Meet the Expert Lineup of Mentors for Seedspace Cairo’s ‘It’s Easier Online’ Hackathon

In addition to having one-on-one mentorship sessions with key players from the ecosystem, the Seedstars hackathon’s winning ideas will each receive EGP 200,000 in initial funding.

Staff Writer VIEW ALL ARTICLES BY Staff Writer

Date
09/06/2020 12:24

With no clear end in sight to how the Coronavirus crisis will play out, Egypt’s vulnerable communities and businesses are struggling to adapt to what we now dub as “the new normal”. This reality now involves eliminating human contact to the bare minimum, which leaves the country’s rural businesses and informal sector at a loss.

These market vendors, wholesalers and farmers are now in need of unique, smart solutions for this unprecedented economic topple. In comes Seedspace Cairo’s new hackathon: It’s Easier Online. The online event invites startups to think up a digital resolve to Egypt’s informal sector dilemma.

These bright thinkers will need to face two major challenges facing this community: Challenge A) how to help urban market vendors sell in contact-free ways due to closures and curfews brought on by the COVID-19 outbreak, and B) create a supply chain and business model to how these vendors can be equipped to catapult their local businesses into well-oiled-machines that can package, produce, transport and market their produce in both urban and rural cities.

Three winning entrepreneurs will each receive EGP 200,000, and two runner ups will get a cash prize of EGP 20,000. In addition to the grand prizes, startups will have the chance to work one-on-one with Seedstars’ impressive slate of mentors, including execs and experts from Aramex, Mastercard, The World Bank, World Food Programme and UNDP.

Find out more and apply here.