We offer an innovation grant of
₹15 lakhs that will enable you to develop your theory of change and make it work
1:1 hands on mentoring by The/Nudge CSI partners to help you achieve strategic clarity along with focussed support on fundraising
Connect with an awesome peer group, and a network that is interested in your idea and eager to help you to grow
Dedicated mentoring by some of India’s most admired leaders.
Anil Kumar SG is the Founder and CEO of Samunnati. His passion to bring resounding impact in the agri ecosystem led to the establishment of India’s largest agri-tech enterprise, Samunnati. His vision was translated to Samunnati’s mission, which is to create an open agri-network to unlock the Trillion dollar plus potential of Indian agriculture with smallholder farmers at the center of it. Anil has received awards/recognitions from several forums, including the Best Social Entrepreneur in the Global Social Entrepreneurship Programme 2018; the TiE Impact Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2013; Real Leaders Impact Award 2020 (ranked 83 in top 100) and the ET Social Enterprise Start-up award in 2020. Anil is also on the task force for CII on Agri Start-ups and FICCI on Minimizing Food loss and Wastage. Anil has close to three decades of experience in the areas of Rural, Retail and Agri Banking. Anil’s professional journey has lent him an understanding of Indian smallholder farmers. Prior to Samunnati, Anil was the Co-Founder & Trustee of IFMR Trust and the CEO of IFMR Rural Channels. Anil holds a Masters in Management from the Asian Institute of Management, Manila. He also holds a Masters in Business Administration from Symbiosis Institute of Management, Pune and a graduate degree in Humanities from Osmania University, Hyderabad.
Dr Sekhar Bonu is a Senior Fellow at the NITI Aayog. He worked as the Director General of the Development Monitoring and Evaluation Office (DMEO) from April 2019 to June 2022. Before joining NITI Aayog, Dr Bonu worked with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in Manila for 15 years. At ADB, he worked in health, urban infrastructure development and regional cooperation, mainly in South Asia.
Dr Bonu worked in the Indian Administrative Services and served as a civil servant inRajasthan between 1987-2003, among others, as district magistrate, director of primary andsecondary education, and chief executive officer of state-owned enterprises. Dr Sekhar Bonuhas a PhD from Johns Hopkins University and is a Chartered Financial Analyst charter holder.He has a research interest in state capacity building, and outcomes measurements, and haspublished in peer-review journals.
Dr. K. P. Krishnan joined the Karnataka cadre of the IAS in 1983 and went on to serve in various positions in the Government of Karnataka (GoK), Government of India (GoI) and World Bank. He retired from the IAS last year as Secretary Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship. Prior to this, he was Special Secretary, Department of Land Resources, Ministry of Rural Development and Additional Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance. He has also served as Secretary, Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister and Joint Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs. Dr. Krishnan served as Adviser to the Executive Director World Bank. Dr. Krishnan is at present the IEPF Chair Professor in Regulatory Economics at National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER)- one of India's oldest and leading economic think tanks. He is also Chairman of the Experts Committee constituted by the Government of India (GoI) to propose the legal framework for Cross Border Insolvency.
Dr. Susheela Venkataraman is a development professional, and is the Chair of Arogya World India Trust. She is also on the Board of two other NGOs, SGBS Unnati Foundation, and the IIT Alumni Centre Bangalore. Dr. Susheela Venkataraman was the Principal Director of the Asian Development Bank’s (ADB) Office of Information Systems and Technology until 2015. She was responsible for planning, implementing, and maintaining ADB’s communications and information technology platforms and systems as well as advising and evangelizing ICT for Development. Prior to joining the ADB, Dr. Venkataraman was MD of Cisco’s strategy consulting group, where her major area of focus was community empowerment and transformation using ICT. Before that, she was Partner in Coopers and Lybrand/PricewaterhouseCoopers/IBM Global Services in India where she led large scale enterprise transformation engagements in several industries and in the public sector.
Dr. Gopichand is the Founder and CEO of Myelin Foundry and an Independent Director of Bosch India Limited. He is also the Vice President of the IET, Board of Trustees, UK. Until recently, Gopi was the Group Chief Technology Officer and Innovation Head for Tata Group. Previously, as the Chairman and Managing Director of GE India Technology Centre, he helped grow GE’s largest R&D Centre – the John F. Welch Technology Centre.
