Project Mudra wins Conquest 2016, the international startup challenge by BITS Pilani

BITS Pilani organised Conquest 2016, an international startup challenge in association with DCB Bank. The competition concluded this Sunday at ITC Maurya, New Delhi as ‘Project Mudra’ bagged the top spot followed by ‘Comfort Products’. The winning project, ‘Project Mudra’ aimed at bringing a technology-based intervention to provide Braille literacy. In addition to that, it also aimed at providing K-12 lessons for the blind. The runner up ‘Comfort Products’ manufactured small portable home appliances like ‘SwiftChill’, a portable device that can chill any beverage in less than 5 minutes. The winner was awarded Rs 2 lakh while the runner-up bagged Rs 1 lakh, equity-less cash funding. BITS Pilani invited Shri R Chandrasekhar, the current president of NASSCOM as the chief guest of the event. He addressed everyone present by quoting his journey from being an IAS officer to the President of NASSCOM. The competition saw close to 12oo applications for the competition this year. The application round was followed by a month-long analysis of the applicant startups on how their revenue system worked, market traction and other parameters to shortlist top 50 startups. These 50 shortlisted startups attended one of the three networking sessions held in Mumbai, New Delhi and Bengaluru. The network session has mentors share expert opinion on fundraising, product management and customer acquisition. 10 startups were selected for the Grand Finale out of the 50 shortlisted startups. [caption id=“attachment_332616” align=“aligncenter” width=“640”]  Panel Discussion- 1. Image Credit: Conquest 2016[/caption] The Grand Finale saw the top 10 startups pitching to investors from over 25 investment firms along with two panel discussions. The first panel discussed basics of talent hiring as well as retaining the hired talent while the second panel discussed about common issues faced and how to resolve them. Dhairik Fuletra said, “We feel delighted to see the culmination of yearlong hard work end on such a high note in the presence of investors, entrepreneurs and students joining in from across the nation. With the evolving Indian startup ecosystem, we have reinvented Conquest such that it delivers a perfect launchpad to emerging startups with funding, mentoring and broad networking opportunities with the key players all under one roof.”