TC-I Tidbits

Your daily dose of headlines:

Technology: Trak.in reports that a DesiWiki will help Indian start ups to increase their knowledge base on the technical aspects of starting a new venture.
Education: In order to encourage students to stay in school, the government approved a merit scholarship that will award deserving students of lower income sections with Rs [...]

SMEs adaptability = ideal conduit to BoP

In a post on Nextbillion.net yesterday, Derek Newberry, wrote a great piece on how SMEs serve as an ideal player in modifying technologies and products to reach the BoP. He starts off by recognizing the recent interest by large multinational corporations (MNCs) in serving the bottom billion, but then pushes forth the inquiry about the [...]

SME News Portal

TradeIndia launched a news portal targeted for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that will be a “one-stop information library” for the sector.
The entire business module of Tradeindia revolves around the pledge to help SMEs build a self-reliant India. To keep SMEs informed on the recent policy changes, international trends and how these changes could affect [...]

Op-Ed: Microfinance revisited and its role in reaching the missing middle

Two weeks ago I wrote about James Surowiecki’s article in the New Yorker that brought forward the inherent limitations of microfinance to actually generate a substantial number of jobs in a developing country. Since then it seems as if I was not the only one (surprise surprise) to take notice of Surowieki’s conclusions and it [...]

DBS Bank Offers Social Enterprise Products, Expands in India

DBS Bank, which is based in Singapore, is hoping to expand in India. With branches currently in New Delhi and Mumbai, the bank offers Enterprise Banking to support small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in India. An interesting program is the new DBS Social Enterprise Special Package, which is currently available in Singapore:

The `DBS’ Social Enterprise [...]

Forbes Magazine: Dearth of innovative SMEs not from lack of $, but lack of trained entrepreneurs

Studies have estimated that over $1 billion in possible venture capital financing has been infused into India in 2007. Instead of spurring a wave of innovative startups, however, this influx in capital has remained just that — surplus of capital. Unlike Africa or parts of Eastern Europe, the lack of wide scale SMEs in India [...]

Op-Ed: Microeffect of Microfinance

A recent article in the New Yorker echoed sentiments expressed by many venture capitalists that have begun to shift their focus on the developing world and BoP markets that microfinance, while an amazing concept for enable entrepreneurs, cannot in itself lift countries out of poverty. James Surowiecki writes:
Microloans are often used to “smooth consumption”—tiding a [...]

Call for Papers and Special Issue on Entrepreneurship

Inderscience news posted on two things:
Call for papers: Realigning the Innovation-Entrepreneurship Interface
While this blend between entrepreneurship and innovation is achievable at both the corporate enterprise and the small-to-medium enterprise (SME) levels, there are some indications that the cocktail has become poisonous and too dangerous for consumption. This is largely based on the recent practices of [...]

New Service Marketplace for SMEs from creators of LimeWire

LimeExchange is a new service marketplace for SMEs in India that will let them bid for free on service contracts from providers. Lime Spot, the company that also started LimeWire, hopes to leverage its global platform to allow SMEs in India compete for contracts all over the world.
PluGGd.in writes that
LimeExchange provides buyers with tools to [...]

Google SMEs: Internet search company to provide capital to small and medium size businesses in India

One of the ongoing issues that appears to be hindering development in countries like India is the lack of equity based funding for small and medium sized businesses. These entities, which usually are too large to be benefited from a microloan but too small to have the necessary financials to secure corporate debt or private [...]