50 startups in Egypt stand a great chance to be accepted into a new accelerator program launched by the Washington DC-based venture capital firm Openner. The firm is now accepting applications from Egyptian startups, through which it aims to identify brilliant founders with brilliant ideas. This Openner’s first entry into Africa, and consequently Egypt. Once on board, Openner aims to expand and scale Egyptian startups locally, regionally, and globally through its local accelerator.
“We want startups to organically grow into revenue generating companies without having to raise funds, match them with a strategic investor when they are ready for rapid growth and position them as acquisition-ready,” said Ash Rofail, Founder and General Partner of Openner. “We have a very strong and proven track record building companies that have exited or have become leaders in their target industries, with 10% of our portfolio companies exiting within three years of operation.”
Here Is What You Need To Know
- Openner is a pre-seed and seed venture capital firm that focuses on investing in tech startups globally and has invested in over 100 startups. Entering Egypt with its accelerator program should allow the company to invest in 50 local startups.
- Applications are open all-year round, as no specified one-size-fits-all programme will be implemented across all 50 selected startups.
- Each portfolio startup will be subject to a custom-designed programme tailored to its needs, combining cash injection with growth resources while focusing on the startup’s product development, tech development and distribution.
- This means that startup founders will be able to fully concentrate on sales and customer acquisition. In the meantime, functions like marketing, engineering, UX/UI and public relations will be provided by the accelerator and its partners.
- Openner has historically co-invested with Andreesen Horrowitz, NEA, Sequoia, Khosla Ventures, YCombinator, Goldman Sachs and several other leading global venture capitalists (VCs). The companies in its portfolio have received follow-on investments from ExxonMobil, Mastercard, CitiVentures and other multinationals, as well as dozens of US-based Tier 1 venture capital firms.
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Read also: Egyptian Startup Rology Secures $860,000 For Its Platform
What Oppenner Offers Startups
- Openner Accelerator offers seed funding, technical product development, business development, legal, operations, back office as well as a partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS), among other services.
- This, in addition to strategic advice from top international executives who are mostly exits and regular founders, a path to fundraising, licensing and acquisition through his publicly traded company in the United States. United States.
- So far, Openner has deployed $ 25 million to more than 100 holding companies in the United States since the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2016, with an aggregate valuation of $ 2.95 billion.
- The Accelerator also helps to transform pre-seed and seed startups with a minimum viable product (MVP) into ready growth and / or acquisition.
- This is proven by their strong global performance in raising Series A funds for 90% of their pre-seed and seed investments.
- Their main goal is to work with startups to help them build sustainable, resilient and scalable businesses.
Openner’s accelerator is the VC’s first entry into Africa, and Egypt
Rofail said that Openner is entering the Egyptian market because it believes in the country’s geographic and cultural centrality and its promising technological talents.
How Startups In Egypt May Apply
Interested startups in Egypt may apply by following this link.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
He is also an award-winning writer