Innovation justice brought its SME empowerment challenge to East & West Africa to find and strengthen new initiatives, specifically innovations that empower and address regulatory hurdles and bureaucratic red tape faced by youth-led startups and SMEs.
Presently, 21 innovations across East and West Africa have been shortlisted with representatives coming from Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Ethiopia and Ghana. And the voting phase is now opened to the public. The voting phase will be closing on 17th of September.
Six innovators will be chosen from the voting phase to attend the Innovation Bootcamp in Lagos, this October, and a panel of experts will select 3 of the most promising innovations to attend the Innovation Justice forum at Hague, Netherlands this December where the finalists will compete for seed investments of a total of $70,000, acceleration support and access to funding, networks and expert advice.
Back in June, Techpoint caught up with Wilfred De Wever, Head of Innovating Justice, for an interview. Wilfred commented on their future plans in Africa laying credence to the success of the SME empowerment challenge as a monumental surge to increase its efforts in Africa. You can read the full interview here.
You can learn more about Innovation Justice and vote for your favorite startups at the Innovation Justice voting site.
Report: Millionaire West African startups” raised over $1.806 billion between 2010 and 2019, 97.9% of which went to Nigerian startups. Get a free overview and 50% purchase discount here.
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