Sri Lanka amidst the turmoil, will a Start-up Nation still emerge?

Images of political complication and economic strife are the norm across world media coverage of Sri Lanka this year. After a recent market study visit however by Vikram Bharati, founder of Draper Startup House— having links to Tim Draper, the billionaire investor, known for his bold bets like Hotmail, Tesla, and Coinbase—he is confident the entrepreneurship ecosystem Sri Lanka is building presents the country’s greatest opportunity in overcoming its hardships.

“Sri Lanka has tremendous potential to emerge a true start-up nation. It has all the ingredients we’ve seen before, so we’re betting on it,” Vikram said in an interview.

In Colombo, Vikram met with Jeevan Gnanam and Brindha Selvadurai, creators of the award winning Sri Lankan co-working space, start-up incubator, and accelerator, “Hatch”. Together, they envision an economy fueled by purpose driven innovators and are on a mission to develop a thriving startup ecosystem by empowering budding entrepreneurs.

Jeevan’s passion for disruptive innovation and supporting the startup ecosystem in Sri Lanka as a means to build the economy started when he was growing Orion City, Sri Lanka’s largest IT-park. “Innovation is known to breed in crisis, Sri Lanka must focus on adopting a growth mindset and remaining resilient as they have done several times before. The community at Hatch and the ecosystem we are building represents the hope that still remains in Sri Lanka.” says Jeevan. He added “Sri Lanka has the potential to produce pioneer innovations as elements of the crises we are currently facing head first are being seen across the world”