November 21st, 2018

New Delhi, November 21, 2018: nasscom Startups and Facebook, today concluded the second edition of the Code For The Next Billion programme with ten shortlisted social impact start-ups showcasing their products on the Demo Day. The programme, a joint initiative by Facebook and nasscom start-ups, started in the year 2015, had a singular focus to discover and empower the next generation of social impact start-ups in the country. Moving beyond the boundaries of digital natives, the second edition of the program was aimed at nurturing social impact start-ups creating digital innovations that serve to bring larger sections of new-to-internet/bottom of pyramid users into the digital fold.

The six months long immersive program saw over 250 applications, and after a rigorous screening and selection process, including an in-person presentation to a jury of industry stalwarts, 10 high impact start-ups from diverse sectors such as healthcare, education, agritech, blockchain made the final cut. The last leg of the six-month long programme kicked off on November 20th at the Start-ups Warehouse in Noida. The full day conference witnessed a high profile participation from some of the leading corporates, start-ups and industry veterans, discussing the impact of inclusive design and immersive experiences and emerging generation of new age technology interfaces in strengthening the backbone of today’s infrastructure, followed by mentorship and networking sessions between the start-ups and investors.

Speaking on the occasion Ms. Sangeeta Gupta, Sr. Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer, nasscom , said, “Today, we are witnessing a remarkable growth in the start-up ecosystem, propelled by innovative thinking and attitude to build solutions in key sectors where technology can play a revolutionary role. This is a positive step towards our objective to empower the developer community and motivate large scale innovation impacting bottom of the pyramid. Through the program, we aimed to accelerate the development and adoption of mobile internet applications across India. We would like to thank all our partners for their valuable support and trust and hope to work with a lot more people in the future”

Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Satyajeet Singh, Head of Platform Partnerships, India and South Asia, Facebook, said, “Identifying, encouraging and mentoring start-ups focusing on India-first innovations is vital to foster an ecosystem that supports innovative solutions tailored to the historically unconnected and underserved. The joint initiative with nasscom and other partners from the industry is aimed at building the much needed infrastructural support that offers an avenue for the unique imagination, risk appetite and skills associated with social enterprises building applications to solve education, financial, health and public utility challenges. We are excited to support the journeys of these startups and hope that their journeys inspire the next generation of developers to apply their talents to solving these problems."

The program was also supported by funding partners Unitus Seed Fund, Ankur Capital and Indian Angel Network, outreach partner Invest India, incubation partner Social Alpha and design mentorship partner Design4India.

As per nasscom's internet report, the number of internet users in India will see a two-fold rise at 730 million by 2020 and are expected to take an incredible leap towards internet accessibility. This opens up immense possibilities for bringing a world of benefits to them. Over the past two editions, participating start-ups as well as industry have given an encouraging response to the initiative for promoting entrepreneurship, and providing a learning and networking platform. By driving discussions, engagement and mentorship the platform will continue to evangelize India's entrepreneurial prowess across the globe and open new horizons for the developer community in India providing them the right support to develop and build innovative apps and mobile websites in the areas of education, financial, health and public utility.

About nasscom 

nasscom ® is the premier trade body and the chamber of commerce of the IT-BPM industries in India. nasscom is a global trade body with more than 2100 members, which include both Indian and multinational companies that have a presence in India. nasscom's member and associate member companies are broadly in the business of software development, software services, software products, consulting services, BPO services, e-commerce & web services, engineering services and animation and gaming. nasscom's  membership base constitutes over 95% of the industry revenues in India and employs over 3.5 million professionals.

Annexure

Here is the list of the 10 start-ups

1. Haqdarshak Empowerment Solutions Private Limited: A social enterprise working to make welfare schemes more accessible to citizens, Haqdarshak’s multi-state, multi-lingual mobile technology platform helps citizens discover, apply for, and benefit from government and private schemes that they qualify for.

2. Eye-D: An assistant to those who are visually impaired, the app helps the user be aware of their location, explore and navigate to nearby places of interest, evaluate their surroundings with their smartphone camera and ‘read’ printed text.

3. Bodhi Health Education: The startup helps healthcare and dental care organisations hire the right candidates and train them efficiently with proven technology solutions.

4. TheTeacherApp: A not-for- profit venture, the app aims to plug holes in the training infrastructure for educators in the country, and guide and train teachers from schools all across India.

5. Jiovio Healthcare Pte: The organisation provides personalised and predictive maternal care using AI, IoT and wearable technology.

6. KrishiHub: This startup improves famers’ lives by providing them with a platform that enables them to sell directly to businesses like restaurants, hotels, canteens and retail stores, eliminating middlemen. Doing so lets the farmers get the best prices for their produce.

7. PublicVibe: This is a news aggregation platform where you can find instant local news and videos in English, Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Telugu, Marathi, Bengali and Gujarati from all leading newspapers and news channels.

8. Right2Vote Infotech Pvt Limited: This is an online verified voting platform for all kinds of elections, including polls for government bodies, corporate organisations, colleges and schools, among others.

9. ChainFrame: A blockchain products company, ChainFrame is focused on using the power of blockchain to create radically transparent systems for large scale public use for state and national governments.

10. Helper4U Services LLP: The startup aims to do away with middlemen in the hiring of unskilled or semi-skilled helpers, benefitting both the job seekers as well as the employers.