Key Learnings from Sweden-India Startup Matchday 2021

The first edition of Sweden-India Startup Matchday 2021 took place on 12th October 2021 between 5 Indian giant corporates, 24 Swedish tech startups and in a total of 37 matchmaking meetings during 4 hours. The Sweden-India Startup Matchday was organized by Ignite Sweden together with NASSCOM Center of Excellence, Business Sweden, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), the Embassy of Sweden in New Delhi, the Swedish Institute, Invest India and the Swedish-India Business Council. It was funded by Vinnova – Sweden’s Innovation Agency as part of the Sweden-India Innovation Initiative and the International Innovation Initiative, a platform to strengthen Sweden’s strategic promotion of innovation in each of these countries.

Collaboration is Key to Successfully Achieving Goals and Missions

In this Matchday we have seen some of the best partners joining the initiative bringing knowledge, experience and drive. When it comes to corporates and startups, we have seen an immense curiosity from both side and an interest of exploring opportunities. It is not easy for a startup to get the right connection at the right corporate, key people that can take a decision of doing commercial pilots. To bring the corporates with the right people to the table makes everything easier for startups, especially when we understand the clear needs and challenges of the corporates with a clear process of matching them together. For the corporates it is always of priority to find the right technologies, innovations and solutions that can solve future challenges that they are facing.

We at Ignite Sweden believe that collaboration is key for getting things done. When people gather around one challenge and joining forces, you get the force and power for achieving goals. And it has never been as important as now to even strengthen the collaboration between countries for greater good.

It is inspiring to see the collaboration between Sweden and India. Personally I see so much engagement and commitment between the countries. In this Matchday, we at Ignite Sweden are happy to contribute to strengthen it even more. I see many possibilities in even doing more between our both countries. India is indeed an exciting country with so many possibilities, a frontrunner with a complexity of finding the right connections in. This is where all partners come in. Sweden with its deeptech startups and innovation ecosystem on top of Global Innovation Index with a frontrunner position of bringing excellent startups to a global arena. In this case, we think it is also vice versa in a perspective of Sweden and India.

Sustainability have been one of our key areas to work with, with the forces and challenges of climate change. We see that collaboration between our countries, where we bring the right solutions and innovations together with corporates that are the ones of creating the possibilities is one area to work on. We are facing one of our biggest challenges ever regarding climate change and we need to both work with reducing C02-emissions, contribute to the transition of a greener and more sustainable society. The sense of urgency is important and getting solutions implemented for a sustainable tomorrow, for future generations is a common goal for us all. That is also why we focused this matchmaking on sustainability and smart cities.

Our Key Takeaways from Sweden-India Startup Matchday Are:

• We need to strengthen the collaboration between India and Sweden. We can do more in the long-term in the matter of connecting startups with corporates and public sector.
• Collaboration is key in getting things done and achieving goals. We could see that clearly in the matchmaking. Thanks to all partners that contributed to a successful Sweden-India Startup Matchday 2021.
• Startups from both countries are on high priority and can solve our future challenges
• This can only be made together with corporates, public sector & government together with startups.
• We know startup-corporate collaboration is also complicated and it takes time, that is why we all need to contribute from our different missions.
• We see interest from both sides, from both corporates from India and Swedish tech startups.
• It is always important to understand the different business cultures and the opportunities in both countries.

Blog post written by Sasan Shaba and published by the Office of Science and Innovation in New Delhi.