Madurai: The city may lack the vibrant industrial culture of Chennai or Coimbatore and the presence of big tech companies, but the startups in Madurai utilise every opportunity that comes their way, especially in agriculture and tech-based sectors. The two-day startup festival here displayed innovative solutions the entrepreneurs have found for everyday problems for people in the city and the region.
Cup Time is one such startup from Madurai.”Every small shop requires tea or coffee when a customer arrives, and they can’t keep sending one of their staff to the street corner for it. We filled in this space to offer tea and coffee,” says Prabhaharan Venugopal, a trained pilot who saw this challenge while running a jewellery shop. Cup Time has an app through which every requirement could be updated to them.
Tomgo Agro Machines from Dindigul is another startup that found a solution for farmers and people who can’t afford big earth movers for smaller work. It makes small earth movers like backhoes and rovers, which could work in cramped places and are affordable, starting from Rs 2 lakh. “Most small farmers may not have enough work for a big earthmover and find it costly to hire one. My machines attend to this need,” says A Thomas.
The rich agricultural activities around the city present a big opportunity for aspiring entrepreneurs. M Dhinesh from Mathur in the district is a farmer who found that people long to have traditional food, but all the traditional knowledge of preparing them has disappeared over time. His startup, Dhaanyas, offers ready-to-cook traditional food like black kavuni, mappilai samba, and poongar rice, known as woman’s rice, to people.
Madurai-based Arola Bamboo Products utilises the skilful hands of local artisans to make bamboo crafts and sell them in cities like Bengaluru, Mysuru, and Chennai. “We innovate using bamboo, and these innovations are crafted by our artisans,” says Suthagar S from the startup. Aushta Laxmi’s Faggro, a startup from the city, uses tech-based solutions to bridge the gap between farmers and customers, eliminating middlemen. “We provide certification of products to customers and assurance of transactions to farmers,” she said.
Dheepan Chakravarthi M shuffles between Tamil Nadu and the US as his startup Infyiot offers software solutions to small players from the region who can’t afford the costly software of big companies. “I see a good startup ecosystem and opportunities for tech-based startups in Madurai and the region,” he said.
Startup Mission director and CEO Sivarajah Ramanathan said the agri-incubator run by Nabard here is a catalyst for many agri-based startups in the region. The other reason is the longing of people from the city and region to return to their native town from their workplaces. “Techies who worked from home during that period are trying out startup solutions through their knowledge,” he added.
