Falak Startups has been operating for the past two years out of AUC, supporting and empowering plenty of up-and-coming startups. Miral El Essawy took time out of her busy day to give us the low down on this much needed initiative.
Falak Startups is Egypt’s largest startup accelerator. To find and empower talented and ambitious early-stage startup founders, in order to help them thrive in the region’s rapidly changing entrepreneurship landscape. The sector-agnostic program focuses on honing startups’ product-market fit, fine-tuning their business model as well as their operating and revenue models, growing their customer base and raising follow-on investments.
It All Started with an Idea…
The idea started under the initiative of “Fekretak Sherketak” by the Ministry of Investment and International Cooperation, under the flagship of H.E. Dr. Sahar Nasr and her top economic advisor at the time, Dr. Shehab Marziban. The initiative resulted in creating Egypt Ventures, a VC fund to support and invest in high growth startups, and accordingly, the idea for creating a startup accelerator – Falak, was initiated to create and invest in a proper pipeline of early stage startups. It took around three months to then build the right team to lead this, and set up the new space to run the program for the first batch of startups.
The Importance of a Strong Team
Falak’s greatest asset is its team. Building a young yet experienced team, each adding a different element that complements the needed building blocks to run Falak, providing real and sustainable support to the startups, and making sure Falak is well positioned in the market ecosystem and the region.
Initial Challenges
At first, Falak was perceived as yet another governmental program that would not have any real tangible output, but rather just created for some good PR. It took a lot of effort and real commitment from the team to prove that they really do care about providing a solid program that is coupled by smart investments and supported by a qualified team that really wants to make a change in the ecosystem.
Where Does Egypt Stand in Terms of Projects Like Falak?
Egypt is one of the leading countries in the region in terms of programs like Falak. We’re one of the earliest counties to lead the startup scene back in the early 2000s, and even though other countries have recently joined in and grown faster, we are still providing very strong support and offer competitive value to startups.
Type of Projects and Initiatives that are Supported by Falak
Falak is sector agnostic, and focuses on tech-enabled and scalable startups. Some of the startups include:
- Automotive: Mayday, Auto Parts, Auto Tell.
- Health tech: Med Box, Mazboot, El Rosheta, Apoteka, 3elagi, Bypa-ss.
- E-commerce: Alla’ona, Agri EG, NART, SOOVI, Faggala, The Mob.
- Fashion: Darjee.
- Construction- Service platforms: Benaa Today, Joudran.
- Education: Splenkid, Olli.
- F&B: Deal & Meal, Masry Market, 3al Mashy, Elgate.
- Clean tech: Value Bekia, Taqatak, Delta Oil, Rabbit.
- Agri-tech: 21 Farmer.
- Social Networking: Droplin.
- Fintech: Paynas, Xpay, Noqood, Hood, Digified, Waffer X.
- Sports: Find Me football, Passport.
Others: Masto, Primo, Makank, Lamina, Kazzem, HLPR, Garrak, E-youth, Raseedi, Wint, Trendster, Merakido, Teradix, Vigo, Rafiq, SKN.
Contact info:
Address: The Greek Campus, Tahrir Square.
Facebook: @falakstartups
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