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Anti-Money Laundering startup IntelleWings raises $650K pre-Series A round from Dallas Venture Capital

Date: March 29, 2022

Anti-Money Laundering startup IntelleWings raises $650K pre-Series A round from Dallas Venture Capital

IntelleWings Private Limited, an AI-powered and SaaS enabled AML/CFT (Combating the Financing of Terrorism) Compliance company, today announced that it has raised $650K in pre-Series A round from Dallas Venture Capital (DVC), a cross-border venture capital firm focused on early and growth stage companies in cloud infrastructure, B2B SaaS, AI/ML, mobile, XR and other emerging technologies.

This round saw existing investors like SucSEED Indovation Fund, Padup Ventures and Vinners, reinforce their support with additional capital along with the participation of new investors like Lead Angels and Nextgen Technology Fund I (a fund created by STPI and managed by Pontaq).

With an aim of reducing corruption and terror funding, IntelleWings has developed its proprietary AML/CFT global database for customer screening, a key differentiator, along with CFT Sanctions and Adverse Media checks, it said in a statement.

IntelleWings Eye claims it provides a simplified view for complex transactions and speeds up detection of money laundering patterns.

“Corruption and terrorism can be combated by leveraging technology with focus and depth. IntelleWings is harnessing the power of AI to provide game-changing AML/CFT solutions,” said Pramod Sharma, Founder and CEO of IntelleWings. “The product is built on deep domain and technology expertise and the capital raised in this round will help us in business development, hiring senior leadership and expansion into new markets including the US.”

“Banking and financial institutions globally have come under increased government scrutiny to prevent money laundering by deploying AML solutions,” said Shyam Penumaka, Partner at Dallas Venture Capital. “Over $342 billion in fines have been imposed globally for non-compliance between 2009 to 2017 as per Reuters. There is enormous market potential for IntelleWings, and DVC is excited to partner with IntelleWings in their growth journey with our DVC Advantage program.”

“Global anti-money laundering software market revenue is expected to register a CAGR of 15 percent over the forecast period, and AML software revenues are projected to increase from $1.6 billion in 2021 to $5.7 billion in 2030,” said Vikrant Varshney, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of SucSEED Indovation Fund.

“We were able to identify the potential of IntelleWings on leveraging technology in solving a real-life problem,” said Pankaj Thakar, Founder and Chief Mentor of PadUp Ventures.

Namrata Kaul, former MD of Deutsche Bank, Corporate Banking, led this round from Vinners. “We have been with Pramod for the last two years and this would be our second round of investment,” said Ms. Kaul.

Startup Innovation/Smart Cities India Awards 2022

Startup Innovation/Smart Cities India Awards 2022

  • Start Date 25-03-2022
  • End Date 25-03-2022
  • Type Awards
  • Display Regular
  • Venue Pragati Maidan

Sh. Arvind Kumar, DG- STPI  will attend the Startup Innovation Awards 2022 Ceremony and confer awards to 4 startups of STPI for their innovation excellence in various domains.

Date & Time :25 March 2022, 2:30 PM - 4:00 PM

To Register : Click Here

 

 

 

Convergence India Expo

Convergence India Expo

  • Start Date 24-03-2022
  • End Date 24-03-2022
  • Type Expo
  • Display Regular
  • Venue Pragati Maidan

Sh. Arvind Kumar, DG-STPI will participate in a Panel Discussion  on  

“6 Year of Digital India: How Successful are We in Transforming India into a Digital Empowered Economy” and share his insightful thoughts.

Date & Time :   24 Mar 2022, 10:00 am

Register now: Click Here

Time to bridge digital divide, data privacy gaps to push financial inclusion at grassroot level: Arvind Kumar DG STPI

Date: March 11, 2022

Time to bridge digital divide, data privacy gaps to push financial inclusion at grassroot level: Arvind Kumar DG STPI

STPI has launched several initiatives including Centres of Entrepreneurship and Next Generation Incubation Scheme to foster tech startups focused on emerging technologies.

Aligned with the vision of the government for achieving $1 trillion economy, STPI has launched several initiatives including Centres of Entrepreneurship (CoEs) and Next Generation Incubation Scheme (NGIS) to foster tech startups focused on emerging technologies by providing them with a robust collaborative platform to realise their unique ideas into path-breaking technology products both in software and hardware domains, Arvind Kumar, Director General, Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), tells Arpit Gupta in an interaction with ETGovernment.

