One thousand entrepreneurs selected from over 20,000 applicants across Africa will converge in Ota, Nigeria for a boot camp session July 10-12. This will be the first major convening for the Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme (TEEP), a $100m pan-African entrepreneurship initiative launched in December 2014. The gathering is expected to be the largest-ever of emerging entrepreneurs on the continent.
“We hope the Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme can catalyze and encourage other African business leaders to empower emerging entrepreneurs. If we all come together with requisite resources we can make a significant difference,” said Mr. Tony O. Elumelu at a press conference in Lagos today.
The boot camp, a major milestone of the flagship programme of the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF), will feature interaction between established business leaders and mentors from different sectors of industry with the 1,000 TEEP entrepreneurs. The TEEP fellows represent 51 African countries and territories, as well as a multitude of value adding sectors ranging from agriculture to education to fashion and ICT. All five regions of the continent (North, East, Southern, Central and West Africa) are represented, as are all major language blocs (Anglophone, Francophone, Lusophone, and Arabic).
Mr. Elumelu has been vocal about entrepreneurship-led development and the push for a private sector-driven turnaround of Africa. “In empowering these emerging entrepreneurs, we are providing the capital, the networks, the training and support for them to drive economic and social transformation throughout Africa, providing solutions to its problems as well as securing their future and that of generations to come,” he said.
As a member of the Spark Coalition for Global Entrepreneurship, an association of NGOs and private companies committed to promoting entrepreneurship around the world, TEF also hopes to use the TEEP boot camp as an opportunity to build support and excitement for the Global Entrepreneurship Summit, an event co-hosted by the U.S. Government and the Government of Kenya which is set to take place July 25-26 in Nairobi.
In the build-up to the boot camp, the Tony Elumelu Foundation has engaged the TEEP fellows in a 12-week online training programme that will culminate in this two-day session. The boot camp format will be predominately plenary style sessions from speakers with proven track records in business and leadership. The entrepreneurs will participate in sessions including an open mic with Mr. Elumelu and other prominent business leaders. The boot camp will also provide a unique opportunity for these 1,000 talented entrepreneurs to build relationships that cross national and cultural boundaries.
Speaking on the ideals of the programme and the need for the training, Parminder Vir, CEO of TEF said, “We are excited to be pushing the envelope and providing a springboard for this set of emerging African entrepreneurs to take over the world with their innovative ideas, beginning from their local communities. At the end of this boot camp, we want them to have come, seen and been transformed into full-fledged entrepreneurs and ambassadors for Africapitalism.”
For inquiries, please contact:
Felicia Okoye, Public Relations Executive, Marketing & Corporate Communications
felicia.okoye@heirsholdings.com
M: +234-810-966-4921
For more information and to follow the conversation on Twitter, please see:
Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme: http://tonyelumelufoundation.org/teep/
@TonyElumeluFDN
2015 Global Entrepreneurship Summit: http://www.ges2015.org/
@GES2015Kenya
Spark Coalition:
http://startthespark.org/
@StarttheSpark