Senior Specialist

About the Department

Invest India is the National Investment Promotion and Facilitation Agency under the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India.

Key Responsibilities

Will led the end-to-end strategy, execution, and governance of Startup India’s funding initiatives, including the Startup India Seed Fund Scheme and other programs such as Credit Guarantee Scheme. This role demands strong leadership, policy fluency, and operational excellence to drive nationwide impact by enabling early-stage entrepreneurs, strengthening incubators, and ensuring transparent and high-quality deployment of government funding.

1. Overall Leadership of Funding Schemes: Coordinate all funding schemes under Startup India. Set priorities, streamline processes, resolve bottlenecks and ensure that each scheme operates in a consistent and efficient manner.

2. Strategy and Planning: Define the long term strategy for Startup India’s funding vertical. Plan future program design, operational models and improvements needed to strengthen early stage funding support.

3. Governance and Compliance: Ensure that incubators and startups follow all scheme guidelines. Maintain strong financial controls, timely reviews and a clear audit trail for each funding program.

4. Seed Fund Portal Oversight: Lead product and tech teams to improve the Seed Fund portal. Ensure the platform supports efficient applications, monitoring and reporting across all schemes.

5. Fund Disbursement and Due Diligence: Oversee due diligence, milestone checks and document reviews for disbursement to incubators and startups. Ensure timely and accurate release of funds.

6. Monitoring and Portfolio Management: Track performance of incubators and startups across all schemes. Use KPIs such as fund utilization, follow on funding, IP creation, revenue growth and job creation to evaluate outcomes.

7. Managing EAC and Decision-Making Processes: Lead the Experts Advisory Committee processes including agenda preparation, evaluation notes and handling complex cases that require escalation.

8. Operational Improvements: Build and update SOPs, processes and data systems to strengthen execution across all funding schemes.

9. Data Insights and Reporting: Create reports, dashboards and insights for senior leadership and government stakeholders. Use data to recommend changes in scheme design or operations.

10. Stakeholder and Ecosystem Engagement: Work closely with incubators, state governments, investors and ecosystem partners to strengthen the pipeline of startups for all funding schemes.

11. Outreach and Awareness: Oversee communication and outreach efforts so that eligible incubators and startups across the country are aware of and able to access the funding programs.

Qualifications

- Bachelor’s/master’s degree in business/commerce, Data Management, Public Policy, Economics, Engineering.

- 10+ years of experience in data management, MIS reporting, policy monitoring, government consulting, and startups.

- Proven experience leading teams, managing multi-stakeholder programs, and driving operational excellence.

- Proficiency in Microsoft Office (Advanced Excel, PowerPoint) ; knowledge of BI tools (e.g., Power BI, Tableau) is a plus.

- Fast learner possessing a strong analytical mindset with experience in data management/analysis, research, policy and consulting.

- Ability to work with government stakeholders, handle complexity, and manage high-visibility national programs.