Criteria for entry
Proposals will be invited from the potential startups submitted by any citizen
including students, alumnae and faculty members. The application will be
evaluated based on the criteria such as concept of the proposal, development
plans, market potential, uniqueness of product, usefulness to the society, cost,
returns, etc. Out of the total selected applicants more than 70% will be selected
from the startups proposals submitted by existing students, research scholars,
faculty members and recent alumnae of Solapur University and its affiliated
colleges. There will not be any deadline for the applicants to submit the
application. A committee comprising board of directors will meet once in three
months and will evaluate the proposals to look for their suitability. If needed,
this committee may recommend for formation of subcommittee to study the
proposal in more detail for making decision on suitability of the proposal.
Shortlisted proposals will be invited for a presentation. Based on the technical
document and presentation, the committee comprising experts in specific
domain will either select or reject the proposal. On selection of any proposal,
the proposer of the startup will be issued a letter with details of material,
equipment, facility to be provided to his/her startup. Such selected startup will
be placed under the preincubation stage and necessary facilities will be
extended to such startups.
Rental Policy
No rent will be levied to the startups in the preincubation stage. A nominal rent
will be charged to the startups for the allocated building space for those who
are upgraded from preincubation stage. Other facilities like electricity, water,
internet, limited server space, common area, vehicle parking, etc will be
provided at free of cost.
Exit policy
A natural exit of startup will be a period of five years for all those who show a
steady performance. If the entrepreneur progresses excellently and would like
to exit within the five years period, then it will be permitted to do so and
incubation centre will reserve some percentage of equity in that startup. If the
progress of any startup is not up to the mark during its intermediate evaluation,
then based on the recommendations of the committee, the agreement with the
startup will be terminated leading to its exit.
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Establishment of funding arrangement
The University will provide resources like land and other facilities, man power
to look into the activities of incubator and an initial grant for establishing
necessary infrastructure through its own resources. University has reserved Rs.
1 crore for this incubation activity under the “Soft Loan” head. It will also
generate resources from CSIR, RUSA, MeitY (project worth Rs. 1 crore is in
progress) and other funding agencies.
For long term sustenance, the incubation centre will have an equity in the
startups, which have attained stability in their business. This will generate
funds and will help to fund the future startups.
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Rules for engaging external mentors/ experts
Shortly the University will frame a committee for incubation policy. The
committee will comprise faculty members engaged in the research transformed
in to products and external experts, who will generally be industrialists.
Regular meetings will be arranged to monitor the progress of startups and
provide proper direction for the growth. Experts in specific domain will be
invited to organize workshops or to mentor the students, research scholars and
faculty.