Middle Eastern accelerator Changelabs has opened applications to its Scale Up To Green programme, targeting Egyptian resource efficiency, green energy, and agri-tech companies.
Changelabs is launching the programme in partnership with the Green for Growth Fund (GGF), which is an investment fund supported by the likes of IMF and Deutsche Bank, and also counts the European Union’s EU4Energy initiative, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and MINT by EGBank as partners.
The accelerator will offer small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and scale-ups access to the resources they need to scale and acquire more customers. It also aims to help build the right long term partnerships, and raise additional rounds of funding.
Fifteen post-revenue Egyptian scale-ups will be admitted by mid-2021, with each admitted startup to be considered for investment by GGF, whose ticket sizes can reach up to EUR1 million (US$1.2 million), and gain access to technology and design services, and product build-out support.
“While the Egyptian ecosystem is one of the most robust in the MENA region, and accelerators and VCs are everywhere, there’s a huge gap in the scale-up and operating segments of the startup support menu,” said Karim Samra, chief executive officer (CEO) and founder of Changelabs.
“We aim to bring together the right stakeholders to fill that gap, in Egypt and beyond. Organic farming, clean energy, efficient buildings, agriculture, and access to water are all priorities.”
The programme’s design and structure are in the final stages. Interested SMEs and scale-ups from across Egypt can apply to the programme here, with all applications considered on a rolling basis throughout the second quarter of 2021.
