About - Turbine

Our Passion
Building an enduring start-up community in the Indian Ocean

We passionate about building communities

Meet our team

We’re passionate about building an enduring start-up community in the Indian Ocean and about supporting our incredible entrepreneurs as they set out to conquer the world.

Fabrice Boullé

Director

Fabrice is Compass’ Partner. He is responsible for the firm’s direction of travel. Fabrice is an ardent believer in the Indian Ocean region’s potential for innovation and ability to create start-ups that will conquer the world. Fabrice is passionate about investment and is convinced of the practical and monetary value of long-term partnerships. He has over 10 years’ experience in finance and previously worked at blue chip companies in Europe and Australia, notably as a Senior Associate in a private equity company investing in the East African region, and as a Senior Consultant in a global firm specialised in advisory and assurance services.

Diane Maigrot

Startup and Business Growth manager

I strongly believe that Turbine can make a difference and contribute to a better rate of succes for new businesses in Mauritius.
I have 18 years of experience in Entrepreneurship as I have also my own business, my ambition is to help others start this exciting journey of being an Entrepreneur!

Pooja Raghoo

Communication and events coordinator

Pooja is responsible for the market presence of Turbine. From digital to traditional media, she handles all the communication of Turbine. She is also responsible to connect Turbine with innovators, entrepreneurs, start-ups and key people for whom she organizes tailor made events to enhance the entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Having a degree in Management and entrepreneurship and being an aspiring entrepreneur herself, Pooja joined Turbine in 2017 to strengthen Turbine’s Network and brand.
She believes that entrepreneurship is not an easy career path and there are a lot ups and downs. Alone and despite the intense passion, an entrepreneur may fall weak at times. With the support of Turbine, such inconveniences will be much reduced.

Shubhda Gujadhur

Community Associate

Shubhda is Turbine’s first point of contact for start-ups and the coworking space. Her role is to nurture a working environment that favors collaboration and the discovery of impactful synergies among different stakeholders.

Emerging from a highly technical background, Shubhda’s skills lie in critical and design thinking as well as in community building.

"My vision for Turbine is to see us becoming the reference point for innovation and entrepreneurship in Sub-Saharan Africa as well as in the Indian Ocean at large." --SG

Entrepreneurship is

our inspiration

Our team consists of exceptional people with a passion for and track record in innovation entrepreneurship. We are committed to working with you through the challenging moments that make or break a business.

We’re not just here to offer you a roof – we’re here to help you grow.

Turbine is led by a Committee drawn from the ENL Group’s senior management and heavyweight independent directors. Their people skills, experience and expertise help our portfolio companies go from strength to strength.

All you need to know

Question and Answers

Who is Turbine?

Turbine is a co-working space and a start-up incubator in Mauritius. Launched by ENL Group in 2015, Turbine acts as a catalyst for entrepreneurs helping them convert their ideas into successful and sustainable businesses. Turbine is a national accredited incubator by the Mauritius Research Council (MRC). Turbine works closely with Sting, the leading Accelerator in the Nordics.

What is a business incubator?

A business incubator is an organization that accompanies entrepreneurs in developing their business idea by providing services such as business coaching, co-working space, access to the useful network, experts advice in legal, marketing, tech and business exposure through the different platforms.

Why would i need to be incubated?

More than 90% start-ups fail before the second year of operation. An incubator increases significantly the chances of success by helping you develop your business idea in a sustainable manner.

We will help start-ups to go through their:

Business Development: We assist our startups with developing the correct business model, tailoring their customer focus, value proposition and advise them on methodology to increase retention.
Sales and marketing: Startups receive feedback on their go-to market strategy, optimization of sales through enhancing their marketing strategy , shortening their sales cycles and help them devise systems that increase their conversion rate.
Product development: Our coaches help startups identify important features to which development time should be allocated. They also assist in implementing procedures to test their product and understand when to make use of existing libraries and open source facilities available to them and when to develop from scratch.
Key metrics: It is important for startups to identify their principle goals and metrics in order to ensure the sustainability of their company. Our coaches help incubates to define their goals and metrics as well as help them align their short term goals to their long term goals.
Process: We give our startups feedback on how to develop efficient processes that optimize the progress rate of their company.
Financing: Often times, a business needs funding in order to further its development. Turbine helps its incubated enterprises assess their company’s worth, their required funding and when to attempt to raise it. We also help our startups identify investors when it is possible.
Team and individual development: Different businesses require different skill sets. The Turbine team will help businesses identify,
What additions to the team are most important? How should we find them? How do we need to develop ourselves to increase the company’s speed?
Order and structure: Do we have a stock register, shareholder agreement, balance sheet, bookkeeping etc.?

