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9 Years of Start-up India: Empowering Innovation

National Start-up Day is celebrated every year on January 16th.

January 18, 2025 | Team Brydgework

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On 16th January 2025, India celebrated the 9 years of the completion of the Start-up India Scheme. On this occasion, the Prime Minister of India Shri. Narendra Modi shared a post on X through his handle, acknowledging the impact of the Start-up India Scheme.

Launched on 16th January 2016, the Scheme is an ambitious initiative to boost India’s start-up ecosystem through government support in funding, compliance, and networking with relevant stakeholders. The scheme aimed to empower start-ups in the country to grow through innovation and design. 

Rooted in indigenous innovation and fostering inclusivity across regions and sectors, the Indian startup ecosystem has achieved a remarkable milestone with the creation of over 1,57,000 startups. This thriving ecosystem continues to shape its journey, driving impactful growth and transformation.

Today, India stands as the 3rd largest start-up ecosystem in the world, with the sector growing by 15% on a year-on-year basis. This growth is also experiencing diversity, with women entrepreneurs constituting 14% of the total start-ups, up from 10% and 11% in the two preceding years respectively. The sector is estimated to create over 40,000 new jobs, taking the total growth of job opportunities to about 1.7 lakhs. 

Salient Features of the Start-up India Scheme

The Start-up India scheme is a comprehensive programme that addresses several issues that start-ups face to empower their establishment and growth. These include simplification and handholding initiatives such as self-certification for selected regulations, legal support for the patent process to encourage innovation protection through expediting the issue process and subsidising the patent registration fees, relaxed norms for public procurement to allow start-ups to participate in government procurement drives, and provisions for faster exit for start-ups. 

Talking about the financial support aspects of the programme, the scheme offers various tax exemptions to start-ups, such as a tax holiday for the first 3 years and exemption from capital gains tax. In addition, the scheme also provides for a credit guarantee fund for start-ups that offers collateral-free loans to eligible entities. 

Finally, the scheme fosters industry-academia collaborations through start-up fests that provide a platform for start-ups to showcase their innovations and connect with relevant stakeholders such as investors, etc. It also involved the setting up of 7 research parks in the country based on the model of the Research Part at the Indian Institute of Management, Madras. Udyamotsav 2025, also called National Start-up Day, is another initiative to encourage the youth of the country to come up with innovative solutions to generate profits by addressing the problems of society. It was held on the same day, that is, 16th January 2025, and over 300 start-ups from all across the country pitched their ideas before investors.

To learn more about the Start-up India Scheme, click here. If you wish to register your business as a start-up, Brydgework Consultants can streamline the startup registration process for your enterprise by taking care of all formalities, including the preparation of pitch decks/proof of concept. Visit our Business Setup and Nurture Services page to learn more.