During Global Entrepreneurship Week 2017, local entrepreneurs from Milton Keynes joined disruptive tech startups, corporate innovation leaders, investors, SMEs and business leaders from the UK and India at the Houses of Parliament.
The aim of the event was to promote trade and collaboration between their emerging tech ecosystems at the India Tech Summit hosted by the Europe India Centre for Business and Industry. Co-organised by Sivaleen Associates and Empact Ventures, this curated event aimed to establish an understanding of the major technological challenges and opportunities in India and the UK, and to connect and enable people, companies and communities to work together. Since it was first held in 2012, the EICBI’s summits have engaged more than 2700 delegates from over 1000 companies.
Kosta Mavroulakis, Founder & CEO at Empact Ventures who is the UK Vice Chairman of the EICBI said the summit had come at “a critical time for the UK economy as it faces a crossroads in its relationship with the rest of the world, and bringing together leaders of businesses of all sizes to discuss opportunities for collaboration is an important step towards strengthening the longstanding partnership between India and Britain. Sujit Nair, Chair of the Europe India Centre for Business and Industry went on to add that “the agenda for the summit is structured in way to make these companies aware of these opportunities and to encourage them to invest in India.”
This year’s summit was introduced by Virendra Sharma MP, with other MPs in attendance including Preet Kaur Gill, Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi, Bob Blackman and Ruth Cadbury. “Summits like India Technology Summit at British Parliament help in bringing together various stakeholders who are keen to have a strong relationship between UK and India in one platform and since the summits do attract other members of Parliament and Members of House of Lords, it provides an opportunity for the delegates from specific sectors to discuss their issues with MPs,” Virendra Sharma MP, Chair – Indo British All Party Parliamentary Group. said.
Milton Keynes based entrepreneur, Rakesh Bokinala recently founded Flyero.com, the world’s first airport-to-airport travel assistance service that sees peer-to-peer travel assistance services offered by frequent flyers to co-passengers who require assistance including translating to local language during immigration or navigating through airports during transit amongst others.
Rakesh believes that “the British-India relationship has always complemented each other but with Brexit it will to the greater extend. The skills between these two nations when combined can produce superior results. As with anything else, there are some challenges especially culture, languages and trust that impact the results. However with the advance in technology, open culture and digital initiatives I believe these challenges will fade. There are many Indians settled in the UK while their parents continue to live back home in India. Due to the work commitments many people in the UK are unable to travel to India to visit their parents. Parents who have time to visit their children but are afraid to travel alone due to their age and English not being their first language. We at Flyero are aiming to resolve this issue by helping parents find a travel companion. Our mission is to bring UK and India closer and people living in these counties feel they are not too far away”
Another panelist based in Milton Keynes was Ajay Hari, Director of Logic Shore which provides support for digital transformation projects for large brands and Indian Law Enforcement Agencies and provides on-demand Chief Technology Officer services for startups. He said “Milton Keynes is ideal with its great transport links to London and the Midlands. The Smart City provides a great opportunity for our company to provide services to the plethora of corporates like Jaguar Landrover and Santander, SMEs and startups like DIPSTA in the area. This is in addition to enabling it to leverage its capabilities of inshoring and offshoring models to build brilliant mobile-based end-to-end solutions”.
This is not the first time a local Milton Keynes based business has represented Milton Keynes at one of the EICBI’s summits in Parliament. Last year the organisation held its UK Karnataka Business Meet in November 2016 where Kalyan Chaudrapu, Co-Founder of Qapitol QA attended with his business partner Mohan Panguluri. Qapitol QA is a quality assurance testing form for startups and SMEs with more than 50 staff members based in Bengaluru and with the help of its delivery partner Empact Ventures, the company has picked Milton Keynes as its UK base to supports its expansion. Kalyan feels that “Milton Keynes is the best place to support our ambitions of expanding into the UK thanks to its affordable operational costs, a wealth of support for new businesses, close links to London by train and ability to travel quickly by plane to our European office in Madrid from London Luton Airport”
Other Panelists included corporate technology leaders from the likes of Hays and Pizza Hut; tech startup founders including ClickMechanic, Skignz, E-Fundamentals and Hollabox.com; investment platforms such as Seedrs; and leading agencies including Three Straight Lines, Rarely Impossible and Zealous Digital amongst others.
For further information about the Europe India Centre for Business and Industry’s next summits visit www.eicbi.org
About Europe India Centre for Business & Industry
Europe India Centre for Business and Industry is an independent, non partisan organisation which promotes business opportunities across various sectors in Europe and India. Europe India Centre for Business and Industry was formed with the intention of making European companies aware of the business opportunities in India and vice versa. The mission of the organisation is to promote trade and investment between India and Europe, and to provide a platform for companies and businessmen who wish to become part of the India- Europe trade community. With seasoned professionals at helm, the organisation also provides all the ground support required for companies to expand and flourish in Europe and India.
For more information visit http://www.eicbi.org
About Empact Ventures
Empact Ventures are startup facilitators and super connectors that:
- Design, Deliver & Support Startup Initiatives at a local to international level including investor pitch days, corporate pitch days, tech summits, national campaigns and more
- Support the Growth of Emerging & Funded Tech Startups by acting as their super-connector to advise, support, connect and plug them into the UK startup ecosystem
- Scout for Startups & Tech for investors and corporates looking for specific deal flow to invest in and/or partner with / integrate / become a customer of startups and their technologies
- Support the Expansion of Global Startups & SMEs into the UK, Europe and Globally who are looking to grow their operations, secure new customers and plug-into the startup ecosystem