Incubation centers are the companies or institutes which support budding entrepreneurs or individuals with innovative business ideas.
Engineering colleges in India have also started implementing this concept in college campus to support students having creative business ideas.
Some of the characteristics of incubator in an engineering college which makes it an important part of the institute include:
Entrepreneurship – incubation centers always aim to develop a sense of entrepreneurship among students. Students also understand all aspects of business at pilot stage of the project before starting a full-fledged firm.
Resources – Students receive most of the resources for the business through incubation centre like capital and office area etc.
Potential customers – Students starting a business in incubation center of the college already have numerous potential customers in the form of other students of the college.
Rise of employment – Businesses operating through incubation centers also result in hiring of other students of the college thereby increasing the employment.
Mentorship – Several colleges provide mentors to the students which can guide them through various stages of the business. This results in making the business proposal more feasible with minimum risks.
Venture capitalists – Students can also use incubation centers for generating heavy funds from venture capitalists and angel investors.
Benefit to researchers – Researchers can also be assured that their commercially realistic technology can drive good returns by support of colleges. It makes engineering students to be more innovative during their course period.
Internship – students can also use their small business venture for representing it as the project for the internship required as a part of their curriculum.
Engineering colleges themselves can also obtain multiple benefits by installing incubation centers in the campus. Some of the benefits include:
- Incubation centers may benefit in commercialization of various research projects taking place in the college. Faculty and staff members can also derive benefit from their commercial ideas.
- Successful entrepreneurs from incubation centers will result in enhancement of college reputation.
- Various multinational companies may also invest in some pilot projects which have feasible returns.
Some basic ideas which students can use to start a business with the support of incubation center –
Publication house – students can start a monthly or bi-monthly engineering based magazine which may comprise recent updates from technology world. They can also include special sections featuring developments from college campus.
Website development company– Engineering students with website designing and development skills can take support of incubation center to convert it into a successful web designing startup.
Robotics workshop – Students from engineering colleges having a high competency of robotics technology can start providing workshops to other students which have an aptitude for this technology.
Intra-college websites – Students can also start websites which are intra-college in nature like intra-college social networking portal, job portal and online engineering tutorials etc.
Book rentals – students can start a book rental business at small scale in which they can provide books on rent to other engineering college students.
With all these benefits, an incubation center in engineering college will indeed help students in developing better future for themselves and the nation!