Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub Platform launches in Asia to provide support to entrepreneurs and early-stage startups

Microsoft today launched its Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub in Asia, to empower startups’ ambitions and fuel innovation to drive economic and societal progress for Asia and beyond.

Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub is a new digital and inclusive platform for Founders in Asia. The platform offers over $300,000 worth of benefits and credits, giving startups free access to the technology, tools, and resources they need to build and run their business, including open-source cloud platforms and developer and productivity tools like GitHub Enterprise, Visual Studio Enterprise and Microsoft 365.

Beyond access to technology, Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub will empower entrepreneurs to innovate and grow by connecting them with mentors who will provide them with industry, business, and technical support to guide them through their next business milestones. In addition, Founders will have access to Microsoft Learn and a variety of startup and unicorn programs to help them build connections with customers and accelerate their growth.

Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub is designed specifically for early-stage startups to lower the barriers of business creation, be a catalyst for entrepreneurship and innovation, and contribute to easing the journey from an idea to a unicorn. It is available to all startups in Asia, including those without third-party backing, as part of Microsoft’s commitment to empower startups’ ambitions to drive innovation from Asia to the world.

Mirosoft has provided TechNode Global with key information about Mirosoft for Startups Founders Hub.

What is the Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub?

• Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub is a new platform designed to remove traditional barriers to building a company and help founders innovate and grow – no matter their background, location, progress, or passions.
• The new platform offers startups free access to the technology, tools and resources they need to build and run their business. It provides technical support and guidance based on where startups are in their journey, allowing them flexibility to grow at their own pace. Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub is open to any startup with an idea, no funding needed.
• Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub was created based on what founders explicitly told Microsoft they need including access to a digital ecosystem that promotes opportunities and democratizes innovation.
• Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub is designed specifically for early-stage startups. Microsoft for Startups program experience is not changing for existing startup members.

What are the key benefits and functionalities?

• Unlike others in the industry, we do not restrict support based on affiliation or connections, therefore we don’t require startups to be ‘investor-backed’ to receive our help.
• At the same time, we believe technology enablement is a starting point, not the goal and that a one size fits all approach is not designed with a startup’s needs in mind.
• Our global platform thus provides startups with access to personalized technical guidance from experts at every development stage, a use-as-you-go approach to technical credits to support startups growth at their own pace, mentorship on a variety of business topics from hiring to go-to market strategy, as well as self-led learning to give founders, and their teams, the knowledge they need to progress to the next stage.

With Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub, founders can access more than US$300,000 in benefits, including:

Technology at no cost

• Azure credits – Brings startup’s solutions to life with free Azure credits. It lets them build, run, and manage applications across multiple clouds with the tools and frameworks of their choice. With Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub, we have a tiering system based on where startups are in their journey and can reward up to $150,000 in Azure credits.
• Microsoft 365 – Improve processes, reduce costs, and empower employees to work from anywhere with Microsoft Teams and more.
• GitHub Enterprise – GitHub is the largest and most advanced development platform in the world. GitHub Enterprise extends the flexibility and functionality of GitHub with features that simplify account administration and provide additional security, compliance, and deployment controls as your team scales.
• Visual Studio Enterprise – An integrated development environment (IDE) for Microsoft Windows fully packed with an array of tools and features to elevate and enhance every stage of software development, including computer programs, websites, web apps, web services, and mobile apps.
• Power BI Pro – Unified, scalable platform for business intelligence that provides deeper insights by connecting and visualizing any data.
• Power Platform – Empowers everyone in the organization with an intuitive, collaborative, and extensible platform of low-code tools that makes it easy to create efficient and flexible solutions.
• Power Automate – Power Automate is a service that helps create automated workflows between startup’s favorite apps and services to synchronize files, get notifications, collect data, and more.
• Dynamics 365 Customer Service Enterprise – End to end solution to deliver consistent, connected support across channels.
• Dynamics 365 Team Member – Empowering teams to work better together with access to Dynamics 365 instance.
• Dynamics Professional Direct Support – Fast response times and access to break/fix resources, upgrade and release readiness, enhanced service incident handling and more.
• LinkedIn – With over 660 million professionals across the globe it serves as a tool for start-ups to connect, help generate leads, build brand awareness while engaging audiences and growing business.

Exclusive offers from trusted partners

Based on the unique needs of founders, we are working with start-up friendly partners to offer discounts, free products, and credits. OpenAI, Ansarada and Drata are available today with new offerings added on a rolling basis.

• Also, today we are unveiling an exciting partnership with OpenAI, an AI research and deployment company whose mission is to ensure general-purpose AI benefits all of humanity. Together we will provide founders with exclusive access to $1,000 of credits, 3 free months OpenAI API Innovation License and free consultation with an Open AI expert. Founders can start building new products with OpenAI’s API which offers access to one of the most advanced language-based AI models in the world, GPT-3.
• Ansarada – an AI-powered platform designed to help streamline the process of raising capital. Ansarada’s curated startup deal room, which uses data from over 24,000 previous transactions to help you make more informed decisions about your fundraising strategy.
• Drata offers an advanced continuous automation platform for SOC 2, ISO 2700 & HIPAA compliance. With 50 + deep integrations, startups can quickly connect to their tech stack, start collecting evidence, and gain a real-time view of their security posture.

Guidance and mentorship

• Microsoft for Startups Mentor Network – Personalized guidance at every step through 1:1 mentorship with hundreds of mentors available for a variety of business topics, from hiring to go to-market strategy, to step-by-step guide to understand when, how, and why to raise a funding round.
• Microsoft for Startups Founders School – Curated learning paths and content made to help founders understand how to reach their business goals and sharpen up their technical development expertise.
• Azure technical advisory – Microsoft’s Azure technical experts are available to help startups and offer guidance at any development stage, whether just getting started on Azure or looking for help with a specific implementation.

Startups can apply for the program here.