12 min readFeb 16, 2019

Mumbai Startup Ecosystem Guide for Mumbaikars and other startups & Entrepreneurs.

The Mumbai Startup Ecosystem is ranked 3rd in India and 32nd globally.

With major fintech innovations happening in the city and with increasing co-working spaces along with government supporting startups, Mumbai ( a popular city with all kinds of connectivity- lan, air, water) has certainly became an attractive hub for startups.

Here are all the ecosystem partners and resources available to every entrepreneur in and around Mumbai:

Incubators in Mumbai 🌆

An incubator is an organization with a physical space that incubates and nurtures early stage startups for a period of time or up to reaching a milestone, by providing a working space, helping them receive initial funding, finding early users, and building the business structure and strategy for future growth. Here are all the incubators present in Mumbai:

Society for Innovation and Entrepreneurship — IIT Bombay: SINE extends the role of IIT Bombay by facilitating the conversion of research activity into entrepreneurial ventures. Financial assistance is provided by DST. Infrastructure spread over 10000 sq.ft., can accommodate about 15–17 companies.
Centre for Incubation and Business Acceleration (CIBA): CIBA is a Technology Business Incubator catalyzed and supported by Department of Science & Technology under the Startup India Action Plan. CIBA is committed to growing a collaborative entrepreneurial network by providing a one-stop support system for start-ups and transforming Mumbai as a hub for innovation.
Centre for Innovation and Technology Entrepreneurship (CITE): CITE is a platform to convert technology ideas, projects and prototypes into commercial ventures and scale existing startups.
Freemont Partners: Freemont Partners is a global incubator, focused on disruptive online businesses that cater to today’s E-Generation.
BioRiidl: It aims to nucleate and nurture technology and knowledge-based enterprises leveraging knowledge in the areas of biotechnology (biopharma, agrobiotech, industrial biotech, clean technology).
National Centre for Aerospace Innovation and Research: It collaborative consortium of the Indian aerospace manufacturing sectors providing research and technology to its members with a vision to create a world-class aerospace manufacturing ecosystem in India. It serves as a catalyst for collaboration between industry, academia, research & development organisations, and the government with an aim to provide economically viable and sustainable solutions to the Indian aerospace manufacturers.
thinQbate: A community driven startup enabler with focus on helping entrepreneurs towards market validation, product development, business scaling and access to business opportunities, capital, office space & service partners through its incubation program.
Sardar Patel Technology Business Incubator: To support entrepreneurs with business and technology mentorship, sales and marketing strategy, funding strategy, co-working and much more.
UnLtd India: Provides social entrepreneurs with opportunities to maximize their potential as leaders, accelerate the growth of their organisations and deliver high-impact.
Riidl Technology Business Incubator: To support individuals building startups, to represent the interests of entrepreneurs, celebrate successes, and foster a collaborative community.
IAMAI Mobile 10X: Mobile10X ‘Startup Hubs’ are dedicated incubators for promising startups, planned across the country. It helps app developers step up the quality of their apps and the monetization potential, ten times over.
Incubation Center, S.P. Jain Institute of Management and Research (SPJIMR): It is chartered to provide opportunities to SPJIMR students, alumni & faculty to test their entrepreneurial ideas and build them.
Yes, Yes, Why Not?: It is a Mumbai-based artist incubator, multi-disciplinary design studio, and an international gallery of emering Indian artists rolled into one. It trains, mentors and manages aspiring artists and creative folk into pedigreed creative professionals.

Accelerators in Mumbai 🌃

An accelerator is a organization providing an intensive structured time-bound program for fast growing startups, that is intended to act as a catalyst and accelerate their growth. Here are all the accelerators in Mumbai

Venture Nursery: Venture Nursery (VN) is India’s first angel-backed startup accelerator, established in March 2012. It undertakes an intensive and immersive coaching and mentoring role in the chosen startups and helps each with end-to-end infrastructural and learning support.
Amplifi Asia: It operates a structured, custom-designed, super-intense accelerator program aimed at helping early-stage enterprise SaaS startup founders to scale their ventures globally.
empoWer: An initiative with Zone Startups India, empoWer is an accelerator for female founders based in Mumbai looking to scale and grow their startups.
ESpark-Viridian: Espark-Viridian is a business accelerator for early and growth seeking startups. It is a joint venture between Viridian Ventures and Europe’s most dynamic business accelerator, Entrepreneurial Spark, UK.
GSF India: The key objective of GSF is to spur innovation and entrepreneurship. Its larger mission is to provide informed, knowledgeable mentorship capital to the startups.
ISDI Creative Accelerator: It is powered by Microsoft Ventures and is India’s first and only, truly interdisciplinary business accelerator merging design and technology to propel the next generation of highly innovative, globally competitive companies from India.
JioGenNext: JioGenNext is a startup accelerator backed by Reliance Industries. It advises and mentors exceptional founders for launching their startup in the Jio ecosystem.
Oracle Startup Cloud Accelerator: To build a thriving global startup community to drive the digital economy based on collaborative partnerships that enable next-generation growth, business development, and drive cloud-based innovation for startups throughout all stages of growth.
Startupbootcamp FinTech Mumbai: A leading accelerator that supports innovative companies in the financial industry.
The Rise Accelerator: It offers India’s first global FinTech accelerator programme. It will assist with company building, mentorship and provide a great opportunity for companies to get plugged into the global ecosystem and engage with world class decision makers.
YES FINTECH: YES FINTECH provides access to digital banking infra including 200+ APIs, opportunity to expand to 18 global markets through global ecosystem players, mentorship and scale up support, access to 2 million+ customers, funding access upto USD 1 million.
Zone Startups India: Zone Startups India helps founders accelerate their business through its market-validation and customer-acquisition focus, and it invests in select companies that have demonstrated the ability to scale quickly.
Z Nation Lab: Z Nation Lab is an early stage startup accelerator which empowers entrepreneurs with capital, technical expertise, and network.

