Desert storm: startups mobilize for BITS Pilani Conquest, India’s largest student-run pitch-fest

Pilani is located at the edge of the Thar desert, but it’s a fertile ground for green shoots of innovation. Many of these sprout in the Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership (CEL) at BITS Pilani, one of India’s top tech universities.

BITS CEL has a project called Conquest, which is now more like a banyan tree, spreading out over a larger startup ecosystem. It began as a business plan competition way back in 2004 and grew into a pitch-fest for startups, one of the biggest such events to be run by students.

The runner-up of the last edition of Conquest in 2013 – iTraveller from Bangalore – raised US$1 million in series A funding just a couple of months back. This year’s Conquest aims to reach out to second- and third-tier cities in India that are also seeing startup activity. “Conquest 2015 will be more like a conclave, with two months of mentoring sessions leading up to the pitching rounds in front of the top investors in India,” says Devanshi Kotak, a student of electronics and instrumentation, who handles the marketing for Conquest. More than 50 partners will do the mentoring in five cities across India: Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, and Hyderabad.

Kotak says that with sponsorship from DCB Bank and others, as well as support from BITSAA – a global BITS Pilani alumni network – the resource pool for the finalists in the form of awards, cloud computing credits, and other such goodies will bust previous records. The last edition had a pool of US$1 million for startups. What she likes in particular is a new social entrepreneurship award.

Conquest 2015 also has a more streamlined application process through a tie-up with Applyifi, a newly launched platform for startups to make online pitch-decks for investors. Registrations have already begun and the last date for applyifying is May 1. Fifty startups will be shortlisted by June 15 for the pitching rounds.

It’s an international competition open to startups from anywhere, provided they’re registered after January 1, 2013, or still at the idea stage. You can apply here.