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The Largest Entrepreneurship Conference You Have Never Heard Of

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This week is the 7th annual Development Dialogue. It’s the largest entrepreneurship conference that you have never heard of. Hosted by the Deshpande Foundation in Hubli, Karnataka, this conference annually attracts 400 entrepreneurs, 1500 college students, and 2500 farmers to a variety of events held during the week. (Full disclosure – I was Executive Director of the Deshpande Foundation when the conference was launched.).

While the conference is not as well-known as other entrepreneurship conferences, like South by Southwest or TiECON, I believe there are several reasons why the Development Dialogue has grown over the years and now attracts some of the top leaders in India, including Narayana Murthy, Ratan Tata, Mohandas Pai and the Indian Minister of Rural Development Jairam Ramesh. Of course, the conference is chaired annually by Desh and Jaishree Deshpande. Dr. Deshpande also serves as Co-Chair of President Obama’s National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

The primary, but often over looked reason for the growth of this conference is that it is actually held in the field. Hubli, Karnataka is located in northwest Karnataka – eight hours from Bangalore or Mumbai. It is a region of a few million people and was not very global in nature until recently. But in the international development world, conferences are almost never held in the field. They are held at swanky hotels in modern global cities like New York, Geneva and London. Donor agencies, foundations and high net worth philanthropists generally will visit the field sites they fund, but don’t want to stay longer than they have to.

But anyone who has been an entrepreneur knows the critical importance of location. Entrepreneurship ecosystems, and the conferences that mark them, are inherently local by nature, even if they become global over the years, like SxSW. These conferences are where entrepreneurs meet investors, mentors, advisors, potential board members, recruit employees and learn about breakthroughs in their field. It is where the various players comes together. So if the international development community really wants to get serious about entrepreneurship and innovation being a source of solutions to global problems like poverty, food security and education, there will need to be more of these conferences held….in the field.

The second reason this conference is important is that it attracts entrepreneurs interested in the issues of the region. The Development Dialogue is part of a larger project by the Deshpande Foundation called the Sandbox, which brings together entrepreneurs, philanthropists, investors and others from around the world. Well known Indian American entrepreneurs like Hemang Dave, Palaniswamy Rajan and Hemant Kanakia have all attended, as have leading American universities like Northeastern University, UC Berkeley and the University of Southern California. But the bulk of the entrepreneurs are from Hubli – they are college students trying out ideas, farmers looking to grow their family farms, and committed entrepreneurs participating in a variety of accelerator programs launched by the Foundation. The Dialogue brings them all together annually. Over 10,000 local residents and colleges students now annually take up an entrepreneurship project through these initiatives.

The third reason that this conference is important is that is occurring as far from Silicon Valley as possible. No disrespect to Silicon Valley, because everyone is trying to be the next Silicon Valley. But the Valley is so, so far ahead of everyone, that it’s an impossible model to use for replication. That is why it’s important that new cities – whether it’s Hubli, New Orleans or Cleveland, figure out their own path towards a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem. At the Development Dialogue, we see entrepreneurs focused on agricultural productivity innovation, supply chain management, health supply chain management software, watershed construction and a host of other issues that are relevant to the region. We don’t see whole lot of big data startups because that is not relevant to the region. The big mistake most entrepreneur ecosystem planners make is to try and create startups in sectors like data analytics when they clearly don’t have the capacity too. It took Silicon Valley, and Boston, and Austin, TX decades to figure out how to take an idea and turn it into a commercial success.

I have missed the last few Development Dialogue. But I am excited to see how they have grown, and how entrepreneurship is becoming a bigger part of the international development discussion – in India, Africa and elsewhere. Next year, trade in your Davos invite and come hear about the next big thing in Hubli.