Incubators/Accelerator Programs in Mumbai🚀

Bio Entrepreneurship Program: A 5 week program that focuses on product development and go to market strategies.
Amplifi Asia SaaS Accelerator Program: A 6 month virtual or in-person program aimed at helping early-stage enterprise SaaS startup founders to scale their ventures, globally.
Venture Nursery Acceleration Program: Venture Nursery organises Acceleration Programs three to four times a year, approximately one every quarter. It aims to mentor and guide startups in several business building basics and refine their proposition, business models and scaling plans.
Startup Program, ESpark-Viridian Ventures: A 4 month enablement process that works in 3 stages — Application, Induction and Acceleration.
GSF Accelerator Program: GSF Accelerator provides mentoring and funding Tech startups who have at least an initial prototype built. GSF website invites applications from startups couple of times every year. GSF Accelerator invests upto USD $200K in each startup inducted into the Accelerator program.
Incubation Program, Riidl: To support individuals building startups, to represent the interests of entrepreneurs, celebrate successes, and foster a collaborative community.
Startup Bootcamp Program, Riidl: a one month program where early stage startups (prototype ready) will be exposed to various sessions and mentors and will be prepared for the finals which is a pitching round in front of the investors.
Startupbootcamp FinTech Mumbai: An intensive 3+3 month program that provides 10 selected FinTech companies with hands-on mentorship from over 100 industry experts, office space in the heart of Mumbai, seed funding, and access to a global network of investors and corporate partners from across the FinTech industry.
The Rise Accelerator Programme: Created by Barclays, the Rise Accelerator Programme is an 18 week cohort-based programme that offers industry connections, customer validation, investor access, and a global reach.
YES FinTech Accelerator Program: A program that is divided into 4 phases — Co-create, Operate, Scale and Invest.
Z Nation Lab Program: A Pre-Accelerator Startup program to shape ideas into action plans that can potentially grow into sustainable businesses.
Zone Startups India Acceleration Program: It provides hands-on strategic and tactical guidance for startups looking to drive market validation and customer acquisition, as well as access to investors, corporate partners, and advisors. Zone Startups reviews applications consistently throughout the year, with no limiting cohorts.

Co-Working Spaces in Mumbai:

E-Cells in Mumbai🚀

Entrepreneurship Cells (E-Cells) are set up to foster entrepreneurship among students. They provide a conducive and healthy environment for budding entrepreneurs. Here are some of the E-Cells in Mumbai:

Startup Investors in Mumbai💰

Investors are individuals, groups of individuals or corporations who invest their capital in startups at various stages, in exchange for equity in the company. The investment amount and equity allocated determines the net valuation of the company at any stage. Investors usually invest at Seed (Very Early Stage), Angel (Medium Stage), Venture Capital (VC — fast growing stage). Here are some of the investors from Mumbai:

