Totalstart Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Developers

TotalStart Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Developers is a Section 8 not-for-profit company with a focus on establishing entrepreneurial ecosystems to sustainably nurture and develop Read moreindigenous entrepreneurs and enterprises in regions of the world that are less developed in terms of entrepreneurship. The organization is connected with resources from entrepreneurially developed regions, operating in domain-specific business areas relevant to the respective regions. Conceived and established in 2002 at the StarterZentrum of the University of Saarland, Saarbruecken, Germany, TotalStart currently boasts a strength of over 200 Direct/Indirect or Co-Founding Full-Time Equivalents (FTEs) in its incubated, co-incubated, co-created, and mentored companies. The organization's mission is to support, encourage, and safeguard the interests of start-ups by offering education, training, guidance, mentoring, learning, research, marketing, advisory services – including legal, administrative, and financial aspects – and connections to industry associations, business leaders, relevant corporate entities, government organizations, and financing agencies for incubatees/mentees. The organization also strives to provide and procure necessary physical, IT, administrative, financial, legal, HR, and sales & marketing infrastructure for the same. TotalStart Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Developers has been established on the foundation of three key premises. Premise 1: The bedrock of the nation resides in the rural and district heartlands. Premise 2: The nation's foundation is constructed by micro and small enterprises, scalable self-help groups (SHGs), and industrial and agricultural cooperatives, which provide the socio-economic baseline for the country's stability, growth, and widespread employment and engagement. Premise 3: The country's foundation can only be robustly built if wealth is generated by the underprivileged community for the underprivileged community. In light of these three premises, TotalStart launched its mission. Mission: "Fostering Entrepreneurship in the Underdeveloped Regions and the Underprivileged Communities" of the country through a structured engagement process. It commenced with two states, Sikkim and West Bengal, with intense focus from 2010 to 2014. Based on its learnings, the organisation evolved its National Flagship Program 1: "Incubating and Scaling Micro & Small, Rural and District Level Entrepreneurs" National Flagship Program 2: "Incubating and Scaling Underprivileged Community Enterprises" These programs are currently operational in 25 Regional District Hubs (an RDH consists of 3 or 4 districts in a state) across 12+ states, at varying levels of engagement, depending on budget availability and the state's focus for the year. The national program is primarily funded by TotalStart's founding members and some select exceptional support through CSR funding. The journey of the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Builder, TotalStart, has been as challenging as that of its beneficiaries – the micro and small enterprises at the rural and district levels. However, the passion and dedication ingrained in the organisation's DNA, its founding members, and its Chief Visionary and Chief Catalyst, Dr Suryanil Ghosh, have propelled it forward. Despite facing numerous obstacles with minimal support, the unwavering spirit of "engaging and mentoring towards scaling rural and district enterprises" has persisted and grown stronger every year.

TotalStart's mission is 'Fostering Entrepreneurship in the Underdeveloped Regions and for the Underprivileged Communities' with the goal of creating wealth by the underprivileged for the underprivileged.

Key milestones include incubation in Germany in 2002, creation of TotalStart initiative in 2010, legal formation as a Section 8 company in 2014, and ongoing community enterprise projects across 12 states since 2014.

TotalStart has engaged in focused scalable community enterprise projects across 4 eastern and 8 north eastern states of India since 2014.

TotalStart's mission is 'Fostering Entrepreneurship in the Underdeveloped Regions and for the Underprivileged Communities' with the goal of creating wealth by the underprivileged for the underprivileged.