New Delhi, May 11 (IANS): On the occasion of National Technology Day, Kochi-based business incubator Startup Village was bestowed the national award for technology business incubator on Monday.

"Startup Village’s role is to play a foundation layer in the creation a culture of entrepreneurship among youth, particularly in engineering colleges by converting final-year academic projects into startups,” said Pranav Kumar, chief executive of Startup Village.

The business incubator received the award from Minister of Science and Technology Harsh Vardhan at a function here. The business incubator has supported 530-plus nascent firms in three years.

Startup Village was incepted in April 2012 as the country’s first public-private-partnership (PPP) model technology business incubator.

Startup Village is directly promoted by the government of India’s department of science and technology (DST), along with Technopark in Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi-based MobME Wireless Solutions.