Maruti Suzuki India Ltd announced the winner for its hugely contested Maruti Suzuki WagonR Think Big Challenge season 3. Varun Chandra from Guwahati won the prestigious title for his big idea of Voice Biometric Platform. VP marketing Mr. Manohar Bhatt and noted Film actor Mr. R. Madhavan, were present at the function to felicitate the winners. The winner bagged a cash prize of about Rs. 10 lakh and a brand new Maruti Suzuki Wagon R with opportunity to win venture capital. Along with the prize money winning idea will also receive nurture incentive worth Rs. 50 lakh for a year.
The winner was chosen by an renowned panel of judges consisting of ShaileshVickram Singh (Executive Director, Seed Fund advisors) Abhik Ghosh (CEO and co-founder AG Knowledgetech) and ArvindJha (Director LAVA International P Ltd and Director and Co-founder Movico Technologies P ltd. Maruti has also announced to provide incubation support of about Rs. 50 lakh to the winner for one year. During this year Maruti will provide support for monetary and infrastructural funding that will help to govern the feasibility in long term.
Vice President Marketing Maruti Suzuki India, Mr. Manohar Bhatt on the occasion said that the third season of the challenge has brought in more objectivity and participants arrived more from the specific targeted groups. He also added that the previous two seasons were a huge success and Maruti was overjoyed with the tremendous response from the enthusiastic participants.
He further said that to add and encourage entrepreneurship among the college student they had also introduced a new category ‘The Young Turks’ from this year. The challenge is an ultimate test for the smart and young Indians with business idea, leadership, smartness and passion to lead the way and become inspiration for the other people just like the WagonR’s core value.
The contest was started in April and was continued for four months. This challenge tested not only the raw idea from the participants but also their determination and innovative insight required to initiate a successful business venture.
The contest witnessed an extensive onset of business ideas from all over the country. The Maruti Suzuki Wagon R Think Big challenge received a total of about 36,318 entries from over 19 cities this year. The total number of complete ideas that were registered was 2,385. The participants were made to attend rigorous training and interactions under the guidance of industry gurus. Taking inspiration from the last two seasons of the Challenge, this year a new category was inducted named as ‘Young Turks’ which was targeted exclusively to young college students. The grand finale of the competition was conducted at Delhi last week.
Highly successful WagonR is the symbol of innovation and use of current technology to provide better commuter solution. It is car meant for smarter people, thinkers and innovators. Since its launch back in 2000, WagonR has constantly seen various upgrades with some class defining features which has made it the leader in the category. WagonR has been playing a key role in defining the path for the new technologies.
Maruti Suzuki Wagon RThinkBig Challenge is a unique platform of its kind for budding entrepreneurs to show their innovative business ideas to the world. The unique initiative by Maruti Suzuki India Ltd is to encourage the entrepreneurship qualities among the individuals. The participants presented their ideas to the capitalist who could evaluate their ideas for commercial feasibility and even for possible funding.
