One of the most prestigious mobile start-up competitions and conferences, PIVOT East 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 catalyze 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.
Source: www.pivoteast.com
