Sequoia Spark, Sequoia India’s program for women entrepreneurs in India and Southeast Asia, and NITI Aayog’s Women Entrepreneurship Platform (WEP) have joined hands for a year-long partnership to promote women entrepreneurship in India.
Under this partnership, Sequoia India will mentor a cohort of aspiring women founders to help them with domain knowledge and skills needed for scaling up and setting their businesses.
Anna Roy, Senior Advisor, NITI Aayog, said, “WEP and Sequoia India’s Spark program are collaborating to level the playing field, helping women founders on their enterprise building journeys by launching a new capacity-building program to impart sound financial knowledge and develop fundraising skills. The program is designed to look at challenges from their lens and aims to materially help them accelerate the growth of their business”.
A survey conducted earlier this year by Sequoia India with women founders in India and Southeast Asia, 66 percent of the founders surveyed wanted access to mentorship sessions with investors and business leaders.
Hence, Sequoia India will offer monthly office hours, curated around specific sectors and problem statements to the 25 women entrepreneurs who will be part of the first cohort.
Alongside, apart from hosting webinars, being open to large WEP community on topics of fundraising, go-to-market, and product-market fit, it will also attract key talent in early stages and teach the art to unleash the power of storytelling to create strong brands. These sessions will be tailored to address the needs and challenges that are unique to female founders.
“While India’s startup ecosystem is a large and vibrant one, it is far from being a diverse one. There are huge gaps and lack of opportunities faced by women entrepreneurs — especially when it comes to accessibility to network, mentorship, and fundraising. We share a common vision and goal with NITI Aayog’s WEP - to close this gap and work towards more diversity in the startup ecosystem. With this partnership, the Sequoia India team aims to equipping women entrepreneurs with deep functional expertise across some core areas of company-building, ensuring they get access to much-needed skills for scaling their ideas into enduring businesses,” said Shweta Rajpal Kohli, Head – Public Policy, Sequoia Capital India.
