IIPHG NIDHI TBI incubation

This is how a founder joins IIPHG NIDHI TBI. It is not a rolling intake: the incubator opens numbered calls for proposals and you apply online while one is open. Support comes in three modes — pre-incubation to get to a proof of concept, incubation itself, which can be physical on campus or virtual, and an accelerator mode that adds scale-up support with industry collaboration.

What you get

• Incubation support, physical on campus or virtual
• Mentoring from domain experts, and hand-holding through the early stages
• Help with patent filing and other IP work
• Use of the incubator's prototyping labs and fab lab, furnished co-working space, conference and meeting rooms, and high-speed internet
• Access, through the host institute, to its microbiology and molecular laboratories and its health technology assessment centre for validating a product
• Professional services covering legal compliance, accounting, financial management and IT support
• Help raising money through angel investor networks and Gujarat and central government schemes
• Introductions through startup events, workshops and seminars

Who can apply

• Founders and teams with a technology-based venture aimed at a public health problem
• Outside founders are admitted — nothing on the incubator's pages limits intake to the institute's students, faculty or alumni, and every venture it currently lists is an outside company or LLP
• Your idea needs some entrepreneurial potential; a research project with no achievable goal will not be considered
• Named areas are predictive and diagnostic healthcare, primary and community prevention, therapies for non-communicable and infectious disease, AI, IT, machine learning and IoT health solutions, medical devices and diagnostics, food adulteration and fortification, and water, sanitation and hygiene including infection prevention and control — and the incubator says this list is not closed
• You are asked not to put confidential information into a proposal unless it is already protected

How selection works: there are two levels of review. First an internal review by the incubator's team together with senior members of the host institute. Then an external review by two or more reviewers, who may be domain experts, investors, industry people, established entrepreneurs or potential clients and users. The incubator says review can be relaxed case by case for serial entrepreneurs, for ventures with customer validation or adoption, for ventures already trading at a stated revenue level, and for ventures that have already taken angel or venture money. A business idea already screened and approved through a government grant or competition may be admitted directly. Admission is at the incubator's sole discretion and it does not give reasons for a rejection.

How to apply: wait for a call for proposals, then use the online application link on the incubator's page on the institute's site. Applications are evaluated and shortlisted by an internal team, shortlisted applicants present to a screening committee, results are declared, and selected teams complete formalities before incubation starts. For questions write to incubation@iiphg.org or ceonidhitbi@iiphg.org. The institute's site-wide "Apply Now" button is for academic admissions and is not the route into incubation.