September 8th our next program starts. Now Sprint! Accelerator is ready. Press Release.
Posted August 18th, 2020, for Stage-Co
Based on the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals), early-stage teams will be selected and go through an intense acceleration program to get ready for impact and success.
Now Sprint! Accelerator, a program created by Stage-Co Masters announced that applications are now open for the fully online Startup Accelerator program, starting September 8th, 2020.
Stage-Co is Turkiye’s leading startup platform but the program is international, aiming to give a global outlook to all teams from the day they apply. The second edition of the Now Sprint! Accelerator program will be free of charge to attend and completely online.
Together with the partners, the regions that are targeted, are Balkans, Africa, Central and South-Eastern Asia and Türkiye. Now Sprint! Accelerator sees these regions as most promising startup ecosystems where we can create a positive impact on creating jobs, overall growth and a positive impact on society. Multiple studies can be found that startups and small companies grow and create jobs, whereas large companies focus on bottom-line with fewer jobs (costs).
How does it work?
The applications are open for the Now Sprint! Accelerator. The selected 10 startups will go through an interactive and intensive training program along with mentoring by valuable mentors from all around the world. At whatever stage the teams are, or whatever tech or market, Now Sprint! Accelerator will help in detecting the missing elements and work on them with our instructors and mentors.
Details of the program:
The program starts on the 8th of September and will run 2 times per week after-hours (GMT +3 hours) over a 4-week period. Workshops will cover topics for going from an idea to a product, and becoming ready to pitch to an investor. The hands-on training program includes Design Thinking, Lean Startup, Business Model Canvas and Customer Development. At the end of the program, each team will present their accomplishments to the potential investors, entrepreneurs and the media during the Demo Day.
Goals:
Now Sprint! Accelerator will play an important role in the early-stage startups in their goal of becoming successful with a validated product or service and ready to confront early-stage investors. As well in the selection as in the build-up, Now Sprint! Accelerator will use the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) as guidance, as sustainability and a positive impact on society are key. In the selection of the teams, we give priority to refugee and women founders but not exclusive. No EQUİTY is demanded.
Startups are in good hands:
The partners and mentors that have joined the program are active and experienced in the local and international startup scene or specialists in a domain. A major distinction here is that Now Sprint! Accelerator will have some founders from startups that passed the first round of investment, so they know what it is about and ready to share their experience. Some mentors are professionals from corporates (local or international) who are startup enthusiasts with a large network and knowhow in the startup ecosystem.
The Program Management is in the hands of Patrick Bosteels, cofounder of Stage-Co. Patrick was a serial entrepreneur in Europe and when moving to Türkiye his focus was on growing and improving the startup ecosystem providing mentorship, facilitation, creating and giving workshops and an enthusiast speaker/motivator.
Previous Program results:
Covid-19 has shaken up the world, including our approach. Although we planned to start in a classic setting. We changed overnight to online and that way we could extend the region we targeted. In May we started with the 1st cohort, 12 teams from 9 countries. We have now 7 teams as alumni that we continue to support. You can find the results on the website www.nowsprintaccelerator.com.
Please check our websites and social media for more details. You can always contact us at contact@stage-co.com or hello@nowsprintaccelerator.com
