By IANS,
Trivandrum : The Kerala chapter of the Institution of Electronics and Electrical Engineers (IEEE) will launch the first all-women start-up here next month, an official said Friday.
The start-up will utilise existing technology trends in social media to address the applications of crowd sourcing, with special relevance to the market and social requirements of the country.
“Even though women constitute 50 per cent of students in engineering and other technical areas, their presence and visibility in the realms of start-up enterprises is low… due to lack of family support, risk aversion and the organisational culture of start-ups,” said Sarada Jayakrishnan, who heads the Women in Engineering (WiE) initiative of IEEE Kerala chapter.
IEEE Kerala is the fourth-largest section of IEEE in the Asia-Pacific after Tokyo, Chennai and Bangalore.
IEEE, headquartered in New York, is the world’s largest technical body with over 400,000 members in over 160 countries.
R. Srinivasan, chairman of IEEE Kerala, said: “Women are a hidden resource for start-ups in Kerala as there are many women who are unable to go to the metros to work. Women’s start-ups will go a long way to tap into this resource, thereby bringing women into the mainstream.”
The Kerala section, with about 5,500 members and student branches in 70 academic institutions, is one of the most rapidly growing in the country and in the Asia-Pacific region.