Nigerian Crowdfunding startup Ladda, proceeds to regional stage of the Seedstars World Competition 2020
Every year between June to November, Seedstars, a Swiss-based private group of companies holds the Seedstars World Competition to look out for the most promising early-stage startups from Asia, Africa, Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and North Africa, and Latin America regions. These startups would receive intensive training on how to be investment-ready.
Additionally, they will take part in local, regional, and global stage competitions but only one of the startups will emerge as the global winner and take home a prize of up to $500,000 in equity investment.
Out of the 94 local winners of the Seedstars World Competition (SSW) 2020 that have been announced, crowdfunding startup Ladda is set to represent Nigeria in the next round of the competition — regional stage. While from the Africa region, a total of 25 startups are set to compete for a spot at the global finale which comes up on April 2021.
Ladda helps users to own personalised portfolio of mutual funds, Eurobonds, local and international stocks that are available in one secure location and make it accessible at all times.
“During this unusual year for everyone, I am proud to say that we managed to identify the most promising startups in 94 emerging markets. The online format of the competition allowed us to dream and go bigger as we reached a larger audience and invited more startups from all the cities of each country to apply. Now, we can’t wait for our local winners to represent their countries in the webisodes of the regional stage of the competition. I’d like to invite everyone to follow their journey and root for their favourite startup from the different corners of the world,” Eugenia Shevchenko, Lead of the Seedstars World Competition 2020 mentioned.
This year, there was an online open call for applications and a total of 94 ecosystems were included. Subsequently, 1,200 startups participated in the Online Seedstars Academy, a training programme for entrepreneurs to accelerate their growth and receive mentorship from industry experts around the world.
The next phase of the competition takes the local winners to the regional stage. From the regionals, 10 startups will receive $50,000 in growth programme investment as well as the chance to compete at the grand finale for a shot at the global winner prize.
According to the private company, “The regional stage of the competition will include a 1-month long Investment Readiness Programme, modernised and personalised programme helping startups get investment-ready. It will consist of: action-driven webinars on key business metrics; online office hours, where startups can discuss challenges they are facing; domain groups and 1-on-1 mentoring sessions; investor meetings for potential funding opportunities; and peer-to-peer learning and networking sessions.”
It has been inspiring seeing entrepreneurs from across the region soldier on through the pandemic and continue to work hard on their solutions. We have met incredible entrepreneurs and are excited to see them competing at the regional stage for a chance to be at the Seedstars Grande Finale in 2021. We wish all the local winners the best of luck for the regional stage competition,” said Seedstars Africa Regional Manager Lorraine Davis.
At the end of January 2021, online episodes for the regional stage of the competition will be aired and viewers will get to see each local winner pitch in front of the juries as well as learning more about each of the teams’ startup stories. The regional winners moving on to the global finale in March 2021 will be announced at the end of each episode.
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