State Bank of India (SBI) on Monday opened a lounge on IIIT-Hyderabad campus for startups as part of an engagement it wants to cement with the vibrant eco-system, one that will see the country’s largest lender hand-hold and evaluate fin-techs going forward.
Chief General Manager of SBI Hyderabad Circle O.P. Mishra, who along with IIIT-H director P.J. Narayanan, inaugurated the lounge, said the purpose of setting up the facility is to be part of the startup ecosystem.
The opening of the lounge was part of the programmes SBI organised here to mark its foundation day.
Financial consultation
Seeking to highlight the significance of tech startups and their disruptions, he said SBI would like to begin its association with the startups in the city by offering financial consultation, advisory services, transactional products and foreign remittances.
Another component of the engagement would evaluation of fin-tech start-ups by those from the bank’s innovation centre in Belapur, Navi Mumbai.
The startup lounge was the first of its kind for SBI in collaboration with a premier institute and on a campus. Besides those under the wings of IIIT, a large number of start-ups also function out of the famous T-Hub tech incubator in the same campus.
Professor-Co-Innovation and Head Research/Innovation Outreach at IIIT-H Ramesh Loganathan said SBI would help startups understand finance and associated areas through enabling talks, mentor the aspiring entrepreneurs and evaluate some of them from a perspective of becoming a client.
Funding
SBI Deputy General Manager-SME Debasish Mishra said with time, the bank depending on recommendations of its Innovation Centre and IIIT-H would look at possible funding of the startups.
