<div><em>Elsys is the first of the ten start-ups picked up by the government, to solve real life problems for India, writes <strong>Vishal Krishna</strong></em></div><div> </div><div>Around 10 million passenger cars have been added on the roads since 2010 and none of them have an accident management system. According to the Department of Transportation, there are 1.2 million Indians who have lost their lives in the last decade due to accidents. Many of those deaths could have been avoided provided information reached emergency services on time.</div><div> </div><div>The government could not crack it and hence they have decided that using technology was the way forward and startups could be their saviours in stopping road accidents. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has requested startups to make software solutions and devices that can solve Indian problems. The new star-tup initiative, run by the Indian Electronics and Semiconductor Association and the Software Technology Park of India, is intended for that purpose.</div><div> </div><div>Elsys, a startup that provides emergency accident assist services, through its data management platform "Raksha" is all set to be the first startup to be part of the government run Electropreneur park. The device SafeDrive can be retrofitted into cars and bikes and on massive impact, the device triggers phone calls to an ambulance service in the vicinity, dials next of kin and shows exact location of the accident. On top of that, the data collects information on driving habits and can also allow video capture accident or impact. "We built the system to make sure that an ambulance reaches the victim in less than an hour," says Prasad Pillai, co-founder of the company. He adds that he had built this system after a near fatal experience. The Raksha platform collects data from vehicles across the country and presents the data to the government to continuously improve transport services and safety.</div><div> </div><div>Elsys is the first of the ten startups picked up by the government, to solve real world problems for India. A few months ago, Ashok Chandak, Chairman of the IESA, along with the folks from the Software Technology park of India, picked up startups to solve problems such as road safety, accident management, public services information management, access to education and healthcare with the use of smart devices. The government received 240 applications of which 160 were shortlisted and 10 selected. Sources say that each start up will receive around Rs 30 lakh to Rs 60 lakh of funding to incubate their ideas and also create market access for commercial viability.</div><div> </div><div>Elsys hopes to use this experience to scale up to 100,000 customers in one year. Their go to market model is B2B2C; the founders will connect with automobile companies to retrofit the product into cars or will allow consumers to buy directly off the Elsys website. They plan to sell to state governments too as their product could be used in state transport department vehicles. The platform can even collect on board diagnostic data. There is also a case for hospitals and insurance companies to work with data collected from Elsys to create a network for nationwide road safety. </div><div> </div><div>Currently, Elsys is self funded and the company plans to raise a seed around by the end of three months. "We hope to raise our round quickly because the interest in this emergency management product needs us to scale up manufacturing the device," says Jayanth Jagadeesh, co-founder of Elsys. His company competes with the likes of FIN, a bluetooth-based gesture based infotainment management system, which has raised $1 million from Kalaari Capital, and CarIQ, a car on board diagnostics system, which has raised $1 million from Snow Leopard Ventures. FIN is yet to see market traction while CarIQ is trying to ramp up its operations. The good thing is that these startups are solving problems that Indian citizens face when it comes to information transparency and efficiency of service. They could be great acquisition targets to the likes of a Bosch or a Continental, the automobile tier 1 vendors, if they manage to create a niche technology service. The game is in the software platform of Elsys and others. They should scale up their services for Indian consumers and businesses.</div><div> </div>
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