Sri Sivasubramaniya Nadar College of Engineering

Choosing the right programme

• Ideas without a working prototype: start with the three-month iFactor pre-incubation.
• Startups that have reached a proof of concept: apply to Elevate, the incubation programme.
• Teams with a product in the market: look at Propel, which covers Engage for market access and Ascend for fundraising.

How selection works

• The incubator process begins with a public call for applications, followed by an initial screening, a virtual interview, a technical screening and a final board evaluation.
• Incubation screening expects at least a proof of concept, with prototypes or MVPs as an advantage.
• Each stage has a minimum score, and the team may use judgement beyond the score.

What reviewers look for

• A clear problem and a solution that answers it.
• Technical feasibility and readiness of the technology.
• A team with complementary technical and business skills.
• Willingness to work with mentors and act on feedback.

SSN Incubation Foundation, known as SSN iFound, is a not-for-profit company registered under Section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013. It is hosted by SSN College of Engineering on the SSN campus at Kalavakkam, Chennai, and it helps students, faculty and early-stage founders turn technology ideas into products and businesses.

How the programmes work

SSN iFound runs in stages. A three-month pre-incubation programme, called iFactor, helps an idea become a validated concept and a minimum viable product. Startups that reach a proof of concept can apply to Elevate, a two-year incubation programme that adds technical and business mentoring, infrastructure, funding routes and market connections. Once a company is past the build stage, the Propel track offers market access through Engage and fundraising readiness through Ascend.

The foundation also acts as an accredited incubator under the Startup India Seed Fund Scheme, a Government of India scheme run by DPIIT, which provides equity-free prototype grants and later debt-based funding to early-stage startups. Separately, SSN iFound is the knowledge partner for the Innovation Voucher Program run by the Entrepreneurship Development and Innovation Institute of Tamil Nadu, helping applicants prepare their applications and build their prototypes.

Who can apply

Incubation applications open through a public call for applications. Startups send a detailed application form and a pitch deck. Pre-incubation is open to engineering students and to people from outside the college. Students in their third year and above can also apply to the Plant Lipids Student Entrepreneurship Program, an industry-sponsored pre-incubation track in which teams work on the sponsor's problem statements.

Facilities

The product development space has 3D printers, embedded systems development kits and diagnostic instruments for building prototypes. Startups can also use a co-working space with office amenities and high-speed internet, along with meeting rooms and conference rooms. Startups may use the college's research centres and laboratories, and the foundation's business support tools include incubation management software, productivity suites, and simulation software.

Scale

The foundation reports having nurtured 35 or more incubated ventures. Its team pages give different figures for startup leads and for the funding its startups have raised, so those figures are not published here.

Who runs it

T S Giridharan became chief executive of SSN Incubation Foundation in July 2023. The foundation draws on in-house technical mentors from the college's engineering departments and on business and domain mentors from partner networks including TiE Chennai, the IIT Madras Entrepreneurship Forum, Keiretsu Forum and Headstart.

Location

The address is Rajiv Gandhi Salai (OMR), Kalavakkam, Chennai 603 110. The foundation's contact details are on its website at ssnifound.in.