Lai See | Nest and AIA offer mentoring programme for start-ups

An interesting opportunity has arisen for people planning to set up a start-up. Nest, an early-stage venture capital firm in Hong Kong, and AIA, one of Asia's largest insurance companies, have together launched a project called AIA Accelerator, which seeks to encourage innovation in health and wearable technology start-ups. Nest, which has been running for four years, provides seed capital and support to start-up entrepreneurs in Asia.

The way the Accelerator scheme works is that those with an idea in the area of health care and wearable technology have until February 1 next year to submit their proposals. Eight winners will be accepted into the programme and notified on February 9.

The programme gets under way on March 2 and lasts for 12 weeks. During this period, participants get access to about 50 mentors from AIA, Microsoft Corp, Amazon, Nest and others.

"This is a priceless offer," Simon Squibb, founder of Nest, told Lai See. "You cannot buy this kind of access to a mentor network. We are giving them support and advice, which is much more valuable to them than cash at this stage."

After three months, Nest will organise a Demo Day where the entrepreneurs present their ideas to investors with a view to persuading them to invest.

Aside from giving a boost to the start-up industry, Squibb believes there is a huge demand for innovation in health care and he thinks the way we receive health care will change radically over the next 10 years, driven by technological change.