahul Meha, Managing Partner, DST Global.
Here are the five entrants shortlisted for the 'Social Enterprise' category in the Economic Times Startup Awards 2019. A high-profile jury will pick the winners from eight categories on Friday. Kaleidofin
Founded: 2017 Founder: Sucharita Mukherjee (CEO, in pic), Puneet Gupta
Based: Chennai Key investors: Blume Ventures, Omidyar Network, Venture Catalyst, Bharat Inclusion Fund What it does: Kaleidofin is a wealth management platform that offers customized, goalbased financial products to the under-banked in partnership with banks, mutual funds and insurance companies.
Social Cops
Founded: 2013 Founder: Prukalpa Sankar, Varun Banka Based: New Delhi Key investors: Waterbridge Ventures, Google Launchpad Accelerator, Rajan Anandan, Ratan Tata What it does: SocialCops is a data intelligence startup that works with governments, businesses, philanthropies, and nonprofits to help them take better decisions using data-based insights.
Founded: 2016 Founder: Rahul Pathri (CEO, in pic), Arpita Singh, Vaishnavi Reddy Based: Hyderabad Key investors: Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (grant), AIRmaker What it does: Docturnal is a health technology startup that is attempting to detect diseases more easily using mobile software. Its flagship product, TimBre, can detect pulmonary tuberculosis just by recording the audio of a person’s cough.
Founded: 2013 Founder: Sanskriti Dawle (CEO), Aman Srivastava, Dilip Ramesh, Saif Shaikh Based: Bengaluru Key investors: Greycell Ventures, Anand Mahindra, Village Capital What it does: Project Mudra addresses the issue of low Braille literacy through a mobile app, which acts as an interface between visually impaired users and Braille hardware using speech recognition.
First Step Digital
Founded: 2015 Founder: Deep Bajaj (CEO, in pic), Mohit Bajaj Based: New Delhi Key investors: Indian Angel Network What it does: First Step Digital aims to identify and solve women’s issues around intimate and menstrual hygiene. After its first product PeeBuddy, the company launched BodyGuard, a range of antipollution and anti-mosquito products, and Sirona, which focuses on feminine hygiene.
WHAT WE LOOK FOR IN A WINNER Expert Speak: Rahul Mehta, Managing Partner, DST Global
Evaluating winners is not just about who is big today, but rather about who has the most potential over time. I am looking for founders who have vision and ambition to disrupt a large industry or make it more efficient, and who are willing to take bold bets as they scale. An obsession for product, customer, and to build a strong team and culture are what sets them apart. I am also looking for innovative products, including ones that solve India-specific problems. Early category leadership, fast growth, love from users, defensible competitive positioning and a large market opportunity are the other important criteria in selecting a winner.
Get Unlimited Access to The Economic Times
