Apply for Merck Accelerator Lagos Satellite Programme ($3000 in Funding)

Merck Accelerator, in partnership with MEST incubator recently opened applications for early-stage startups in West Africa.

The Merck Accelerator initiative is a satellite programme which recently concluded its Nairobi edition. The Lagos leg of the programme will enable startups to explore potential collaboration with Merck’s innovation projects.

Merck’s Accelerator innovation project focuses on the following areas:

• Healthcare Access Solutions: Innovative startups with solutions addressing delivery of healthcare, financing therapies, healthcare connected logistics, community self-service enablement and faster diagnosis
• Biosensing and Interfaces: Startups integrating electronics and biology to develop groundbreaking medical treatment solutions, based on a unique mix of sensor data retrieval, machine learning, and curation expertise.
• Precision Farming: Startups with ideas using combinations of materials, analytics, and services that will create a system of farming that is no longer dependent on the blanket application of agrochemicals to feed an expanding global population in a sustainable way.

Eligibility

• Interested startups should have an innovative solution related to any of the above
• Must have been operating for less than four years
• Have at least two co-founders

Benefits

• The overall winning startup receives $3,000 cash prize
• A fully paid trip to Merck headquarters in Germany to pitch for partnership and collaboration on Merck’s projects
• Access to Merck training materials and networks, including its innovator academy TrainToInnovate (an interactive innovation platform to develop innovator skills and share experiences)
• 12 months of free office space at Seedspace Lagos.

How to apply

If you are an early-stage startup based in West Africa and would like to run a collaboration project with Merck to solve real-life problems using cutting-edge innovation, apply through the link. Deadline for submissions of applications runs till Monday, August 20, 2018.

Featured image: startupticker.ch