By CIO Insider Team
 

On Tuesday, Flipkart announced the finalists of its first-ever startup accelerator program called "Flipkart Leap". Launched in August 2020, the program was started with objective to nurture promising startups so that they can contribute to India's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem and boost the Government's Startup India campaign.

The eight finalists were shortlisted from among more than 920 applicants across five categories including Design & Make for India; Innovations in Digital Commerce; Technologies to Empower Retail; SCM & Logistics and Enabling Deep Tech Applications. The finalists will now undergo a 16-week mentorship program conducted by a team of Flipkart leaders and various industry experts and receive an equity-free grant of USD 25,000 each.

The 16-week mentorship program will offer knowledge of Venture development and secure partnerships for the selected startups under two separate tracks - one that includes one-on-one business and technical mentorship, masterclasses, and networking sessions and the other track that will help the startups explore partnership opportunities with relevant business units at Flipkart.

The eight shortlisted finalists include:

ANS Commerce: A full-stack e-commerce enabler for online brands
Entropik Tech: India's first artificial intelligence-powered emotional intelligence platform
Fashinza: A B2B Saas enabled marketplace for Fashion Manufacturing
Gully Network: A tech-enabled retail network for mid-size grocery stores
Piggy: A fin-tech startup that focuses on savings and has in-built automatic wealth management
Tagbox Solutions: A supply chain monitoring startup that provides an array of services to F&B, pharma and hi-tech/industrial companies
Unbox Robotics: Builds a plug-and-play system of AI-powered parcel sorting mobile robots for the logistics industry
Wolkus Technology(Fasal): An AI-powered IoT platform for Agriculture ecosystem that records a variety of growing conditions on the farm

"With Flipkart Leap, we aim to nurture promising startups and help them create compelling solutions for customers and bring value to the industry. The quality of the startups and the number of applications we received have been encouraging. We look forward to working with the eight startups, mentoring them and supporting them through industry exposure and strategic partnerships," said Naren Ravula, VP, Product Strategy and Deployment at Flipkart.