Ghana: Chalkboard Education named best startup at Seedstars Accra
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Seedstars World, the global seed-stage startup competition for emerging markets and fast-growing startup scenes brought its Ghana round to a successful close during Seedstars Accra. The event took place this Sunday in Impact Hub Accra , where 9 selected startups were invited to present their ideas in front of the local and injury panel.
The local winner, Chalkboard education offers plug-and-play mobile learning solutions that work on any device and without an Internet connection. “If i judge by last years winners i think the global summit in Switzerland is going to be life changing. Last year’s winners Asoriba had an amazing year and we hope to be able to do the same with the help of the Seedstars platform.” explains Adrien Bouilloit, Founder and CEO of Chalkboard Education. As a part of the prize, Chalkboard Education will be participating at Seedstars Summit, taking place in Switzerland in March 2017, a weeklong training program with the opportunity to meet the other 60 winners, as well as investors and mentors from around the world. Traditionally, the final day of the Summit will be dedicated to pitching in front of audience of 1000 attendees, with the possibility of winning up to the USD 1 million equity investment.
1st runner up was Landmapp, that offers affordable land rights documentation for smallholder farmers and builds accurate data profiles to broker additional services. The 2nd runner-up, TECHAiDE is an all-in one content delivery system that is a low-power, durable device that reaches low-income, Internet free places in the World. The other startups invited to pitch were HQ Renewable Tech, GoSun Stove, Krinotech Solutions, Cocktail Insights, SynCommerce and Nubian Oryx.
Seedstars World has closely worked with Impact Hub in order to deliver the best possible event and to provide local entrepreneurs with this opportunity.
“After reviewing all the startups that applied to SeedStars Accra 2016, we are very happy to see that this was another successful event, one which will showcase Ghana’s potential as an exporter of technology.” says local ambassador Victor Kelechi, Community Manager at Impact Hub Accra.
The 8 startups pitched in front of a prestigious jury, including Ato ulzen appiah founder at GhanaThink Foundation, Selam kebede Associate at Seedstars World, Mansa Ayisi-Okyere, African Entrepreneurs Hub, Ethel Cofie founder at Women in Tech Africa and Leticia Browne partnership manager at Ghana Angel Investors Network |GAIN.
Seedstars Accra featured an insightful keynote by Nana Prempeh, founder of Asoriba and winner of seedstars world Accra 2015. “The Seedstars World competition truly gave us the opportunity to shine and get exposure and visibility. As an entrepreneur you need opportunities like these to get your feet into the door. For us, Seedstars World open the door to get into Techstars accelerator in South Africa for example.”
“The quality of startups in Ghana is absolutely impressive and it was very hard to choose a winner amongst so many great companies. However, we are very happy with our decision to take Chalkboard Education to our Global Summit.” says Selam A. Kebede, Associate for Seedstars World Africa.
The Accra leg of the event was supported by local and international organizations, such as Orange, Meltwater entrepreneurial school of technology, Barcamp, Ghana Think, TEDxAccra, VC4Afrika, Lionesses of Africa and Brussels Airlines.
“With nearly 8 million passengers per year from around the globe, we can offer the winning business the visibility and reach they need. Africa is the stronghold of our network, and we are committed to give back to the communities we fly to. Seedstars World is the ideal partner for us to do so. By enabling African tech startups to showcase their business to all our long-haul guests from and to Africa, North-Atlantic and soon also India, we hope to contribute to the further development of technology entrepreneurship on the continent” says Bernard Gustin, CEO Brussels Airlines.
All participating startups will also qualify for two major prizes that Seedstars World is running this year: Together with TRECC Startups in Education qualify for the global “Transforming Education Prize” which will award the best startup in the education space from around the world with a prize of over USD 50,000. In addition, Seedstars World and Intel are collaborating on the “Intel Solutions Challenge” to find the best startups in Hardware, IoT, Cloud and Analytics with the goal of inviting them to a prestigious Demo Day with internal and external partners who will give access to market and funding for the best startups.
Continuing on its world tour of startup scenes in emerging markets and fast-growing startup scenes, Seedstars World’s next stop is Abidjan at Co-Lab to select the best startup in Ivory Coast. Seedstars World is looking for smart startups that solve regional issues and/or develop profitable products for the global market.
Staff Writer