YouthSpark Live To Mentor First Time Entrepreneurs

Microsoft India organized the first annual YouthSpark Live event in Bengaluru. Hosted in partnership with QUEST Alliance, YouthSpark Live is a two-day program to mentor first time entrepreneurs and job seekers. This year’s event helped young people explore careers in technology, hone their skills for 21st century jobs, and armed them with tools to kickstart their own entrepreneurial ventures. Close to 100 youth from 10 Indian states attended the event where they underwent two days of intensive training. Another 100 participated via webcast across 13 locations.

Keynoting  at the event here today,  Jean-Philippe Courtois, President, Microsoft International said, “Youth in India can drive positive economic and social impact, but there is a need to empower them with the relevant employability and entrepreneurial skills. At Microsoft, we have many initiatives to help young people succeed. Over the course of the last decade or so, Microsoft India has invested more than $100 million (Rs 650 crores) in various initiatives to help young Indians realize their full potential. Microsoft is committed to taking Indian youth from the classroom to the boardroom.”

Talking about the global YouthSpark program to create opportunities for 300 million youth over three years, he further added: “Through more than 30 programs, and partnerships with 186 youth-serving non-profits, in its first year alone Microsoft YouthSpark has created new opportunities for more than 103 million young people in over 100 countries around the world.”

At the event today, Courtois congratulated the three winners from the YouthSpark Live Challenge and presented them an award of services worth Rs 1.5 lakh each as seed funding to get their business started. The three winners are Chandrashekhar Bhuyan from TERcoms whose project is focused on informing rural poor about their rights and entitlements, with the aim  of empowering them through regular interface with the Government to push for corrective measures; Gaurav Mittal of Eye-D, short for EYE-Device, a microcontroller and phone combination to help the visually challenged with tasks like guidance, bus routing, face identification and colour identification; and Rahul Jacob, for RideIT.in, an online carpool matching service exclusively for working professionals.

YouthSpark Live is one of the many Microsoft youth focused programs. Over the last decade and more, Microsoft has been committed to making Indian youth more employable by arming them with skills that are in demand today. Starting in 2003 with Project Shiksha, Microsoft has been consistently adding to its bouquet of programs aimed at providing relevant skill development, employability and entrepreneurship skills for youth in India.