Excerpts:

How can India become Atmanirbhar in emerging technologies and new age devices? What should be the roadmap for a trillion-dollar digital economy?

The government has been playing a transformational role in formulating futuristic reforms to make India Atmanirbhar. The flagship initiatives like Make in India and PLI schemes for the manufacturing sector can catalyse India’s economic growth by attracting FDI, strengthening the domestic manufacturing ecosystem, boosting exports, and creating immense employment opportunities for the skilled talent pool. The recently launched Rs 76,000 crore PLI scheme for the semiconductor manufacturing and the total fiscal support of Rs 2,30,000 crore for the entire ESDM supply chain can significantly galvanise the electronics manufacturing ecosystem and push India to rise above the ESDM value chain.

The HSDC Scheme proposed at an estimated outlay of around Rs 10,500 crore is expected to augment additional capacity of 2000 MW (which denotes the amount of energy consumed in a data centre and eventually marks the capacity of the data centre) by 2027. This will make India a Global Data Centre Hub. Support initiative of making Aatmanirbhar Bharat by promoting indigenous products in Data Centre space is projected to attract Rs 3.52 lakh crore and generate around 1.2 lakh direct and indirect jobs.

The Digital India Infoway - “The Network of Networks” is expected to be the next generation secure network with high speed, redundancy, robust architecture & security, continuously updated with emerging technologies and would be a high-end multi-tier, multi-technology research, education and eGovernance network.

The National Language Translation Mission launched by the government can play a pivotal role in large scale translation from English to Indian languages and vice versa by enhancing digital inclusion across linguistic diversities. Speech to Speech and Text to Text Machine Translation systems for major Indian languages will help faster localization of technologies and boost inclusion.

Prime Minister’s vision for “One Nation, One Digital Platform” has resulted in the initiation of several public digital platforms including National Digital Health Platform, National Digital Education Architecture, National Digital Agriculture Platform, and Future Skills PRIME / Online Education. These platforms will further boost the digital economy.

Could you share some of the key initiatives of STPI which will enable achieve the trillion-dollar digital economy goal?

Aligned with the vision of the government for achieving $1 trillion economy, STPI has also launched several initiatives such as Centres of Entrepreneurship (CoEs) and Next Generation Incubation Scheme (NGIS) to foster tech startups focused on emerging technologies by providing them with a robust collaborative platform to realize their unique ideas into path-breaking technology products both in software and hardware domains.

Till date, STPI has launched 20 CoEs in emerging technologies including, but not limited to AI, IoT, Big Data, Blockchain, etc. Such initiatives can further revolutionize the tech startup ecosystem in the country and accelerate innovation-led entrepreneurship in the country, which will further help in contributing to the vision of a $1 trillion economy.

India has already achieved global laurels in the software services field. Time is opportune for India to focus on products, semiconductor design, electronics system design, innovations in emerging technology domains, and unify platforms for delivery of government services to the citizenry to become a $1 trillion digital economy during the next five years.

What challenges do you see in the next era of digital India and smart governance and taking it to the last mile? What is the way forward to digitally empower India to make it more resilient, competitive, and future-ready?

Over the last few years India is witnessing a transformation in its digital footprint and governance. The government has undertaken several path-breaking initiatives like Digital India to expand the digital footprint of the country while delivering citizen-centric services. India stacks such as AADHAAR and UPI have played a major role in boosting digital adoption in the country. Let me share some numbers. These numbers itself speaks a lot about the digital profile of India.

According to a report published by TRAI in August 2021, the total number of internet subscribers in India has gone up to 82.5 crore. UPI recorded 461 crore transactions in January 2022, which is 1% higher than the 456 crore transactions recorded in December 2021. The transaction volume has also increased by 1% from Rs 8.26 lakh crore to Rs 8.31 lakh crore. Direct Transfer Benefit (DBT) to citizens has been leveraging the AADHAR-based money transfer to the bank accounts of citizens. Today, India has the largest number of digital identities i.e., 132.4 crore AADHAAR card holders. Since April 1, 2021, over Rs 4.53 lakh crore has been provided to the beneficiaries under the DBT through 544 crore transactions. 150+ applications leverage AADHAAR authentication services. 4.47 lakh Common Services Centres (CSCs) of which 3.48 lakh CSCs are at Gram Panchayat level are taking 380+ government services to the locality of villagers.