Non-Executive Chairman, IIBX (India International Bullion Exchange) and FDRVC (Foundation for Development of Rural Value Chains)
Jugal Mohapatra, a post-graduate from Delhi School of Economics, joined Indian Administrative Service (Odisha Cadre) in 1979. Later he also obtained a Master’s degree in Economics from Boston University, USA in 1992. During his career in civil service spanning over 37 years, he has served as Secretary to the Chief Minister, Principal Secretary (Finance), Development Commissioner and Chief Secretary in Odisha Government. He was Secretary in the Department of Fertilisers and Rural Development in Government of India during 2014-16. He is currently the non-executive chairman of the India International Bullion Exchange (IIBX) and Foundation for development of Rural Value Chains (FDRVC).
Lan set up one of India’s first endowment funds, at the Azim Premji Foundation, to sponsor various philanthropic activities in the areas of primary education and related development. He currently manages investments worth ~$21 billion. Lan is an MBA from IIM Lucknow, and has previously served as Chief Strategy Officer and Head of M&A for Wipro Technologies.
Kamakshi has two decades of experience investing in listed equities. She was Senior Vice President at Capital International and has served on the board of Larsen and Toubro Financial Holdings. Since 2013, Kamakshi has been affiliated with Ankur Capital, a venture capital fund for social enterprises. Kamakshi is an alumna of Harvard and UPenn.
Maneesh Dhir heads Technology Strategy at FICO(R). He is also a Partner at Social Venture Partners. Maneesh was formerly head of Apple in India, responsible for growing their business to $1Billion+. He holds an MBA from the Stanford, and is an alumnus of University of California, Los Angeles and IIT, Delhi.
Paresh Parasnis is the former CEO of Piramal Foundation. He has been closely involved in developing innovative solutions for issues that are critical roadblocks towards unlocking India’s economic potential. He has played a significant role in facilitating the Foundation’s four initiatives – Piramal Swasthya, Piramal Sarvajal, Piramal Udgam and Piramal Foundation for Education Leadership. These social projects, funded and nurtured by Piramal Foundation, are doing remarkable work in healthcare, water, livelihood and education sectors. Additionally, he also oversaw other projects such as PURP, Gopikrishna Piramal Memorial Hospital and Annamrita. Prior to joining the Foundation in 2012, he served as the Executive Director & COO of HDFC Standard Life Insurance Limited. Mr. Parasnis is a Chartered Accountant by qualification. His hobbies include listening to Indian classical music and reading.
Raj Gilda is a banker-turned-social entrepreneur. He is the Co-Founder of Lend A Hand India, an NGO focused on providing vocational education in secondary schools in India. Raj has been instrumental in launching an innovative internship program for higher secondary government school students, placing them with small and micro-enterprises across 4 states covering 10,000+ students. He has worked across Asia, Europe and North America in the fields of education, banking, insurance, and IT. Prior to leaving the corporate sector in 2011 to focus full-time on Lend A Hand India, he spent 10 years in New York working with Citibank and Deloitte Consulting. Raj was appointed by the Government of India as a General Body Member of the National Skill Development Agency (NSDA) from 2014-17.
Samit Ghosh is the Founder of Ujjivan Small Finance Bank. He served as the Bank’s Managing Director and CEO till his retirement in November 30th 2019. Prior to Ujjivan, he was a career banker for over 30 years. He started his career with Citibank in 1975 and has also led the launch of retail banking for Standard Chartered Bank in Middle East & South Asia and HDFC Bank.
Sanjay is a Chief Curator at Societal Platform, and Strategic Advisor for EkStep Foundation, eGov Foundation, Mantra4Change, Fundamentum Partnerships and Unleash, to name a few. He is a frequent speaker at the World Economic Forum (Davos). Previously, Sanjay was Chairman of the Board, Infosys Consulting, and CEO for EdgeVerve Systems Limited, an Infosys Company.
Shankar Maruwada is the CEO and Co-founder of EkStep. He was Head of Demand Generation and Marketing for AADHAAR, India’s national identification program. Shankar co-founded Marketics, a pioneering company in data analytics. He is also a startup investor and mentor. He is an Alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad, IIT Kharagpur.
Surendra Kumar Jain (SK) is a co-founder and former Managing Director for Westbridge Capital. Prior to Westbridge, SK was with Sequoia Capital. Earlier, he was co-founder and CEO of MeraNet, and worked at Intel, Motorola and Booz-Allen & Hamilton. SK is an alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad, IIT Delhi and the University of Minnesota.
Sushma Rajagopalan is a Global Leader in the IT Industry and a Venture Capitalist with over 25 years of successful track record in transforming companies. She is a Partner at Rittenhouse Ventures. She is on the boards of WISH Foundation and Ben Franklin Technology Partners. She actively mentors startups and is a mentor with Harvard ilabs and Philadelphia Alliance for Capital and Technologies (PACT). Prior to this, Sushma was MD and CEO for ITC Infotech, a fully owned subsidiary of ITC Ltd. She has also been a partner at LiquidHub (acquired by Cap Gemini) and the Chief Strategy officer at Larsen & Toubro Infotech. Sushma has an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University & a Master’s Degree in Personnel Management from Tata Institute of Social Sciences.
