New home for startups at Putrajaya

PUTRAJAYA: Mad (Make A Difference) Incubator has launched its third Startup Hub branch at Menara PjH in Putrajaya. The facility aims to build an ecosystem to encourage the establishment of more startups within the city. 

It offers office solutions and flexible tenancy agreements to entrepreneurs to support them throughout the various stages of growth that their organisations will go through. 

It is hoped that by building a more vibrant startup community, this will give a chance to local entrepreneurs to showcase their Malaysian innovations in a more prominent way. 

“This is the first incubator in Malaysia that has a theme,” Andrew Wong, chief executive officer at Mad Incubator said during the Startup Hub @ PjH launch party.

He explained that this hub would incubate startups that were operating in the areas of service provision to the government, smart technologies and green initiatives. 

“Our Putrajaya startup hub will be a model for all our future startup hubs throughout the Southeast Asian region,” Wong added. 

“We believe that this programme by Mad Incubator will produce successful entrepreneurs who will operate in Putrajaya,” Datuk Azlan Abdul Karim, chief executive officer of Putrajaya Holdings, who was also present at the launch party, said. 

Growing an ecosystem
This is the third startup hub that Mad Incubator has set up so far. It is a joint venture with Pedoman Semarak Sdn Bhd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Putrajaya Holdings Sdn Bhd. Two earlier hubs are already in existence in Cyberjaya and Bandar Sunway. 

Mad Incubator also plans to kick start a fourth startup hub in Brunei next month, and thereafter, to open one in the Southern Philippines. 

Once those are in place, Wong said Mad Incubator would then return to its home ground to set up more startup hubs across the nation. 

One of the locations under consideration is in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah which would be carried out via a partnership with Universiti Malaysia Sabah and Universiti Teknologi Mara Sabah. It will focus more on the area of grass root entrepreneurship, which includes home-based businesses. 

“We want to bring these (home industries) to the next level,” Darwin Tan, chairman of Sabah West Coast Entrepreneur Network Association said. His organisation will be one of the partners working with Mad Incubator to set up this startup hub in East Malaysia. 

Besides this, the Mad-Sun Putrajaya Challenge, which was organised by Mad Incubator in collaboration with StartupNation (Sun) recently, has already identified four out of eight startups to be funded through the program. These same startups will be invited to base their operations at the Startup Hub @ PjH. 

Investment opportunities granted via this challenge can go up to US$10,000 (RM32,700) per startup. 

For more information about Mad Incubator, visit http://www.incubator.com.my/.