Amazon.in on Sunday announced the launch of “Amazon Mentor Connect” programme ahead of its flagship event — Smbhav.

The programme is aimed at accelerating the growth of start-ups and emerging brands enrolled in the Amazon Launchpad programme, helping them gain exclusive access to guidance from VCs, industry veterans and Amazon leaders through expert knowledge sharing sessions, networking events and 1:1 mentorship sessions. Mentors from educational institutions and VC firms like Fireside Ventures, DSG Consumer Partners, Elevation Capital, Tomorrow Capital have already signed up for this programme to contribute to the Indian start-up growth story.

Start-ups and emerging brands can access guidance from these mentors through various ways — one-to-one mentorship with chosen mentors over a 3-month period, ongoing networking opportunities with a wider pool of industry experts, or knowledge sharing sessions between these experts and other Launchpad brands. This offers entrepreneurs a platform to engage, learn and showcase their start-ups to the industry’s leading subject matter experts to help tackle strategic and functional challenges.

Smbhav summit

The Mentor Connect programme is not limited to start-ups and emerging brand owners enrolled in the Amazon Launchpad programme, but will also be extended to the winners of the Amazon Smbhav Entrepreneurship challenge in the upcoming second edition of Amazon Smbhav summit to be hosted from April 15-18, 2021. The winners will be the first cohort of start-ups to receive the benefits associated with the Amazon Mentor Connect programme.

“India has a large start-up ecosystem that is key to disruptive innovation and accelerating India’s progress towards an Atmanirbhar Bharat. Most of these start-ups are led by first time entrepreneurs who have the passion to drive a change, but don’t have the experience to deal with the breadth of challenges they face along the way. With Amazon Mentor Connect programme, we aim to create a support system to help start-ups unlock their potential by providing them with the right kind of mentoring that can help them scale their business, avoid blind spots, learn from experience of existing leaders, open new doors and help them unlock infinite possibilities for a Digital India” said Pranav Bhasin, Director, MSME & Selling Partner Experience, Amazon India.

Amazon Launchpad is a programme that showcases differentiated products from start-ups and emerging brands to millions of Amazon customers and has been instrumental in helping brands scale at an accelerated rate since its inception in India in December 2016.

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