With funds flowing into Indian startups at a rapid pace, the Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal believes the startup fraternity can nurture 75 more unicorns this year. He noted that India currently has around 82 unicorns. More than half of them reached the $1 billion valuation mark in 2021.
Goyal said the startups can help in taking healthcare to the remote areas and make India achieve the government’s vision of self-sufficiency. “Let’s target to nurture additional 75 unicorns this year,” he said at the inaugural ceremony of the Startup India Innovation Week.
The minister said that successful startups should make it a point to reach out to entrepreneurs and startups in the smaller towns and villages. “Startups should aim at catering to new and unexplored sectors across the country such as rural tourism.” Acknowledging the significance and rise of startups amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Goyal noted that startups have turned COVID-19 into an opportunity from a crisis. He said Indian entrepreneurs should emphasize making startups more resilient and focus on making the world healthier.
“I think our startups can play a very important role to democratize the availability of healthcare across the world for the rich and the poor, for lesser privileged countries, less developed countries as much as for the developed world,” Goyal said startups have been a key factor for India’s rise in the global innovation index. It was 76 in 2014 and 46 in 2021.
“We have broken into the ranks of top 50, but I think we should now all collectively aspire to breach the top 25 ranks in the global innovation index, and I will seek your cooperation and support to make this happen,” the minister said.
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In regards to policy measures, Goyal highlighted that the fees for patent filing have been reduced to 20%, with the government giving a 50% discount on trademark filing fees. He said an improved intellectual property rights (IPR) regime has resulted in the registration of over one million trademarks in the last four years.
“I would urge more and more startups to look at the intellectual property rights that they are creating as an important element of their value proposition.”