Although a lot of challenges are solved however challenges like digital divide, digital fraud and data privacy needs to be addressed further.

While the government has been doing its bit to expand digital and financial inclusion at the grassroots, it’s essential to bridge the digital divide between urban and rural populations. During the pandemic lockdown, most of the students living in remote areas of the country could not access the digital classes because of unavailability of devices and connectivity. At this juncture, the tech industry and startups must think about building disruptive innovations to enhance affordability of tech products & services and empower the people living at the bottom of the economic pyramid to access the facilities easily.

What’s concerning now is the growing instances of cyberthreats and digital frauds as we move forwards with digital adoption. We must think about building robust digital infrastructure with the highest level of security standards to keep the digital revolution leaping forward.

Another critical factor is data protection. Data has enormous economic value. We need new modes to protect data and privacy in the realm of a hyperconnected world. We should keep upgrading our existing platforms and build new platforms and solutions driven by Blockchain and other cutting-edge technologies to ensure trust, transparency, traceability, and security of digital information.

COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of technology. How has the industry used technologies like AI/ML, Blockchain, AR/VR, IoT and Cloud and other technology-based applications to mitigate the pandemic challenge?

Pandemic brought disruptions across all aspects of life; however, the Indian technology industry left no stone unturned to meet the exigency of contemporary requirements. Almost all the technology-based solutions and products have used emerging technologies such as AI, ML, IoT, Cloud, AR/VR etc. to bring breakthrough innovations.

First, as you know companies faced challenges in the physical ecosystem and shifted to work from home models. Now the entire work environment went digital by using cloud-based products and solutions. The change realized on ground was earlier unthinkable and most of the companies were even not in favour of considering work from home a viable option for running operations in a seamless manner. This new normal is going to be a practice even in the post-pandemic period.

Second, industry started a wide range of solutions like touchless transactions and sensor-powered sanitization and technologies that helped industries in different verticals to continue their operations and deliver services & products to the customers.

This pandemic has given impetus to the technology adoption which otherwise might have taken many more years to reach this level. What’s essentially required now is to focus on digital inclusion and digital accessibility to democratise the adoption of technology across the demographics. The legacy of the Indian IT industry, growing tech-entrepreneurial ecosystem, and rising tech startups can play a pivotal role in boosting India’s technology evolution by creating patents and building products for India and the world, making India a technology product nation.

CII Chandigarh Annual Session 2021-22 & Chandigarh Business Conclave

CII Chandigarh Annual Session 2021-22 & Chandigarh Business Conclave

  • Start Date 09-03-2022
  • End Date 09-03-2022
  • Type Conferences
  • Display Regular
  • Venue CII NR Headquarters, Chandigarh.

CII Chandigarh Annual Session 2021-22 & Chandigarh Business Conclave

Shri Arvind Kumar, DG, STPI  will address at Chandigarh Business Conclave as an eminent speaker on 9th March 2022 at 10 AM.

Join live: Click Here

Theme :  Inclusive, Innovative and Sustainable Chandigarh Region

Date & Time  : 9th Mar 2022,  10:00 am 

Venue :  CII NR Headquarters, Chandigarh. 

STPI to increase data centre footprint: DG Arvind Kumar

Date: March 01, 2022

STPI to increase data centre footprint: DG Arvind Kumar

Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), under the administrative control of the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY), promotes innovation and research and development (R&D), and is eyeing to increase data centers footprint in India. In an interaction with ETTelecom's Muntazir Abbas, STPI Director General, Arvind Kumar speaks on Center for Entrepreneurship and EMC 2.0 schemes, and said that the organisation is planning to set up new data centres. Edited excerpts.

What are STPI objectives, and your focus areas?

STPI basically started with the concept of Softex form. In the IT/ITes industry , if they want to export the software, they need some certificate by which they can export the software and legitimize the money which is required by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). We provide a one-stop solution. Now, our focus is more on the Center for Entrepreneurship. So, we are developing the Center of Entrepreneurship all over the country. We have planned 25. We have done the 20th one in Lucknow, which is called MedTech on medical products. So, all Center of Entrepreneurship are domain specific.

Do you have any timeline for that?

I think by the end of this calendar year, we will be able to complete 25.

What is the industry's and the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) role in driving this?

