Mumbai based media startup incubator, MEHUB kick-starts its operations by collaborating with Venture Catalysts, India’s leading early stage Angel Investor network for startups. The collaboration is aimed to bring investment and growth expertise for the potential portfolio companies that the pioneering incubator MEHUB will take under its wings. The deal comes close on the heels of MEHUB setting up its robust infrastructure at the nerve centre of the entertainment industry in Mumbai. As part of this announcement, it is also joining hands with JPIN, which runs a Media & Entertainment Tech Venture Capital Fund and an investment platform in London, UK and is building the largest Euro-Asia investment and growth corridor with Venture Catalysts to help startups grow and scale internationally.
MEHUB is a start-up incubation outfit which will identify and reach out to start ups operating in the space of technology driven Media & Entertainment & Edutech and offer them an environment conducive to growth comprising infrastructure, professional consulting, finance and business opportunities aligned to guaranteed expansion. In the very year of its inception, MEHUB targets to identify and incubate 20 startups within the identified space. Once success stories come to fruition, the company will scale up its operations to take on a fresh batch of start-ups under its wings.
The company boasts of sound infrastructure and forging gainful associations with professionals within the industry and across spectrum which the identified start-ups can leverage to their advantage. The company is also on its way to construct an advisory board with celebrated names from the industry who would add immense value to MEHUB mentored companies. Apart from a direct inroad to Venture Catalyst, MEHUB will also make various funding options available to its roster of companies through the core team’s pre-existing network of long term relationships within the finance sector and investor community.
Talking about the inception, Nidhish Mehrotra, Co-Founder, MEHUB said, “ Media & Entertainment industry in around INR 95 thousand crore & with so many platforms entering into the Indian market like Netflix, Amazon, Jio, Hotstar etc, there will be a level playing field for content creators, producers, & technology driven companies like VFX, Virtual Reality etc. We are poised to witness a content boom, yet there are no players in the market which is ready to cater to this unprecedented surge of demand. We have done a prolonged market research to understand this need gap hence MEHUB is born. The founders come from a diverse background and will be further padded up by an advisory board of stalwarts, so we are well placed to lead the identified star-tups to success”.
Adding to Nidhish’s statement, Varun Mathur, Co-Founder, MEHUB, stated, “While we are experiencing content boom on various platforms there is a dearth of steady supply. This is one industry where entrepreneurship comes very naturally; the nature of the industry is such. I wanted to harness this force and marry it with the market dynamics. MEHUB is a well researched venture where we are committed to not only grow businesses but raise budding entrepreneurs. Talent is a word used to describe the creative workforce in the industry but we at MEHUB believe that the indigenous outfits and entrepreneurs scattered throughout the industry can add immense value and expand the industry at multiple levels.
Nayan Gala – Co-founder JPIN & Managing Partner, Venture Catalysts, London said, “The entertainment industry needs a centralized ecosystem considering the higher number of variables present in it as compared to other segments. Being determined by qualitative variables rather than quantitative ones, entrepreneurs in this category need more mentoring and handholding than others. Through MEHUB’s dedicated efforts and our strong global network, we are ready to facilitate the portfolio companies and high-potential entrepreneurs to make India a desired destination for entertainment focused businesses,
Anuj Golecha – Co-founder, Venture Catalysts said, “India has a thriving entertainment industry and probably the largest consumer market. The steady rise of OTT platforms, web-based content driven by smartphone consumption, falling data costs have come together to make entertainment one of the most lucrative avenues at the moment. Through our infrastructure and MEHUB’s expertise and insights on industry specific operations, the association has set the ball rolling on the holistic enablement of enterprises in these domain,
Apart from providing infrastructure, consulting and funding, MEHUB will lay equal stress on learning and development. It will make relevant workshops available to the roster companies to participate and draw up. The state – of- the-art workshops by stalwarts from the industry puts MEHUB in a frontrunner position within the space as these quality workshops and master classes are designed to resolve business issues and assure growth.
