Women-led Startups Shine In NetApp Accelerator's 12th Cohort
The 12th cohort of the NetApp Excellerator included NEMA AI, Zeron, Chaos Genius, Kensu and Blockfenders
NetApp on Thursday revealed that three out of the five graduating startups from its accelerator programme (NetApp Excellerator) were led by women. These women co-founded startups received specialised mentorship through NetApp ExcellerateHER, an initiative aimed at empowering and supporting women entrepreneurs.
The 12th cohort of the NetApp Excellerator included NEMA AI, Zeron, Chaos Genius, Kensu and Blockfenders. Each of these startups had a unique focus on data-driven deep tech solutions.
These startups presented their solutions to a distinguished audience including investors, industry leaders, mentors and NetApp executives.
With 18 women-led startups mentored within the programme’s seven-year tenure, NetApp has seemingly remains focused inclusivity and gender parity in the startup landscape. In total, NetApp’s flagship accelerator programme has mentored 77 deeptech startups.
“We were the first to have a women founders-focused emphasis for an accelerator programme. We call it NetApp ExcellerateHER initiative. We have seen amazing success from it,” Ravi Chhabria, VP & MD at NetApp India told BW Businessworld.
According to a recent report by Tracxn, India has about 8,000 startups led by women. These startups have collectively secured nearly USD 23 billion in funding. However, 6,000 of these startups have yet to secure funding. Among them, 590 startups have managed to generate revenues surpassing USD 30,000.
Chaos Genius, led by Founder and CEO Preeti Shrimal, was one of the standout performers in the latest NetApp startup accelerator cohort. The Elevation Capital and Y Combinator-backed company has also completed a Proof of Concept (PoC) with NetApp, revolutionising the company’s approach to Snowflake expenses with its solutions. By providing targeted advice, user-friendly design and seamless implementation, Chaos Genius reportedly facilitated a 28 per cent reduction in expenditure for NetApp. This translated into a reported 20-fold return on investment, alongside huge operational efficiency enhancements.
Chaos Genius has raised USD 3.3 million in seed money and founder Shrimal is also part of Google for Startups Accelerator: Women Founders program for India (2023).
The alumni of the NetApp Excellerator programme have collectively raised USD 360 million.
Recently featured on Shark Tank, Neuroscience-meets-AI company NEMA AI, led by Founder and CEO Nidhi, was also among the graduating startups from the NetApp cohort. “When we started looking at NEMA AI, we started looking at it because clearly there was a data angle to it. (But) there was also a CSR angle to it. It’s another evolution of our startup program. It’s kind of spliced into our DNA,” said Chhabria.
“You must have seen her (Nidhi’s) pitch on Shark Tank… We helped her understand what other adjacent areas and how data can be used at corporate level,” revealed M Naveen Kumar, Engineering Program Manager, NetApp.
13th Cohort
For the next cohort, NetApp told BW Businessworld that it is interested in exploring opportunities with startups and technologies that align with their own business objectives. They mentioned a willingness to explore adjacent technologies to their core offerings, not necessarily for acquisition purposes but to gain insights and learning experiences.
Specifically, the company expressed an interest in technologies related to Language Models (LMs) applications (small and large LMs), particularly those applied to private data for enhanced productivity.
NetApp said it is less concerned about the generalisation of LLM technology into generalised AI, focusing instead on its potential to significantly boost productivity, possibly by 20-30 per cent. Additionally, NetApp is also looking to engage with startups to experiment with processes or functions that could improve efficiency within NetApp itself. This engagement with startups has been framed as a new approach for NetApp, suggesting a shift towards exploring opportunities for consumption rather than solely focusing on their own offerings.
