National Start-up Awards 2021

The winners of the “National Start-up Awards 2021” were declared by the Government of India, which honored 46 start-ups for their contributions in their various industries.Government also conferred an incubator and an accelerator with the award during this ceremony.This marked the second edition of National Start-up Awards.Applications were invited from 15 sectors and 49 sub-sectors, ranging from agriculture to animal husbandry and from enterprise technology to fintech.

National Start-up Awards 2021

• National Start-up awards seek to recognise start-ups contributing towards economic dynamism by encouraging innovation and injecting competition.

It focuses on following start-ups:

1. That build innovative products or solutions
2. That are scalable enterprises, with high potential of wealth creation or employment generation
3. That demonstrates measurable social impact.

Number of applications

• Ministry received 2,177 applications from start-ups across 49 sub-sectors. There were applications from 53 incubators and 6 accelerators as well, for the ecosystem enablers categories.
• Out of these, 863 were women-led start-ups and 253 were start-ups, which were working in rural areas of India.

What parameters were used to decide winners?

Six parameters were used to decide the winners:

1. Innovation
2. Scalability
3. Economic impact
4. Social impact
5. Environmental impact, and
6. inclusiveness and diversity.

Who are the winners?

• In fintech category’s financial inclusion sub-sector, Bengaluru-based Naffa Innovations Private Limited was declared the winner. The start-up, also called ToneTag, was founded in 2013. It provides for mobile payments using sound and near-field communication (NFC), without using internet.
• Another winner in fintech category’s insurance sub-sector, Umbo Idtech Private Limited won the award. This start-up was founded in 2018. It has built a full-stack platform, enabling omnichannel insurance distribution for its clients.
• In Robotics sub-sector, Sagar Defence was declared the winner. It was founded in 2015 by Mridul Babbar and Nikunj Parashar. The start-up builds autonomous navigation systems, aerial vehicles and unmanned marine.
• In the women-led start-up category, Jaipur-headquartered Frontier Markets was honoured. It was founded in 2011 by Ajaita Singh. It is a social commerce platform that focuses on rural India.