Microsoft India Unveils ’Build Your Business’ Curriculum for Indian Youth

Microsoft India unveiled the ‘Build Your Business (BYB)’ curriculum for Indian youth, at the second edition of YouthSpark Live event in Bengaluru. A comprehensive package for micro and small businesses, BYB curriculum provides best practices, access to technology, and training tools to help skill entrepreneurs and grow their businesses. The curriculum will be available as a download for all non-profit organizations focused on empowering youth.

Commenting on the curriculum’s role in helping fuel the growth of entrepreneurship in India, Rajinish Menon, Director, Microsoft Ventures India, said, “We have a long-standing commitment to helping youth realize their full potential. Build Your Business curriculum is aimed at empowering entrepreneurs and startups with tools and practices to develop their business strategy, build and sustain their business, and effectively compete in the marketplace. With this, we hope to encourage youth to become entrepreneurs and job creators.”

Developed by Microsoft in partnership with the International Youth Foundation and localized for India by QUEST Alliance, the Build Your Business curriculum is an interactive training designed to introduce entrepreneurs to the basic ideas, activities and skills needed to successfully launch and grow a small enterprise. It covers essential steps such as market research, developing an effective sales pitch, and ways to obtaining start-up capital.

The curriculum is designed as a series of modules, and in India, it will feature several case studies, providing students with insights into local business practices. YouthSpark Live 2015, a two-day event, conducting in partnership with QUEST Alliance, witnessed participation from over 40 NGOs and 120 young participants. In addition to a comprehensive orientation to the BYB curriculum, the event provided exciting platforms for existing and potential youth entrepreneurs as well as NGO partners to engage and share their experiences and success stories, with an aim to inspire more youth across the country to successfully start and grow their own business.

In India, Microsoft has been running several initiatives to empower young people to succeed in a mobile-first, cloud-first world. Through investments of over Rs 670 crore, the company’s skill development, entrepreneurship and digital literacy programs have touched over 5 crore people in the last 10 years.