Sustainability, innovation and entrepreneurship are buzz words heard everywhere, including in business, academia and social circuits. All these elements came together at a reception hosted by my colleague Tom Wells last month. About 25 representatives from the Bangalore cleantech community shared their innovative ideas in the cleantech space at this informal gathering. The entrepreneurial and ecological spirit of Bangalore was very evident and the discussion was flowing with opportunities for collaboration between two great innovation clusters, Bangalore and Cambridge
The trigger for the gathering, which was co-hosted with the TiE SIG-Cleantech, was the visit of Dr. Tony Raven, a serial entrepreneur and CEO of Cambridge Enterprise – an organization with the mandate to commercialise university technologies and innovations, along with Dr. Shai Vyakaranam, Director of Center for Entrepreneurial Learning, University of Cambridge. Their visit to Bangalore was a follow-up of a delegation from Bangalore who visited Cambridge to understand the research, innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystem at Cambridge. Cleantech was a focus area of the visit. A short report can be found here.
To give you a flavour, the Bangalore companies included both small and large, R&D and technology intensive, angel investors and consultants. These included Terra Firma Biotechnologies, Energram, Prakruti Hydro Labs, SunMoksha, Enzen, Kotak Power, New Venture India, PRDC – Smart Grid, I2India, Kalkitech, Cleantech Consultants, Trueskill Energen and Dawn Consulting.
Tony and Shai shared some thoughts on why the Cambridge University innovation ecosystem works as well as it does at commercialising research and on the opportunities they believe it offers for working with the Bangalore cleantech ecosystem. A special mention has to be made of Dr. Ashok Das, Sampath Kumar and S R Gopalan, for their help in providing necessary support and spirit for the gathering and also TiE Bangalore for co-hosting the event.
Some of the ideas for collaborations will be taken forward in September when Cambridge Vice-Chancellor Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz will lead a delegation to Bangalore comprising of scientists, entrepreneurs and Cambridge Cleantech representatives. A broader conversation will be held at the Indian Institute of Science where Cambridge University and Indian Institute of Science will co-host an event called Science, Innovation and Entrepreneurship on 13 September. If you are keen to attend this programme, do email me on Sunil Kumar. I hope that the Cambridge visit will lay a stronger foundation for successful translation of ideas into action and provide greater opportunities for collaboration between both the cities.