The Nagarathar Chamber of Commerce (NCC), is planning to set up a fund for start-ups owned by young entrepreneurs from the community. The funding platform is called ‘Kittangi Finance’.
Plans are on to form a peer-to-peer lending platform to support the businessmen in the community. The community will also invest around ₹ 500 crore in various business verticals in the next two years.
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“We are ready with the concept. We will be finalising the quantum of fund soon,” said EMC Palaniappan, chairman of International Business Conference of Nagarathars (IBCN), a biennial business conference organised by the NCC.
“People in the Nagarathar (also known as Nattukottai Chettiar) community were always into entrepreneurship.
“We now want to mentor and guide the youngsters who want to pursue entrepreneurship/start-ups,” he said.
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Earlier this week, the NCC organised a meet for start-ups where 40 people articulated their ideas. There were ten women entrepreneurs too.
TiE roped in
The entrepreneurs were mentored on how to scale up their ideas. The NCC has also roped in TiE Chennai Chapter,
The Chennai Angels and KPMG as knowledge partners and mentors to help the budding entrepreneurs.
“We have created modules for them with the help of a firm called SkillAngels. We also met some aspiring start-ups and entrepreneurs from this community and we will provide them whatever support they require,” said Akhila Rajeshwar, Executive Director of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) Chennai.
Balram Nair, Vice President of The Chennai Angels (TCA), an angel investor network, said, “We have been associated with the Nagarathar community and it’s wonderful to see a traditionally business community preparing their next generation for the new age business.”