Nigerian startups solving real every-day challenges stand the chance to win US$25,000 each in funding, under the Co-Creation Hub’s (CcHub) “Call for Ideas” incubation programme.
The Call for Ideas programme aims to encourage the development of Nigerian-led technology solutions to local problems, focusing on six key areas – governance, transportation, healthcare, education, food security and the environment.
Speaking to Disrupt Africa, Olamide Udo-Udoma project manager at CcHub said the incubator will take on “as many good ideas as are submitted”, with each startup standing the chance to secure up to US$25,000 in seed investment.
Each submission is considered by an assessment team, which selects the “good ideas” to proceed to a pre-incubation period at which stage each startup has access to US$5,000 in cash.
After three months, each startup is reviewed for progress – such as successful monetisation, or gaining market traction -, with these teams graduating to the full incubator programme. Each startup in the incubation programme will receive between US$10,000 and US$25,000 in seed investment.
Udo-Udoma said the programme aims to leverage Nigerian entrepreneurs’ personal experiences of local challenges – this experience making local innovators the best placed to create real and viable solutions for Nigeria.
“By understanding and experiencing a problem everyday, there is a high chance that you have already thought of multiple solutions. And at times not just thought but started to implement these solutions for yourself, or your family. These ideas may or may not have the potential to be scaled up, but at times there are solutions or ideas that have the capacity and uniqueness to create change. And that is what we are looking for and that is what Nigeria needs. Real solutions for real problems that people face everyday,” Udo-Udoma said.
According to Udo-Udoma, all great global solutions start with a local context. As such, she says innovations coming out of Nigeria have the potential to have global relevance, despite initially solving a local problem.
“Even global solutions have local routes – for example, Facebook was created for a university. Therefore our approach is to foster local solutions. These may then have the potential to go Africa wide and overall global, but it is important to start local,” she said.
Applications can be made online, and are open until May 31.
