Ampion Venture Bus West Africa 2015 begins September in Abidjan
Ampion Venture Bus West Africa 2015, a 7-day road trip designed to encourage participants to develop startups in financial inclusion and democratic participation, will kick off on September 17 in Abidjan, Ivory Coast.
Organised by Ampion, a pan-African entrepreneurship initiative that enables young Africans to start ICT companies, 45 talented entrepreneurs will embark on the tour from September 17 to 23, 2015 to meet tech startup communities in Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, Benin and Nigeria.
The startups on the Venture Bus will be encouraged to collaborate with Ampion’s partners to develop innovative solutions in the fields of fin-tech and governance.
Ampion is organizing the programme in partnership with Transparency International, the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) and leading financial institutions in West Africa. The partnerships will also cover the Ampion Fellowship, a start-up incubation programme to be launched and ran in West Africa from October 2015 to March 2016.
The Venture Bus programme which gets underway at the brand new Fablab Baby Lab in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, participants will shuttle between working on own startup ideas on the bus and pitching workshops and coaching sessions during stops in the region’s biggest tech hubs.
The best startups emerging from the Venture Bus West Africa – chosen at a grand finale to be held in Lagos on September 23 – will have the chance to apply for the Ampion Fellowship West Africa 2015/2016.
The Fellowship is a six-month incubation programme which offers the startups a unique opportunity to be mentored by some of the world’s best investors. Ampion Fellows will travel to a kick-off event in Berlin, Germany, to meet investors and to refine their business model.
Ampion, a non-profit organisation, is a catalyst for entrepreneurship and innovation in the emerging world which has more than 40 people in over 20 countries dedicating their free time to AMPION. Ampion is winner of the “Global Innovation Ecosystem Award 2015” as well as the “Pan African Awards for Entrepreneurship in Education 2014.”
Posted by Janice Johnson
