PIVOT East 2014 - Call for applicatio
Greetings,
I trust you are well.
PIVOT East 2014 is here! PIVOT East,
one of the most prestigious mobile start-up competitions and
conferences is back in Nairobi after a successful event at Sheraton
Hotel in Kampala, Uganda in 2013. This years conference will be held on
24th - 25th June in Nairobi, Kenya.
PIVOT
East aims to catalyse the growth of mobile startups, so as to amplify
and consolidate the gains of East Africa’s Mobile developer and
entrepreneurship ecosystem. The key objective for this year’s event is
“to facilitate discovery of the next wave of high potential mobile
startups in the region”.
PIVOT
East has officially opened the call for applications for 2014.
Start-ups across the region that meet the requirement can start applying
for the competition. Startups may join the competition through the
PIVOT East Startups Community Network startups.pivoteast.com. Information on how to join including eligibility criteria may be found here pivoteast.com/how-to-enter.
Applications
to compete in 2014 will be entered as detailed startup profiles which
describe the customer pain, the startups solution, revenue streams, team
composition and commitment, market traction, short-term projections and
milestones among other aspects. The overall startup profile will be
used by the competition judges who will mostly be investors to score the
potential of the startup to become a sustainable high growth
enterprise.
The
competition has five categories which are; Mobile Finance, Mobile
Enterprise, Mobile Entertainment, Mobile Society and Mobile Utility.
Each category will feature five finalists who will pitch to an audience
of Investors, Development Partners, Government Representatives, Telecom
Operators and other key mobile industry players from East Africa. The
five category winners will attract investment from the m:lab, who are
the organizers of the competition.
25
finalists in the competition will receive training, coaching and
mentorship on how to arrive at repeatable and scalable business models.
The finalists will also receive training and coaching on how to pitch to
investors. PIVOT East is the primary route for startups to secure
support through the m:lab’s residential and virtual incubation programs.
The deadline for submission of applications is on 11th April 2014.
Applicants are encouraged to start building and curating their startup
profiles early as they might need to research or source some of the
information required widely. Applicants are also required to upload a
short (max 5 mins) video of the founders expressing the mission and
strength of their startups.
Companies that reached final 25 lists of Pivot 25 in 2011, Pivot East 2012 and Pivot East 2013 may
not compete with products/services previously submitted for the
competition, the judging panel will have discretion to disqualify
entries in breach of this requirement. Companies that entered the
competition but did not make it to the finals can compete with the same
product, all you have to do is update your startup profile on startups.pivoteast.com
Information on finalists of previous editions of PIVOT may be found on the PIVOT East website (2011, 2012, 2013). For more information on PIVOT East 2014, please visit our website at www.pivoteast.com, follow us on Twitter @PivotEast, find us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/PivotEast or visit us on Google+ at PivotEast.
Please email us on egra@mlab.co.ke or lincoln@mlab.co.ke if you require any additional information about PIVOT East 2014.
Best Regards
--
Egira Kemunto Ombati
m:Lab East Africa
Mobile, Startups, Learning
www.mlab.co.ke Twitter: @mlabeastafrica
