Three Mozambican startups head for international competition in Helsinki

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Three Mozambican startups head for international competition in Helsinki

8:52 CAT | 15 Aug 2017

slush.org (File photo)

Mozambican startups Toor (a culture and tourism information platform), Bio Oasis (an agro-processing platform) and Wamina (women’s hygiene and health) have been selected for entry in the Slush Global Event, one of the largest entrepreneurship events in Europe.

According to the jury of the event, the three emerging companies are financially viable and show strong growth, the necessary attributes to represent Mozambique in the grand finale from 30 November to 1 December in Helsinki, Finland.

The event gathers emerging market entrepreneurs, investors, startups, talents and media from all corners of the globe.

Noticias reports that those selected have promised to represent Mozambique to the best of their abilities. Isack Lipoche, Toor’s founder, said he was ready to showcase the potential of his initiative, which aims to show the beauty of Mozambique and contribute to the dissemination of culture and the development of national tourism.

Alberto Nhatave, director of Bio Oasis, said the platform’s selection showed that hard work could take you far. He added that he would prepare for the show exhaustively with the aim of convincing the jury and, if possible, bringing first prize home to Mozambique.

Filipa Carreira, from Wamina, said she was happy to be among those selected, an honour which validated the work that her entity has been doing. Participation in the competition was an opportunity to showcase her enterprise to more people, and so improve the health of those women who use her services.

Alfredo Cuanda, leader of Ideário, which promotes the event in Mozambique, said that the selection was the culmination of hard work, with participants benefiting from motivational lectures and other training in order to be able to represent their country.

“There were 25 initiatives competing, of which just six were selected for the final phase on Thursday. Participants had three minutes to compete for the three available positions. We hope that the initiatives selected will put Mozambique at the top of the table,” he said.

Meanwhile Sasha Vieira, who is responsible for Standard Bank’s Business Incubator and arranged funding for the selection process, believes that the initiative has the distinctive characteristic of not only promoting entrepreneurship but also offering visibility to projects with a positive impact on communities and society in general.

Last year, two startups represented Mozambique, the only Lusophone country to participate in the contest. IzyShop was one of the three Slush GIA 2016 winners.

Also Read: Izyshop: Introducing online shopping to Maputo residents

Mozambique was also represented by Mozambikes who, despite not finishing among the winners, so impressed the jury that they promised to do everything they could to help the initiative.

Source: AIM Moçambique