Dubai: This weekend, Arab entrepreneurs from 13 countries battled it out in Cairo to win more than Dh183,000 ($50,000) in start-up seed money as well as mentoring support from successful business leaders.
Nine finalist teams from the UAE, Lebanon, Egypt and Yemen participated in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Arab Business Plan Competition in partnership with Abdul Latif Jameel (ALJ) Company.
"Given the current economic climate globally, the Arab world has never been more in need of entrepreneurial talent to lift its competitiveness and financial prospects" ALJ representative Fadi Jameel said.
More than 1,800 budding entrepreneurs entered the competition. Ideas ranged from the energy sector to engineering, health care, internet-based business solutions, software, and telecommunication.
Winners
The Lebanon team was deemed the most promising entrepreneurs and won the $50,000 while the Egypt team took home $15,000 (Dh55,000) to help realise their business dreams.
"Taking part in the MIT Arab Business Plan Competition has enabled us to refine our entrepreneurial vision while really understanding the dedication and attention to detail required to create and manage a successful business. We hope to help inspire our fellow entrepreneurs in the Middle East and encourage them to be a part of the 2011 competition — it's been an incredible learning and development experience," Rana Al Chemaitelly, The Little Engineer, said.
Although the UAE team's hopes to build their empire have been temporarily delayed, they are still confident of their idea to build a specialised search engine, Vastry, which connects online publishers and advertisers. Team leader Mohammad Hawass said online publishers, that have websites, can register for a fee and post media kits containing information about their advertising rates, contact numbers and profile, among other details.
Advertisers would also be able to efficiently search for legitimate online publishers to negotiate a profitable advertising deal.
"All these details will provide a shortcut for both parties," Hawass said. The Vastry search engine would play an important role in digital media buying he said.
Hawass, who is a Cairo University graduate, is joined by his brother Hussam, who is currently a student at the University of Alexandria, and Pakistani national Syed Shah.
"We got the idea after the pain we experienced in previous jobs where we had to search for key online publishers for our online campaigns. It was extremely difficult trying to source legitimate publishers," Hawass said.
The team members have experience in online media and internet marketing, programming and managing websites.
