Startup and investor community Silicon Cape is calling on members to nominate “driven, passionate, connected and collaborative thought leaders” to take up positions on its steering committee for a period of two years.
Nominations can be made online, while Silicon Cape will hold elections on March 25 to select a new committee, which will be mandated to carry on the vision and work of the initiative and act as duly appointed representatives of the community and the movement.
“Any member of the committee should ideally have a strong ambition for the technology startup scene, great people skills, a collaborative mindset, knowledge of what would be good for the initiative; along with the ability to ensure a balance between insight and undertaking,” Silicon Cape said.
Though the roles of chair and vice chair are not up for a vote at this time, the organisation is looking to elect individuals to take charge of startup relations, funder relations, developer relations, government relations, events, finance, marketing and communications, students and careers, and transformation and women in tech.
Current board members have the right to stand again in another portfolio, while the chair and vice chair will be voted upon by the new committee. Nominations close on March 19.
It has been an exciting last few months for Silicon Cape, founded in 2009 by investor Justin Stanford and entrepreneur Vinny Lingham. In October it raised more than ZAR3 million (US$270,000) in funding from South Africa’s First National Bank (FNB), which is being used to expand its operations.
Disrupt Africa reported in January it launched its own YouTube channel to enable members to advertise events, programmes or products via online video.
Outgoing Silicon Cape chairperson Alexandra Fraser told Disrupt Africa in November the organisation was not trying to be the Silicon Valley of Africa and must instead play to its own strengths as it looks to become a regional hub.
“The potential for us to be a major hub in Africa is certainly there, it is about how do we strengthen all of the hubs because we need a network for entrepreneurs to navigate across and expand businesses,” she said.
