ACIC VGU Foundation

Start on the portal, not the website

acicvgu.com lists programme names but publishes no deadlines, eligibility or terms for them. Every apply link goes to the separate portal at connect.acicvgu.com. Register an account there first and read the open calls on that portal — it is the only place ACIC-VGU states what is actually accepting applications.

Pick the right door

The site sorts its programmes into four buckets, and the bucket tells you more than the name does.

• UpcubateX: Call for Incubation is the incubation route — the one to use if you want a place in the centre.
• PowerPlay 45 is filed as post-incubation support, so it is aimed at teams that have already been through incubation rather than at first-time applicants.
• The DST NIDHI Seed Support Program is a government scheme ACIC-VGU hosts, and it runs as dated phase calls rather than continuously. Check whether a phase is open before you build an application around it.
• The Call for Application for Mentors is for people volunteering as mentors, not for founders.
• The Student Innovator Program is a training programme for students, not an incubation intake.

Fit matters here more than usual

ACIC-VGU is explicit about two things: the sectors it wants — design and craft, handicrafts, lifestyle, fashion and agriculture — and the geography it was set up for, which is Rajasthan and its Tier-2 and Tier-3 towns. It also says it works with early-stage entrepreneurs. If your startup sits in one of those sectors and you are building outside a metro, say so plainly in the first few lines of your application. If you are a late-stage software company in Bengaluru, this is the wrong incubator.

Use the studios as the argument

The centre runs six studios — Makers-Space, Design and Craft, Fabrication, Apparel, Textile and Prototyping — plus co-working space. An application that explains what you would actually make in one of them is far more concrete than a generic incubation request. Equipment lists are not published, so ask on your first visit or by email what each studio can do.

Meet them at an event first

ACIC-VGU runs a steady programme of summits, bootcamps and student sessions on the VGU campus in Jaipur, and they are open. Going to one is the easiest way to get in front of the team and the mentors before a formal application.

Ask before you assume

Because the public pages carry no terms, do not assume anything about cost, equity, duration or what the centre provides. Write to acic@vgu.ac.in and ask directly, and get the answer in writing before you commit.

ACIC-VGU Foundation is the Atal Community Innovation Centre at Vivekananda Global University in Jagatpura, Jaipur. Its full name is Atal Community Innovation Centre - Vivekananda Global University Foundation, and it describes itself as a startup incubator supported by the Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) and NITI Aayog, Government of India. Its stated purpose is to build the startup and innovation ecosystem across Rajasthan, including the state's Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities.

What it focuses on

ACIC-VGU names five sectors: design and craft, handicrafts, lifestyle, fashion, and agriculture. That is an unusual list for an Indian incubator, and it matches the studios it runs rather than a software pipeline. The centre says it works with early-stage entrepreneurs, and puts particular weight on founders from smaller cities and towns who are further from the incubation infrastructure clustered in the metros. Its own summary of what it offers is short: studios, mentorship, handholding support, funding opportunities and co-working space.

How programmes work

The programmes page lists seven things by name: StartXel, PowerPlay 45, the DST NIDHI Seed Support Program, UpcubateX: Call for Incubation, a Call for Application for Mentors, a Community Innovator Fellowship Program and a Student Innovator Program. They are grouped into four types — Incubation Program, Post-Incubation Support Program, Government Schemes and Mentorship Program — with one named programme filed under each, and three left ungrouped.

Be aware that the website publishes almost nothing beyond those names. The programme cards carry a picture and a title and no description, so eligibility, length, cost, equity and intake dates are not stated anywhere on the public site. The one exception is the Student Innovator Program, which is written up on the events pages as a multi-session training run for students, with sessions on problem-solving, startup ideation, product strategy and presentation skills.

The site also points founders at the national schemes it helps with, naming the Startup India Seed Fund Scheme, MeitY and HDFC Parivartan alongside DST NIDHI. Our own catalogue holds several dated ACIC-VGU calls that match this: NIDHI Seed Support Program calls in phase 2 and phase 3, a MeitY GENESIS EiR call, and an ACIC-VGU Anchor Fund co-investment listing.

How to apply

Applications do not happen on acicvgu.com. Every apply link and the Register button in the site header lead to a separate portal at connect.acicvgu.com, where you create an account and then apply to whichever call is open. Because the main site does not publish deadlines, the portal is the only place to see what is genuinely accepting applications at any given moment. For anything else, the general enquiry address is acic@vgu.ac.in.

Facilities

ACIC-VGU calls its workshop space its innovation labs and names six studios: a Makers-Space Studio, a Design and Craft Studio, a Fabrication Studio, an Apparel Studio, a Textile Studio and a Prototyping Studio. It also offers a co-working space. The apparel and textile studios are the giveaway that the centre is set up for physical products in craft, fashion and lifestyle, not only for software teams. No equipment lists or access terms are published for any of the studios.

Mentors

The centre publishes a mentor directory rather than a staff page. Eighteen mentors are named across the home page and the mentors listing, among them founders and operators from Ecowrap, Freshokartz Agri, ImaginXP, Export Guru, SelfAchievers, Thankyou Waste Solutions and MooRakshak Bio Sciences, an investor from Jaipur VC, a policy lead from Deloitte, and academics from LNMIIT Jaipur and Mody University. The list is paged, so there may be more. There is a standing open call for new mentors.

Scale

Treat the numbers on this site carefully: the home page and the about page disagree with each other. The home page claims more than 140 startups incubated, more than 200 events, more than 60 partners and more than 50 mentors. The about page, using the same style of counter, claims more than 75 startups impacted, more than 130 events, more than 50 partners and more than 40 mentors. Neither page is dated and neither explains the difference, so we publish no startup count for ACIC-VGU. Three founders give testimonials on the about page — from Payonetime, CAMPASS and Quantum Robotics — and those are the only portfolio companies the site names.

Events

Events are the most visible part of what ACIC-VGU does. Recent ones listed on its own site include the Genesis NextGen Startup Summit (Jaipur Edition) in March 2026, which it says drew more than 250 founders, investors and mentors to the VGU campus; a two-week Rajasthan GenAI Ready Naari bootcamp for women, run with Nimaya and Dhara Shakti Foundation; the Student Innovator Program; an AI Impact Summit; a Grant Ki Panchayat session; and Code Red, its multi-day hackathon and ideathon. If you are in or near Jaipur, these are the cheapest way to meet the team before you apply.

Where it is

ACIC-VGU Foundation sits on the Vivekananda Global University campus at Sector 36, NRI Colony Road, Jagatpura, Jaipur 303012. It has no other listed location.