Investing In Technology Forum

Arab Technology Business Plan Competition 2009 Semi-Finalists

October 8, 2009October 8, 2009 MMM 1 Comment

The Arab Technology Business Plan Competition, which is a regional Technology investment competition organized by Arab Science and Technology Foundation (ASTF) in cooperation with Intel Corporation, has just announced the list of semi-finalists for this year’s edition of the competition.

The list of 12 semi-finalists includes, in no particular order:

AqarMap (Yemen): An online real estate marketplace.
Telephone line powered lamp (Palestine): A solution to the frequent power outages in Gaza.
EDOM (Jordan): A system to produce green energy.
m-CASH (Palestine): A mobile payments solution.
Human Heater (Jordan): A new innovative heating product.
Therapeutic Vaccines (UAE): Vaccines to help treat chronic inflammation and cancer.
NovelMed (Egypt): New medical device.
Eye Controlled Typing (Palestine): Technology to help people with physical disabilities use computers.
Collapse Analysis (Egypt): Software applications to analyse building structures.
Wiphone (Egypt): Technology to convert earth frequency into wifi frequency and vice versa.
Blue Soft/Blue Phone (Egypt): Solution to minimize train accidents.
HFF (Egypt): Technology to extract hydrogen from water and use it to generate green energy.

The competition provides the Arab entrepreneurs with a number of needed tools and skills through training and mentoring, in order to turn their Technological innovation into business opportunities.

The top 3 winners will get cash prizes of $10k, $6k and $4k respectively; and will have the opportunity to show their business plans in front of venture capitals, angel fund and investors in the ASTF Investment in Technology Forum.

The top 2 winners will also get to represent the Arab World in the world wide finals of the Intel + UC Berkeley Technology Entrepreneurship Challenge (USA).

IIT Forum 6: The Arab World’s Top 10 Investment Ready Startups

May 19, 2009May 19, 2009 MMM 8 Comments

The 6th Investing In Technology Forum; an event that aims to be a networking opportunity for entrepreneurs, researchers, investors, regional corporate CEOs, and all technology leaders in the region to get together to share experiences, develop relationships and explore business opportunities; took place in Cairo, Egypt, last week.

One of the items on the event’s agenda was a series of pitches by Arab technology startups to a panel of the region’s most prominent angel investors and venture capitalists, in hopes to be selected among the top 10 investment ready startups in the Arab world.

There were 33 startups from around the region who pitched their businesses, and the panel evaluated each startup and gave them a score, rating them by their potential and readiness for investment.

The following ten startups came out on top:

Droubi: A company that has invented and patented a new method of dental surgery.
Glocalizer: A company that provides free wireless and technology advertising based products.
Applied Research Institute: A company that works on new technologies for water treatment and organic food.
eSpace: For WeNear, their framework for location based mobile services.
MobiLaps: A company that develops network applications for internet service providers.
Talasim: An online social network and photo gallery for comedy/funny content.
Aboker: A company that works on technology to produce biofuel and silicon carbon from environmental waste.
Vertex: A company that builds customised three-dimensional virtual worlds for education, real estate …etc.
SilMinds: A company that provides hardware acceleration technology thats speeds up intensive computing processes.
Kindisoft: A company that helps businesses to better protect their Rich Internet Applications based on Adobe Flash.

Quite an interesting mix of startups covering different fields, some who were only recently launched, and some that date back to the late 80’s, early 90’s (Droubi: 1989, Applied Research Institute: 1990).

After the selection happened, a number of the top startups were approached by some of the present investors who were interested in their businesses.

A list of these top 10 startups and their full descriptions can be downloaded in PDF format here. (Courtesy of Beep Beep.)

[Via: Beep Beep]

Investing In Technology Forum, Cairo, Egypt – May 12-14th 2009

April 3, 2009April 3, 2009 MMM

The Arab Science and Technology Foundation (ASTF), a Pan-Arab NGO with the mission of promoting and supporting Science, Technology and Entrepreneurship as a tool of economic development in the MENA region, has announced its 6th Investing in Technology Forum to be held this year in Cairo, Egypt on May 12th -14th, 2009 under the Patronage of H.E. Dr. Ahmed Nazif, Prime Minister of Egypt.

Organized in cooperation with ITIDA and Nile University, the forum is a networking opportunity for entrepreneurs, researchers, investors, regional corporate CEOs, and all technology leaders in the region who will get together to share experiences, develop relationships and explore business opportunities.

The Forum falls into ASTF efforts to bridge the gap between those who generate technology and those who generates businesses and investments, with the ultimate aim of creating strong, innovative and competitive knowledge-based businesses that can add value, generate jobs and create wealth.

The Forum is targeted at an audience of investment and business professionals; multinational corporations; leading regional corporations in technology innovation; venture capital funds, private equity funds, and investment banks; angel investors and business angel groups; technology leaders in the Arab region; incubators and technology parks; universities and research centers; NGOs and Gov. organizations; as well as technology startups and SMEs.