Subscribe

Contest to reward young start-ups

Michelle Avenant
By Michelle Avenant, portals journalist.
Johannesburg, 06 Nov 2015
The Startupper of the Year challenge will reward start-ups with capital and business training.
The Startupper of the Year challenge will reward start-ups with capital and business training.

Total South Africa kicked off its Startupper of the Year Challenge yesterday: a contest running in 34 African countries seeking to identify, reward and assist innovative start-ups with potential to boost local development.

The South African leg of the contest calls for entrants who are 35 or younger and have start-ups less than two years old. A shortlist of ten start-ups will be chosen, from which up to three will be selected to win the Startupper of the Year 2016 title, customised business development coaching, and up to R600 000 to develop their business.

"The challenge is open to all business ideas from all sectors or industries," says Dr Jerry Gule, marketing and compliance manager at Total SA. It is looking for innovative, sustainable business proposals that can generate income and local job opportunities, and ideally work to replace imports, Gule continues. "We also know that economic growth and social change will come from the integration of small business in big businesses' value chains," he adds.

Additionally, start-ups will be judged according to how they improve the living conditions of those in their community.

Challenge finalists will be selected by a panel of professionals from different sectors with experience in entrepreneur and business development, says Gule. This includes people from corporate environments as well as business education and incubation institutions, he adds.

The challenge seeks to reward enterprise creation and development in the form of start-ups that have actioned their ideas or proposals by producing and developing products or offering and expanding services to customers, says Gule.

Eligible start-ups can enter the challenge via its Web site, and applications are open until 31 January 2016.

Share