PIVOT East, one of the most prestigious mobile startup competitions and conferences is now open for entries through it’s PIVOT East Startups Community Network. The competition officially opens its application portal for entries on March 31st 2015 and will continue to accept applications until midnight EAT on April 30th 2015.
PIVOT East is organized by m:lab East Africa – a consortium comprising iHub, eMobilis, University of Nairobi and the World Wide Web Foundation. The competition aims to catalyse 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”.
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 2015 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 Governance and Mobile Utilities. 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 25 finalists will 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 30th April 2015. 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.
Companies that reached final 25 lists of Pivot 25 in 2011, Pivot East 2012 ,Pivot East 2013 and PIVOT East 2014 may not compete with products/services previously submitted for the competition, the judging panel will have discretion to disqualify entries in breach of this requirement. Companies that entered the competition but did not make it to the finals can compete with the same product, all you have to do is update your startup profile on startups.pivoteast.com
