SGBAU

Choosing the right programme

• Business Incubation is the main route for a venture with a proposal ready to present. It is built around the university community but also names outside innovators.
• Pre-Incubation is for startup aspirants who are still shaping an idea. It was free, ran for six to eight months, and its latest call we found closed in April 2023. Ask whether a new call is planned before relying on it.
• Open Innovation is for posting or answering a problem, not for joining the incubator.
• Startup Membership gives discounted access to training and events, and is separate from being incubated.

How applications work

• Email the centre's CEO inbox (ceo.srif@sgbau.ac.in) and ask for the incubation application form.
• Fill it in and submit it. An expert committee evaluates the proposal.
• Selected proposals present a pitch to the expert panel.
• Proposals that are selected get a letter of admission.
• The site shows no open or closed intake dates, so ask in your email whether applications are being taken now.

What to ask before you apply

• Whether there is a fee, and whether the centre takes equity. Neither is stated on its pages.
• How long incubation lasts and which facilities you would actually use.
• Whether outside founders, not linked to the university, are being admitted in the current period.

Who to contact

• The CEO inbox is the one the incubation site gives for applications.
• The university's Innovation, Incubation & Linkages office has a separate role inbox, directoriil@sgbau.ac.in, which appeared on the 2023 pre-incubation call.

SGBAU Research & Incubation Foundation (SRIF) is the incubation centre of Sant Gadge Baba Amravati University in Amravati, Maharashtra. It is a non-profit Section 8 company set up under the aegis of the university to promote innovation and entrepreneurship and to turn ideas into businesses. It has worked as the university's incubation centre since September 2019.

How programmes work

SRIF's main offer is business incubation. Its site describes mentorship, legal support, expert guidance, access to university infrastructure and laboratories, and networking. Ventures are admitted after a pitch to an expert panel. Alongside this, SRIF has run a free pre-incubation programme for startup aspirants, offers a startup membership, and runs an open innovation board where anyone can post a problem.

Incubation is the track most founders will be asking about. The application form is not downloadable: you request it by email, an expert committee evaluates the proposal, and selected proposals present to the expert panel. Proposals that are selected receive a letter of admission to the incubation centre. The site does not state an intake calendar, whether a fee or equity is involved, or how long incubation lasts, so ask before assuming any of these.

Who can apply

The incubation programme is weighted towards the university community. Its eligibility list starts with faculty members from the university campus and students and alumni of the university departments. It also names SRIF centre partners, partner universities and institutions, and agencies associated with SRIF research and innovation. The page also names "gross root" innovators and organisations that want an offshoot of an existing business, and the open innovation page says it is open to all individuals, companies, researchers, NGOs and government and non-government bodies. The site's own headline, though, speaks of student-driven on-campus startups. An outside founder should treat the wider wording as an opening to ask, not a guarantee of a seat.

The pre-incubation programme was addressed to startup aspirants in general. Its most recent call that we found closed in April 2023, and the site gives no current dates for it.

Sectors

The site lists IT and ITeS, automobile, biotechnology, agriculture, renewable energy, IoT, artificial intelligence, e-commerce and retail, process intensification, nanotechnology, semiconductor devices and fintech. It also says it is sector agnostic.

Facilities

SRIF describes about 11,000 sq ft of incubation floor space with a landscaped garden and reception area. It lists a conference room with projectors, a video conference room, a meeting room and a pantry. Access to university laboratories and infrastructure is part of what the incubation programme offers, though the site does not name individual labs as SRIF's own.

Scale

The site reports its startup numbers in two ways. One summary says 13 startups have been incubated, while its "Our Startups" list names 30 ventures. The pages give no dates for either, so we do not publish a single count. Both are the centre's own figures.

Who runs it

SRIF is led by a Director and a Chief Executive Officer, supported by a Business Incubator Manager. The university's Vice Chancellor chairs its board. The university also runs an Innovation, Incubation & Linkages office, and a 2025 university regulation sets up pre-incubation centres in its teaching departments, affiliated colleges and recognised institutions within its jurisdiction. That regulation is a rule for the university's own campus network rather than a programme founders apply to directly.

Location and contact

SRIF is on the Sant Gadge Baba Amravati University campus in Amravati, Maharashtra, 444602. Applications and general enquiries go to its CEO inbox. Its website is incubationsgbau.ac.in.