IIT Madras Entrepreneurship Cell to host ‘E-Summit’ from 5th to 14th March 2021

Chennai: Indian Institute of Technology Madras’ Entrepreneurship Cell will be hosting its annual ‘Entrepreneurship Summit,’ aimed at driving innovation through engineering challenges, from 5th to 14th March 2021. This edition of the annual event will be held entirely online and will feature four conclaves – Youth Conclave, Innovators’ Conclave, Start-up Conclave and Growth Conclave.

More than 300 startups have registered for the Start-up Conclave while around 2,000 registrations have been recorded for the Innovators’ Conclave. In addition, around 800 people have registered for the Growth Conclave, with the Youth Conclave set to attract more than 1000 attendees.

The theme for E-Summit 2021 is ‘Sustain to Attain’, highlighting the importance of persevering through difficult times. The E-Summit also features a Social Campaign called ‘Pankh,’ which is focused on enabling the growth of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises through sustainable business models.

Among the top speakers scheduled to address E-Summit 2021 include

Speaking about this edition of E-Summit, Prof. Nilesh J. Vasa, Dean (Students), IIT Madras, said, “The online E-Summit 2021 will provide an opportunity to a wide student-audience and aspiring entrepreneurs, startups, alumni, and investors to network, share knowledge and experience.”

Elaborating on the unique aspects of E-Summit 2021, Prof. Ashwin Mahalingam, Faculty Advisor (E-Cell), IIT Madras, said, “Entrepreneurs among others were greatly affected by the pandemic. Persevering through such challenging times is critical and is one of the main themes for this year’s E-Summit.”

Further, Prof. Ashwin Mahalingam said, “With every challenge there arise opportunities and E-Summit this year is intended to encourage entrepreneurs to identify these opportunities and innovate despite challenges such as the pandemic. An opportunity in a virtual conclave is that we are able to invite speakers from across the country and the world. We hope that this will provide an enriching experience to the participants.”

E-Summit 2021 caters to a diverse set of audiences both in competitive events and lecture series where agritech and retail tech are covered in Unconference, Medtech in the product construct, and the inspirit lecture series covers space tech.

Highlighting the newer additions introduced this year, Mr. Ayush Toshniwal, Students’ Head, E-Cell, IIT Madras, said, “The team has been working on the sixth edition of          E-Summit since the last 4 months; carefully curating online elements to elevate the attendee experience.”

Adding on to these points, Mr. Akshit Bagde, Co-Head, E-Cell, IIT Madras, said, “This edition of E-Summit will provide a customized opportunity to the knowledge seekers to learn and interact, and to the startups to grow and network.”

Catering to the startups, their flagship funding competition ‘Elevate’ has reached nearly 300 startups. Considering the pandemic scenario, E-Summit 2021 is being organized in an online platform named ‘Zuddl’ where the students have attempted to provide the experience of an offline event through the features of virtual stages, expo booths, one to one networking, and discussion tables.

In the social campaign, PANKH, which aims to help MSMEs, is organizing a policy-making competition, ‘Strategise,’ in association with the National Institute of MSME (NIMSME), Hyderabad, to give exposure to the policy-making domain for students.

Another unique event under the campaign is the ‘MSME showcase,’ where unique MSMEs like Rogan art, Block printing of Ajrakhpur, and the like will be showcased, helping them reach more publicity and reach. Hence, through its various events, workshops, and competitions, it reaches 5000+ students and entrepreneurs across India.

Updates about E-Summit 2021 will also be posted on the social media channels – Twitter / Facebook / LinkedIn / YouTube

A brief about the four conclaves has been provided below:

Ø  Youth Conclave: The objective is to launch the ‘leaders of tomorrow.’ Youth Conclave is a multi-faceted confluence of engaging competitive and networking events that help an individual unlock their latent potential and skills in business and entrepreneurship. It is envisioned to promote entrepreneurial spirit and aptitude among the next generation of graduates hence paving the way for these young leaders to ride the wave of change in the careers they undertake.

Ø  Innovators’ Conclave: This conclave is envisioned towards providing aspiring entrepreneurs with intensive mentoring and workshops from industry experts. The Innovators’ Conclave aims to nurture entrepreneurial mind-sets and provide an opportunity to challenge oneself and to test one’s capability in this marathon of innovation through the plethora of competitive B-planning and comprehensive case-study events.

Ø  Start-up Conclave: Aiming to accelerate start-up growth, the Start-up Conclave will focus on providing networking and experimental learning. It is a platform for founders, investors and start up enthusiasts for providing extreme networking experience, insights and knowledge on various important topics and ensuring you meet the right people, in the right business atmosphere.

The Conclave is crafted intrinsically for prospective and emerging start-ups looking for funding and expanding their network as well as knowledge, service providers, business/industrial stalwarts, VC firms and Investors, and Incubators and Accelerators with quality sessions, workshops, seminars, round table sessions, panel discussions, pitch, and of course round-the-clock networking.

Ø  Growth Conclave: A set of workshops to deliver the necessary hard skills needed in building the participants’ technical skills and business acumen to grow in their career and for new-age entrepreneurs to grow in their entrepreneurial journey. Through industry experts, the Growth Conclave aims to provide the best learning opportunities on the platform to upskill oneself and one’s start up. Immersive post-workshop tasks and activities will be included to increase the overall engagement factor in a virtual platform. Conducted broadly over the following tracks: Technology-Based, Business Based and Start-up Based, we aim to cover the following areas of interest.