Ujwal Thakar, a banker for 28 years, has held key senior management positions at several leading banks including Standard Chartered Bank, BNP Paribas and Times bank. He has also served as CEO of Pratham, and GiveIndia. Currently, Ujwal Ujwal is advisor to PricewaterhouseCoopers in their BFSI practice and serves on the board of Educate Girls and several other nonprofits.
deadline: 27th september
submit basic details about the problem & solution. shortlisted applicants will be invited to submit detailed proposals.
deadline: 4th october
submit detailed B plan.
shortlisted applicants will be invited for virtual interviews.
week of 12th october
interviews with CSI Partners.
up to 15 orgs selected for incubation.
partners
Application Deadline: 7th May 2023
For queries, please email us at
socent@thenudge.org
No. For The/Nudge Incubator, we prefer an early stage organisation, and require at least one founder to be full-time.
Yes you can.
You may re-apply for The/Nudge Incubator if you meet the eligibility criteria. Please highlight your progress since your last application, to improve your chances of selection.
We’d prefer that you apply to the appropriate program given the maturity of your org (link to who can apply section on home page). During the selection process if we feel you are more suitable for another program, we will suggest moving your application to that program.
Our selection process begins with online applications. Shortlisted applicants will be required to submit a detailed business deck (PPT), followed by interviews with The/Nudge SocEnt team and CSI Partners. Site visits may be conducted for selection.
The shortlisted applicants from online applications will be requested to submit their startup plan in a presentation format. the startup plans should include answers to the following questions:
What problem are you trying to solve?
Why this problem?
What is your solution approach?
Why do you think this will work?
Who are your customers/beneficiaries?
How do you reach them or intend to reach them?
Are there any other nonprofits doing similar work?
List names and list 1 primary reason you are different from them.How would you describe your organization's key achievements till now?
How much money have you raised till now, and how much in the last year?
What are your impact metrics and what is your strategy for the next 1,3,5 years?
What is your operational plan for the next 12 months?
How would you measure your progress? How many full time employees do you have?
Describe your core team members and what each brings to the table.If you had Rs 2 crore funding available over the next 2 years, how would you use it?
Can you redefine your strategy (in Q6) based on the availability of this funding?
We offer
: an innovation grant of upto 15 lakhs
: hands on 1:1 mentoring by a CSI partner and a focussed support on fundraising
: support from portfolio manager
: connects to potential donors and partners: access to like minded alumni network
The deep hands-on support for 9 months includes
: 1-on-1 mentoring by a CSI partner for a period of 6 months through virtual interactions every two weeks. This helps entrepreneurs achieve strategic clarity and refine their business model.
: focussed support on fundraising. this helps entrepreneurs achieve clarity on your fundraising strategy and become fundraising ready.
: 1-on-1 weekly support by the SocEnt portfolio manager, as a thought partner, and skin-in-the-game collaborator in the success of their incubatees.
: face-to-face as well as virtual immersion events, usually held in Bangalore during the various bootcamps. these are designed to help entrepreneurs to meet fellow cohort members, immerse in The/Nudge CSI DNA through interactions with some of India’s most admired leaders, forge a bond with the The/Nudge SocEnt portfolio manager, and the The/Nudge CSI Partner assigned to be their mentor and most importantly, to get ready to pitch and fundraise.
While mentoring will happen remotely over telephone / video chat, founders and leadership teams will be required to attend bootcamps in person. These will be opportunities for face-to-face interactions with mentors, and will be held in Bangalore.
During the period of support, you will be paired with one of the CSI Partners as your strategic mentor, while members of your core team will be introduced to mentors in their own functional areas. The objective of this engagement is to help you achieve key milestones like attaining product market fit, getting the first rounds of funding, building a brand, hiring your team etc. in an accelerated manner. Your Partner and mentors will coach you, as well as open doors for you by connecting you to individuals and organizations that can help you in your mission. As field visits are a great way to get the right context, we also encourage you to engage your Partner / mentors to visit your customers with you.
The Accelerator portfolio manager will establish (through face to face meetings for pitching your organisation’s work) connects with CSR leaders and representatives of global and domestic philanthropic foundations. In parallel, we will help you with your fundraising strategy and in refining your pitch.
Innovation grant is to help you build a minimum viable product for your idea. This involves costs of experimentation: refining your model based on the interaction with your first beneficiaries and visible impact, costs of building capacity: hiring and training early team members, product development, and any other costs compliant with CSR law.
