Women Start-Ups to Get Support from IEEE

TechnoparkToday.com(April,2013)>> The Kerala chapter of the Institution of Electronics and Electrical Engineers (IEEE) will launch a mechanism to support all-women start-ups.  The support system will utilize existing technology trends in social media to address the applications of crowd sourcing, with special relevance to the market and social requirements of the country.

IEEE Kerala Section team started working to get the first start-up under this programe in the social media space and it will be launching shortly.

“Even though women constitute 50 percent of the students in engineering and other technical areas, their presence and visibility in the realms of start-up enterprises is rather low. There are several reasons behind this, and empirically, I would say that the lack of family support, risk aversion and the organisational culture of start-ups are perhaps some of the reasons,” said Sarada Jayakrishnan, who heads the Women in Engineering (WiE) initiative of IEEE Kerala Section.

“Women are a hidden resource for start-ups in Kerala as there are many women who are unable to go to the metros to work. Women’s start-ups will go a long way to tap into this resource, thereby bringing women into the mainstream.” said R. Srinivasan, chairman of IEEE Kerala.