Global funds should focus on start-ups from small cities- Piyush Goyal

Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal on Friday called upon Global Venture Capital Funds to focus more on Start-ups from Tier 2 and 3 cities. He was chairing the 4th Roundtable with Global Venture Capital Funds, organised by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade as part of the Startup India Innovation Week.  In the meeting it was pointed out that India is home to over 61 thousand recognised Startups spread across 55 industries. It was highlighted that 45 percent of these have emerged from Tier 2 and 3 cities and 45 percent of Startups have at least one Woman Director which is a testimony of diversity, spread and inclusivity of the Indian Startup ecosystem. 
Goyal said that the Government has already taken a number of steps to support the Startups and would do so in the future also. Over 75 Venture Capital fund investors from United States, Japan, Korea, Singapore, and some Global Funds domiciled in India took part in the deliberations. A number of suggestions were also made by the Global Venture Capital funds which could further the investors sentiment in the sector. These funds have a total Assets Under Management (AUM) of more than $30 billion in the Indian Region, according to the Commerce Ministry. The meeting was attended by Anurag Jain, Secretary, DPIIT and major Indian regulators, policymakers, along with global VC funds.