What are the other benefits of Turbine Incubation?

Business coaching: you will have a dedicated business coach who will work closely with you and your team on a weekly basis. The coach will be always involved in the important activities and help you set and achieve your milestones.
Access to Network: you will be put in contact with experts and professionals which will allow you to expose your business idea to get concrete feedback based on their experience. This access to network can potentially lead to business contracts or partnerships.
Co-Working space: you will benefit from free access to our co-working space (including all amenities) located in Vivéa Business Park, Moka for the first 6 months of the Incubation Program. This will help you start your business and meet talented professionals.
Access to Finance: you will receive assistance in preparing your business plan, your revenue model and your pitch to present your business in front of potential investors such as Turbine’s sister company Compass Venture Capital.
Workshops: you will be enrolled in tailor-made workshops organized by Turbine and delivered by renowned experts. These exclusive workshops shall enrich your entrepreneurial knowledge and capacity building.
Experts advice: 30 hours of free experts advice for the period of the Incubation Program will definitely help you develop a sustainable business, imagine having a one to one support on Legal, Digital, Finance, Sales or Marketing with the top field’s experts of Mauritius.

How Turbine sustains itself?

Turbine is a non-for-profit organization financially supported by ENL Group, one of the top player in the Mauritian business ecosystem.
ENL Group participates in the economic development of the country and encourages Innovation and the creation of new business with Turbine as an Incubator.
Turbine also takes 10% of the equity of each incubated startups, the aim is to be self-sufficient in a long-term.
Successful startups will generate enough revenues to finance Turbine operation and help new Entrepreneurs.

What are the selection criteria for Incubation?

The main selection criteria are innovation, scalability, and dedication of the entrepreneur or the team working on the project.
We are looking for ambitious entrepreneurs and team ready to solve a real problem or take advantage of an incredible opportunity.

How many startups Turbine has incubated?

Since January 2017, Turbine has incubated 7 startups which are:

Dodo Work Play – learning through gamification
Mauritius Conscious Ltd – Tour Operator of Sustainable Eco-Tourism
Fundkiss Technologies Ltd – 1st crowd lending platform in Mauritius
Fancy Dreams Ltd – Creative and personalized luxury packaging.
NavigPro Ltd – corporate transport service company through a mobile application
Létour – provide authentic Mauritian experiences to foreigners
AVR Plato Technologies Ltd – modern learning platform through Augmented Reality.

Who are your coaches?

Turbine business coaches are:

– Diane Maigrot (Startup and business growth manager of Turbine).
Diane has an experience as an Entrepreneur, she started her first business in the design, manufacture and the retail of kids garment in Mauritius (Tibo & Zia).
She also started a car washing business using an eco-friendly solution in 2015 which is still active.
Diane is now in charge of Turbine Incubator and her goal is to help and support the next generation of Entrepreneurs in Mauritius.

– Fabrice Boullé (Director of Turbine)

– Aysha Julie (Professional coach)

What is the Turbine’s methodology?

We believe in “fail fast, fail forward”. Dare to try things that do not work perfectly: Create a prototype (MVP), measure usage and compare to quickly move towards the operation and business models that work. Speed is the key. Our methods are best characterized as “lean” and iterative.

The main methods and tools are “Lean Startup” and “Lean Canvas”. Our coaching is always based on “pull” rather than “push”, i.e. it’s the coach’s task to help you find and decide what is the right way forward/focus/priorities etc, rather than telling you what s/he thinks you should do. You’re always in the driver’s seat!

Do you offer seed investment and if so how much exactly?

There is no automation of seed funding investment. We work conjointly with “Compass Venture Capital”. Incubated start-ups can have the opportunity to pitch to Compass to receive seed funding (up to Rs 1 million).

The minimum requirements to Pitch in front of potential investors is to validate your MVP, work full time on the project and show a good return on investment.

If you are interested to join our Incubation Program or if you have any other query, please contact us.

Get in Touch

Let us know if you got an interesting project and want to work together!