We believe technology has the power to accelerate social development, as tech-enabled products and services can help scale ideas much faster and at an affordable rate. We welcome nonprofits that leverage technology in their product, service or outreach, to bring about social change.
We offer an innovation grant of
₹15 lakhs that will enable you to develop your theory of change and make it work
1:1 hands on mentoring by The/Nudge CSI partners to help you achieve strategic clarity along with focussed support on fundraising
Connect with an awesome peer group, and a network that is interested in your idea and eager to help you to grow
Dedicated mentoring by some of India’s most admired leaders.
Application Deadline: 7th May 2023
For queries, please email us at
socent@thenudge.org
No. For The/Nudge Incubator, we prefer an early stage organisation, and require at least one founder to be full-time.
Yes you can.
You may re-apply for The/Nudge Incubator if you meet the eligibility criteria. Please highlight your progress since your last application, to improve your chances of selection.
We’d prefer that you apply to the appropriate program given the maturity of your org (link to who can apply section on home page). During the selection process if we feel you are more suitable for another program, we will suggest moving your application to that program.
Our selection process begins with online applications. Shortlisted applicants will be required to submit a detailed business deck (PPT), followed by interviews with The/Nudge SocEnt team and CSI Partners. Site visits may be conducted for selection.
The shortlisted applicants from online applications will be requested to submit their startup plan in a presentation format. the startup plans should include answers to the following questions:
What problem are you trying to solve?
Why this problem?
What is your solution approach?
Why do you think this will work?
Who are your customers/beneficiaries?
How do you reach them or intend to reach them?
Are there any other nonprofits doing similar work?
List names and list 1 primary reason you are different from them.How would you describe your organization's key achievements till now?
How much money have you raised till now, and how much in the last year?
What are your impact metrics and what is your strategy for the next 1,3,5 years?
What is your operational plan for the next 12 months?
How would you measure your progress? How many full time employees do you have?
Describe your core team members and what each brings to the table.If you had Rs 2 crore funding available over the next 2 years, how would you use it?
Can you redefine your strategy (in Q6) based on the availability of this funding?
We offer
: an innovation grant of upto 15 lakhs
: hands on 1:1 mentoring by a CSI partner and a focussed support on fundraising
: support from portfolio manager
: connects to potential donors and partners: access to like minded alumni network
The deep hands-on support for 9 months includes
: 1-on-1 mentoring by a CSI partner for a period of 6 months through virtual interactions every two weeks. This helps entrepreneurs achieve strategic clarity and refine their business model.
: focussed support on fundraising. this helps entrepreneurs achieve clarity on your fundraising strategy and become fundraising ready.
: 1-on-1 weekly support by the SocEnt portfolio manager, as a thought partner, and skin-in-the-game collaborator in the success of their incubatees.
: face-to-face as well as virtual immersion events, usually held in Bangalore during the various bootcamps. these are designed to help entrepreneurs to meet fellow cohort members, immerse in The/Nudge CSI DNA through interactions with some of India’s most admired leaders, forge a bond with the The/Nudge SocEnt portfolio manager, and the The/Nudge CSI Partner assigned to be their mentor and most importantly, to get ready to pitch and fundraise.
While mentoring will happen remotely over telephone / video chat, founders and leadership teams will be required to attend bootcamps in person. These will be opportunities for face-to-face interactions with mentors, and will be held in Bangalore.
During the period of support, you will be paired with one of the CSI Partners as your strategic mentor, while members of your core team will be introduced to mentors in their own functional areas. The objective of this engagement is to help you achieve key milestones like attaining product market fit, getting the first rounds of funding, building a brand, hiring your team etc. in an accelerated manner. Your Partner and mentors will coach you, as well as open doors for you by connecting you to individuals and organizations that can help you in your mission. As field visits are a great way to get the right context, we also encourage you to engage your Partner / mentors to visit your customers with you.
The Accelerator portfolio manager will establish (through face to face meetings for pitching your organisation’s work) connects with CSR leaders and representatives of global and domestic philanthropic foundations. In parallel, we will help you with your fundraising strategy and in refining your pitch.
Innovation grant is to help you build a minimum viable product for your idea. This involves costs of experimentation: refining your model based on the interaction with your first beneficiaries and visible impact, costs of building capacity: hiring and training early team members, product development, and any other costs compliant with CSR law.
We believe technology has the power to accelerate social development, as tech-enabled products and services can help scale ideas much faster and at an affordable rate. We welcome nonprofits that leverage technology in their product, service or outreach, to bring about social change.
