Startup competition Seedstars World 2015 to kick-off in Mozambique

Seedstars World is a global competition for startups, which aims to find smart startups that solve regional issues, or develop profitable products for global markets. The competition’s third incarnation kicks-off this may and will be taking place 26 May in Maputo, Mozambique.

The seven-month event will be taking place in 12 different countries around Africa, which are Mozambique, South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Rwanda, Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Botswana.

Once the regional winners have been selected, the final will take place in February 2016, in Switzerland. Contestants are competing for a US$1.5-million in equity investments and various other prizes. This final will consist of a three-day startup bootcamp, networking sessions, workshops, and final pitches to determine the winner.

The team behind Seedstars World have traveled between 76 countries in the past two years and identified the 3 000 applicants. Out of these, 600 applicants have been selected to partake in the competition.

Seedstars World is running a new ambassador program in which it will name a local ambassador in each city where the events are held. These ambassadors are representative of the local startup ecosystem. This program aims to work more directly with local players in order to sustain and focus entrepreneurship.

This year sees another new addition to the competition in the form of Investments Tracks. Seedstars World has partnered up with lastminute.com. Their partnership aims to find the best travel startups, and with an unannounced financial institution, find the most innovative fintech company. The Investment Tracks will each carry a price of US$500 000, and the association of the largest players in that field as an added bonus.

Seedstars World CEO, Alisée de Tonnac, says the company has been thinking about Investment Tracks for a while.

We have always thought about doing industry-specific tracks to add more value to the participating startups. lastminute.com is the perfect partner to develop our first track.