So, there are two schemes, one is directly the Center of Entrepreneurship (CoE) which is being driven by the STPI. This model is basically industry-driven, we got some partners in the form of let us say state governments. We appoint a Chief Operating Officer (COO) there. He undertakes the day-to-day activity of the CoE. So, we are not intervening day to day. We just established it, arranged the fund for them, arranged the equipment and they are working independently. So, anybody who wants to do some sort of startup in medical electronics or health informatics, they can get the incubation space there and they can start it. So, all Center of Entrepreneurships are domain-specific like we are planning one on blockchain technology in Gurgaon. We have eight CoEs in the Northeast, a combination of that is called Octane.

Apart from this, MeitY also has some plans for the Center of Entrepreneurship, it is called NGIS (next generation incubation scheme) that is fully funded by MeitY.

How is this different from CoE?

This is different from CoE. In the NGIS scheme, MeitY has said that they want in Tier2/Tier3 cities like Prayagraj, where the government has given some Rs 90 crores to STPI. MeitY has also asked to give seed funds to the innovator. So we also provide Rs 25 lakh as a seed fund to them. So, this model is the same, but the funding scheme is different.

But how much total outlay for the CoE?

Every CoE has its own budget. On an average we can say it is somewhere around 15 to 20 crores for five years.

Following the recent budgetary proposals that also talks about digital currency, how are you focussing on blockchain?

We have some programs called Chunauti 1.0, Chunauti 2.0. It's called an open competition program. So, we continue to have the competition program and these people come to us, give us presentations for pitching so they pitch. We have state level and Central committees and they have to pitch in their project.

Now the digital currency is the new concept. If anyone comes to us, and says, as a digital currency, this is their product. And we see this is in line with the government of India's objective and if this will result in something which is required for the country then, we allow it and handholding is done by us. We just look into whether its ideas are workable. Blockchain is the technology which is good for trusted networks or for making something which is called, the ledger technology. It can also be used very much in the FinTech domain.

How is EMC 2.0 different from the previous version?

EMC 1.0 was a little limited, so we have increased the scope in EMC 2.0 . In EMC 2.0, you can work somewhere outside. So usually, in the EMC 1.0, private players and small units were present, but in EMC 2.0 they have ensured that only the government bodies (public government venture) but there has to be some involvement of the government out there. In EMC 2.0, at least 10 to 20% of the entire place has to be taken up by a bigger unit and only if that unit is there, only then will we allow it.

How many such clusters are there currently?

In EMC 2.0, we have two such clusters already approved with a proposed area of around 1,000 acres and the cost of that will be around Rs 1,400 crores. That will be the development cost. Then the units will come, they will do their own investment, the anchor unit will come.

Where are these two clusters?

These clusters are Haryana and other in Andhra Pradesh, Vizag district. Three applications which are in the pipeline and in the process of approval are from Telangana, Uttarakhand and Maharashtra. We have also received four more applications from Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Bihar which are in the process of submitting it. So, there is a traction around that and we are ensuring that there has to be a very clear-cut success criteria only then governments spend their money out there.

So the government is also giving subsidies?

50% of their development cost will be borne by the EMC.

What are your data centre plans?

We want to increase our footprint in data centers actually. Something we want to do in the data centers. We have data centers at four places- Chennai, Bangalore, Bhubaneshwar, and Mohali. We have a mid-sized or even a small sized data center, but we want to increase our footprint there and that is one thing which we are looking at immediately.

What are these incubation centers?

These centers mean we have incubation space there. Any young innovative entrepreneur if they want to develop software, they want 5-10 seats, like 5-10 workstations, we provide that space to them at a very nominal rate. So, let us say 2000 rupees per month per seat where you will have electricity, water, everything, so they can come, develop their software and start their company so, if you require a 8-10 workstation for starting company then you're not required to take a big space, pay the rent, electricity, lot of other problems. So, you will have ready-made built-in space and you will just come. It’s called Incubation Center, we call plug and play centres.

So, 62 you already have?

We have 62 centres and 22 are in the pipeline.

3 new electronic clusters proposals under consideration: STPI chief

"Three applications have been received for setting up electronic manufacturing clusters (EMC) in the states of Telangana, Uttarakhand and Maharashtra which are being reviewed for approval," Arvind Kumar, director-general, Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) said, adding that states such as Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Bihar are in the process to apply for the Central scheme.

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