Sequoia Capital India: Sequoia Capital India specializes in investments in startup seed, early, mid, late, expansion, public and growth stage companies.
Aavishkaar Ventures: Aavishkaar was started in the year 2001 with a vision to invest in entrepreneurs building sustainable enterprises that can catalyze development impact for excluded communities and remote geographies across the globe.
Ankur Capital: It is an early stage venture capital fund that invests in technologies and product innovations in agriculture, healthcare, education and other areas with the potential to create large-scale impact.
Astarc Ventures: Astarc Ventures is an Early Stage VC fund which aims to partner with startups to help them grow into market leaders.
Blume Ventures: It is a seed-stage venture fund that backs startups with both funding as well as active mentoring and support. It has almost consistently been the most active early stage Indian VC since 2011, funding more than 20 companies per year.
Contrarian Drishti Capital: It is an early stage investor in businesses addressing issues of affordability and accessibility in healthcare, education, livelihood generation, food & agribusiness and energy/ utilities access.
India Quotient: It is a very early stage investor providing seed fund for promising startups.
Nexus Venture Partners: Nexus Venture Partners is a venture capital firm investing in early stage and growth stage startups across sectors in India and US.
Chiratae Ventures: Having a global network of technology venture funds with more than $4 billion, Chiratae Ventures is a leading India-focused technology venture capital fund specializing in startups, early stage, growth stage and expansion stage companies.
Zodius Capital: Operational since 2011, Zodius typically develops one company every six months and works intensively with its portfolio company teams to “speed up” and “shape up” for exceptional growth and profitability.
Warburg Pincus: Warburg Pincus is a leading global private equity firm focused on growth investing. The firm has more than $37 Bn in assets under management. Its active portfolio of more than 120 companies is highly diversified by stage, sector and geography.
Ascent Capital Advisors: Ascent Capital, an India-focused independent private equity firm, is among the most experienced teams on ground with over 150+ years of collective experience in Indian capital markets.
Bain Capital Private Equity: Bain Capital professionals in aggregate is the largest investor in every fund raised. Bain Capital, along with management teams, provides the strategic and analytic resources needed to build and grow great companies.
Equanimity Investments: An alternative investment fund passionate about the early stage ecosystem, working closely with businesses that can leverage on technology to build world class products and offer best in class services in the most capital efficient way.
Fulcrum Venture India: Founded in 2000, Fulcrum is a private equity investor which focuses on the SME business opportunities.They prefer to invest in like-minded entrepreneurs with solid principles and objectives.
General Atlantic LLC: A leading global growth equity firm providing capital and strategic support for growing companies. It does Early Stage Venture, Later Stage Venture and Private Equity Investments.
India Quotient: Launched in 2012, India Quotient is an early stage fund with a corpus of INR 30 Cr.
IvyCap Ventures: Guided by an entrepreneur-centric investment approach, IvyCap focuses on high-quality professional entrepreneurs from premier education institutions of the country.
Kae Capital: Kae Capital invests in those companies which bring out innovative solutions for existing gaps in the markets.They believe in identifying and building large companies even from a concept.
Lead Angels Network: Lead Angels Network is India’s first privately owned angel network that funds and supports startups in India.
Lightbox Management Ltd: India based Lightbox Management Ltd with an investment horizon of seven to eight years is a new $100 Mn tech fund focused on early stage consumer technology businesses.
Matrix Partners India: Mumbai Based Matrix Partners was founded in 1977, and is committed to build long-term relationships. With capital over INR 3000 Cr., they invest across sectors in India.
Mayfield Fund: One of the oldest Venture Capital Firms focusing on early-stage to growth-stage investments in information technology companies, in particular on enterprise software, Internet consumer & media services, and communications.
New Enterprise Associates: It’s one of the largest and most active Venture Capital Firms which helps entrepreneurs to build transformational businesses across multiple stages, sectors and geographies.
Next Orbit Ventures: It is a multi-asset fund manager investing in the debt and equity of growing companies to create long term sustainable value for them and to generate superior returns for its investors.
Nirvana Venture Advisors: Nirvana Venture Advisors invests in early-stage and market leading companies in the fast growing Indian internet and mobile segments.
Norwest Venture Partners: NVP is an India-centric multi-stage investment firm that has partnered with entrepreneurs to build great businesses for more than 50 years.
Orios Venture Partners: Orios Venture Partners is a seed stage venture fund which primarily invests in consumer technology startups and brands.
Seedfund: This venture capital fund recognized the need for an early stage investment ecosystem in India and hence, focuses on investing in Indian startups.
SIDBI Venture Capital Limited: It focuses on startups working in the fields of life sciences, clean technology, retailing, light engineering, food processing, information technology, infrastructure related services, healthcare, logistics and distribution, water and sanitation, agriculture, and education sectors.
Trifecta Capital Partners: It provides customized financing solutions for emerging businesses — whether it is medium term debt, working capital solutions, advisory services or business development capabilities.
Unilazer: It is a Mumbai based private equity and venture fund specializing in early stage and late stage investments.
Brand Capital: Brand Capital has partnered in the building of over 850+ indigenous brands. In 2016, Brand Capital also formed a joint venture with GSVlabs, a global innovation center in Silicon Valley that accelerates startups. The partnership is aimed to target innovation in startups operating in Silicon Valley and India.
ah! Ventures: ah! Ventures is a growth catalyst that brings together promising businesses and investors by creating wealth creation opportunities for both. The venture capital helps investors by offering a bundle of services that help in locating investment opportunities and facilitates decision making.
Eight Roads Ventures: Eight Roads Ventures is a global investment firm. Eight Roads is the proprietary investment arm of FIL, Fidelity International Limited. Eight Roads Ventures invests in high-quality, high-growth companies in India, China, Southeast Asia, Japan, Europe and the US through country specific teams, with a focus on technology and healthcare.

State Government Policies📙

Support Organisations:

Millionminds: Millionminds was commenced in year 2016 with the objective of evolving the motive of entrepreneurship among students across institutions in India with major focus on Tier2/ Tier3 cities. It aims to establish a healthy startup ecosystem, to acquaint the students across India with its comprehensive Entrepreneurship program.

I will be constantly updating the list to make it more comprehensive.

If you feel that any particular organization in the Mumbai startup ecosystem is missing, please update the same in the comment. I will update the list accordingly.

PS: This post is a just collection of all resources and links and shared here to help all entrepreneurs and startups with a good spirit. It doesn’t hold anything related to marketing or sales for anyone.

The original version of this collection can be found here.