About GEN Malawi

The Global Entrepreneurship Network (GEN) built its earliest connections to Malawi's entrepreneurial community through Startup Huddle, a program designed to help entrepreneurs present real-time challenges facing their startup and solicit input on potential solutions from other entrepreneurs, mentors, and their local community. When GEN first piloted Startup Huddle in 2016, Malawi featured prominently — Blantyre and Lilongwe were among only five cities worldwide selected for the launch, alongside Amman, Jordan; Tbilisi, Georgia; and Chisinau, Moldova.The Malawian chapters were driven in the early days by local organizers through funding from the Case Foundation most notably the Network for Entrepreneurial Women (NEW), which used the Startup Huddle format to bring together women founders across both cities. 

The Blantyre chapter, hosted at the Blantyre Entrepreneur Hub, drew around 65 women to one of its early gatherings, organized by NEW co-founder Temwa Msiska to create a space where women could speak freely mostly with other women about the obstacles and opportunities they faced in business. The first Lilongwe Huddle was held at mHub, the technology hub founded by Rachel Sibande, and featured local entrepreneurs such as social enterprise founder Mwiriha Kapondamgaga and agribusiness owner Fannie Gondwe sharing hard-won lessons on discipline, financial management, and perseverance.  

As GEN's presence in Malawi matured, the annual Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) campaign came to be anchored by MicroMek, a Blantyre-based hardware startup that has served as the country's GEW host organization in recent years. MicroMek's founder and CEO, Dumisani “Dumi” Kaliati, has become one of GEN's most active champions in Malawi, serving as a GEW host, a Global Entrepreneurship Congress (GEC) Ambassador, and a GEN mentor and assessor. 

MicroMek itself reflects the kind of founder GEN's network in Malawi aims to support. The company develops low-cost autonomous drones — built in part from 3D-printed components and foam board — to deliver medical diagnostics and supplies to hard-to-reach communities and to support environmental monitoring across the country. Kaliati, a Mandela Washington Fellow through the Young African Leaders Initiative and a Goalkeepers Youth Action Accelerator, has paired that work with a strong commitment to mentoring young Malawian innovators and building local capacity in prototyping and drone technology. 

GEN maintains relationships with key Malawian ecosystem stakeholders, including mHub in Lilongwe, the Blantyre Entrepreneur Hub, MicroMek, and the Network for Entrepreneurial Women (NEW). These organizers, hubs, and grassroots communities form the backbone of GEN's activity in Malawi, connecting founders in Blantyre, Lilongwe, and beyond to one another and to the wider global network.  Much of GEN’s success in Malawi can be attributed to its decision to base GEN Global’s Nick Vilelle in Africa for several years and in particular in Malawi to seed traction on the front lines. 

GEN's ongoing mission in Malawi is to connect the country's founders and ecosystem builders to a global community of mentors, investors, and peers — sharing best-in-class programming and knowledge sourced from around the world, and helping local leaders scale the practical, mentor-driven support that Startup Huddle and GEW have brought to Blantyre and Lilongwe.