What an eventful week it was for the participants and attendees of the MITEF Arab Startup Competition! All the training sessions, socializing, bonding, and the rounds they had to go through, it’s been quite a journey!
The journey paid off though, all of the startups had high spirits on their final day during the final awards ceremony on Thursday, the 27th of April, 2017. The event marked the 10th anniversary of the MITEF Arab Startup Competition.
It’s such a great time to be alive! The amount of innovation and creativity that was bubbling out of the contestants was amazing! To summarize the 10th anniversary of the MITEF Arab Competition in one word: Extraordinary!
But don’t feel like you’re missing out! Since we had the great opportunity of attending and covering the awards ceremony, we decided to compile you a list of the 16 best highlights of the MITEF ceremony:
- The winner and runner ups of the Social Entrepreneurship track: Kiliim from Egypt, Mindrockets from Jordan, and Carpolo from Lebanon
- The winner and the runner ups of the Startup track: Moneyfellows from Egypt, Trukker from UAE, Riego from Lebanon
- The winner and runner ups of the Ideas track:, Blink from Egypt, Spicatech from Lebanon, NanoGreen Hub Egypt
- Of course the MITEF event wouldn’t have been possible without the awesome partners: Zain, Community Jameel, and the strategic partner Tamkeen Bahrain!
- Startups and initiatives from all over the MENA region, including Bahraini startups such as Fleek, Tamaran, Hackarabia, Startup Bahrain and many more had the opportunity of showcasing their startup ideas and projects in front of a huge audience.
- The event’s master of ceremonies and host no other than the hilarious and entertaining Imran Al-Aradi.
- And let’s not forget how the entire hall was bustling with people waiting to hear Ronaldo Mouchawer co-Founder of Souq.com (recently acquired by Amazon!) valuable advice for startups: “You need to go after things that have market. Go after big markets! Retail is a huge market. Find big ideas!” and “Ignore the noise, nobody knows what you’re doing but you”.
- The mind-blowing and remarkable team spirit spread across the hall with what looked to us like hundreds of people, perhaps 300 guests including startups, investors, participants, representatives from various organizations, and others!
- Co-Founder of Myki Priscilla Elora’s inspiring presentation and how they found a major bug in Apple’s security layer!
- An adventurer+entrepreneur+ex-banker all combined in one person = Omar Samra and his success story of moving from the corporate world to entrepreneurship
- Louay El Dada’s presentation of how his startup Quanergy is going to change the future of 3D sensing and perception through LiDAR sensors! These sensors enable an autonomous driving system which will decrease 80% of transportation accidents!
- Awesome music accompanied by a delicious dinner in an awesome traditional Bahraini basta setting downstairs following the event. We heard the food was great!
- Passionate speech from Zain Bahrain’s General Manager Mr. Mohammed Zainalabeden: “People matter, and at the center of all success, great people are the fuel.”
- Rana El Chemaitelly’s presentation of how her startup The Little Engineer is helping out students in the field of science and technology!
- The heartwarming video that recalled the journey of the contestants in the past 3 days that was full of training, networking and pitching sessions!
- Bahrain was also one of the first countries that granted the visa to all of the contestants without any trouble!
The MITEF Arab Startup Competition is held annually, so if you have an idea or an existing startup, you should definitely apply next year! You’re never too old or young to learn more! Be on the lookout for MITEF updates through their website.
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