Women led startups in Hyderabad

While long gone are those days when women were limited to just kitchen, household chaos and nurturing of children, I still look forward to a day when we don’t have to assign a category for women. Thanks to the efforts and stories of some inspiring women entrepreneurs, more and more women are choosing the path of entrepreneurship and are performing extraordinarily well.

This women’s day, we wanted to recognise a few strong and dynamic women leading some uber cool startups from Hyderabad and here they are:

1) Anu Acharya, mapmygenome.in

Mapmygenome and Anu Acharya need no introduction. This  molecular diagnostics company is on a mission to impact the lives of more than 100 million individuals by 2030 by creating a unique database for the Indian population to understand the amazing genetic diversity within it so that people can live a more healthier life. By combining genetic health profile and health history with genetic counseling, Mapmygenome provides actionable steps for individuals and their physicians towards a healthier life.

Anu Acharya had won the Women Ahead honour at the Jio Economic Times Startup Awards 2015. She was also shortlisted as a top contender in “Top Innovator” category at the same awards.

2) Vaishali Neotia, Merxius

Vaishali Neotia cofounded Merxius (mer- she -us),  an award winning technology innovation company that builds products using Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality, Interactive and Web technologies. Merxius is India’s most awarded Augmented and Virtual Reality Startup and has been ranked by the IET as among the top 5 innovators in the World. Vaishali was among the 19 women selected from around the world for an exclusive women’s mentoring program conducted by the US State Department and Fortune.

3) Mansi Gandhi, DoctorC

Mansi Gandhi founded DoctorC, an aggregator of diagnostic service providers along with Neehar Cherabuddi, Karan Kurani, Manya Cherabuddi and Dr.C Dayakar Reddy in 2013.  DoctorC offers a platform where people can look for the best deals in diagnostic tests by comparing prices and discounts offered by different testing laboratories across the city.  Mansi is a Cornell Graduate and handles strategy, operations, and partner relations at DoctorC.

4) Sindhura Borra, Cleanse High

Sindura Borra founded CleanseHigh in 2013. CleanseHigh is an accessible system of body detox with healing elixirs that help maintain health and balance. Within a span of 2 years, she grew from a one woman army to having been supported by an Advisory board that has 3 licensed nutritionists from Sanfransico, Mumbai and Hyderabad and a team of 18 people working towards successful operation, production and marketing of the company.

5) Monika Misra, iKeva

Monika Misra is the founder of iKeva, a workspace provider with community and member benefits. Monika is a hotel management graduate who understood the pain points of finding office spaces and founded iKeva in 2012 which now provides workspaces in prime locations for entrepreneurs. iKeva was ranked one of the Top 28 CoWorking Spaces in India by Inc. 42 magazine in 2014.

6) Vinutha Rallapalli

After being on the investor side for the last ten years, Vinutha ventured into food startups with  Fat Cow Creamery. She had worked for ten years in various roles mostly on the startup investment side of things before finally taking the plunge into entrepreneurship. Vinutha has been actively mentoring startups and has been an active eco-system enabler as knowledge partners and evaluation partners.

7) Arpita Soma, YoGrad

 Arpita Soma founded YoGrad along with Surya Adavi in 2015. YoGrad is an community for students to network, learn and share information. They have been listed among the top 5 internship sites in the country and currently have over 40000+ registered students and 350+ employers using the platform. The team also won the Startups Heroes contest by TIE Hyderabad in January 2015. Arpita also runs an online community for Women Entrepreneurs in Hyderabad and is actively involved with StartupHyderabad.com.

8) Damini Mahajan, WeMakeScholars.com

Founded by Damini Mahajan, Arjun R. Krishna, and Vinay Nair , WeMakeScholars.com is website that guides provides information about scholarships to students flying abroad for higher studies. Damini has recently been awarded as the winner of Silicon Valley Challenge by Action for India 2016 and had also been in Top 75 in Power of ideas by Economic Times at IIM Ahmedabad.

9) Alekhya Nadendla, Bonsoul and FitZop

Alekhya is an ISB grad who founded BonSoul, an online network of spas and salons that provides its users with recommendations for their next visit, ratings and new or interesting treatments to try. Alekhya, a fitness enthusiast also founded Fitzop in June 2015 with an idea of seamlessly integrating fitness and healthy living into communities and making it a part of everyone’s life. Fitzop provides its customers gym memberships that grant them access to thousands of different courses at studios and gyms in their cities.

10) Karthi Subbaraman, Oghma Design

Karthi founded Oghma Design, a company focused on design thinking and brand perpetuity, in 2011. She is an international thought leader and design thinker with over 15 years of experience in the field of user experience design and cognitive psychology. Karthi has worked across myriad of domains such as technology, education, banking and finance, insurance, product development across various parts of the globe and their clients include Amazon.com, Philips, Vodafone, Neustar, Tata Institure of Social Sciences, Scribble Media & more.

11) Rohini Deepthi Natti, Kitki

Rohini quit her job to start Kitki along with Pramod Ponnaluri with the aim to transform learning into an enjoyable experience. Kitki were recently the winners at the 1776 Challenge Cup Mumbai local round Winner and are heading to Singapore for the regional challenge.

12) Dr.Grishma Alampur Goud, JAI

Dr.Grishma founded JAI, a non-profit organization which provides vocational training to the visually/physically challenged and makes them financially independent . JAI is an initiative by the Devnar Foundation for the blind and they presently manufacture paper cups, paper carry bags, candles and files. ‘Jai’ makes Rs. 75 lakhs per annum and has grown 30% from the first year.

While there are hundreds of women weaving beautiful stories for everyone around them, this is our effort to bring forward a few leaders who have been constantly supporting the ecosystem here in Hyderabad. We are always on the look out for interesting stories to share. If you know of any women led startup that should be included in our list, do share the details here. More power to the girls!

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