Via MicroCapital, Intellecap Announces Microfinance Business Plan Competition:

In yet another innovation coming from the burgeoning microfinance sector in India, Intellecap, a microfinance consulting organization, has established an Indian Microfinance Business Plan competition. Called the Srijan Business Plan Competition, this event is being organized along with Aavishkaar Goodwell, a microfinance venture capital fund associated with Intellecap. The conference is sponsored by some of the leading providers of commercial microfinance in India - Yes Bank, Standard Chartered Bank and ICICI. For the organizers of this event, this provides an opportunity to identify business plans with promise to increase "deal flow".The Srijan Business Plan competition opened on December the 8th and executive summary submissions will continue till January 21st of 2007. Thirty teams will be short listed who will need to submit their business plans by the 18th of March. The final ten finalists will be announced on April 1st and the final presentations shall happen on the 10th of April.

We've written about Aavishkaar in the past as a micro-venture capital fund trying to fill the space between micro and formal finance, i.e., mesofinance.? They are associated with Anil Gupta's excellent Honey Bee Network.? My interaction with Intellecap came through a? profile I wrote of Upendra Bhatt, one of the principals, for GreenBiz this past March.?

Good luck to Intellecap/Aavishkaar with the business plan competition; if you are an aspiring entrepreneur in India, you should consider getting your materials together before the January 21 deadline.

Again, hat tip to David Satterthwaite over at MicroCapital for his always-excellent trend watching in the microfinance world.?