LAHORE: Minister of State for Information Technology and Telecommunications Anusha Rahman Khan on Saturday inaugurated the National Incubation Centre (NIC) at the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), opening gates for developing entrepreneurship in the fields of technology and micro management.

NIC is the initiative of Ms Rahman’s ministry, and has been created under its Ignite Fund. Its first chapter was established in Islamabad and more are in the offing in cities like Karachi and Quetta, developing entrepreneurship based on modern technology.

The NIC Lahore is a joint venture of LUMs and Fatima Ventures CEO Ali Mukhtar who won it through a bid. It has selected 17 companies out of 400 which had applied for incubation. The seats are likely to be increased to 20.

It picked up from its previous manifestation as the LUMS Centre for Entrepreneurship (LCE), established in May 2014 with the mission to discover, groom, and develop high-growth, high-impact companies. Till date, LCE has incubated 78 companies, 17 of which have raised close to $4 million in seed funding and are currently valued at $20m. It has also created 1,500 direct employment opportunities and another 5,000 jobs were created through vendors and suppliers.

Ms Anusha Rahman said the launch of yet another NIC at LUMS after Islamabad was a testament to the government’s resolve to bring about a digital revolution in Pakistan.The minister also recounted her ministry’s efforts to modernise digital and internet technology in Pakistan since she took over, elaborating how she picked the idea of NIC from London where she saw young people running business through internet. “I want to produce entrepreneurs in universities without a PhD degree. I want knowledge-based economy and dollar worthy degrees,” she said.

She said her ministry was teaching correct usage of computers to girls of the marginalised backgrounds in the Baitul Maal offices in the country with the help of Microsoft, producing a human resource of freelancers. Each of them would be able to earn $200 a month.

She said she took five of the entrepreneurs produced by the NIC in Islamabad to Barcelona to a world moot. And two of the five were in the list of the top 10 business starters in the world.

Ignite CEO Yusuf Hussain spoke of the role of NICs in the knowledge economy of Pakistan and how these would become breeding grounds for sustainable growth and drive Pakistan’s economy forward with 4th Industrial wave technologies.

NIC Director Faisal Jalil Sherjan highlighted that NIC Lahore will house the first-ever Makers Lab in Pakistan, a modern facility equipped with the latest technologies and smart equipment to bring ideas to life.

Published in Dawn, December 24th, 2017