Deadline: November 15, 2014
Enter now for the Zambezi Prize, an Innovations Competition presented by the Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship at MIT and The MasterCard Foundation. The Zambezi Prize raises awareness of entrepreneurship and financial inclusion, encourages the flow of capital to financial inclusion ventures, and advances entrepreneurship and financial inclusion to fuel broad-based prosperity. The prize is open to a wide spectrum of financial inclusion ventures demonstrating innovation and potential for impact, financial sustainability, and scalability.
Prizes
Cash Prizes
- The Zambezi Prize awards $200K USD annually to support ventures that contribute to financial inclusion in Sub-Saharan Africa.
- The first place winner receives $100K USD. An additional $100K USD is divided among second and third place winners and a small group of finalists.
Boot Camp
- A small group of finalists participate in an MIT-sponsored boot camp to take advantage of MIT’s unparalleled entrepreneurial ecosystem and engage with experts in the fields of entrepreneurship and financial inclusion.
Eligibility
- The venture must advance financial inclusion.
- The venture must have a presence in Sub-Saharan Africa.
- The venture must demonstrate potential for financial self-sustainability.
- The venture must have progressed beyond concept, demonstrating evidence of factors such as customers, revenues, business registration, patents or IP filings, working prototypes, institutional funding, or formal employees.
- The venture must not have received more than $10M USD in aggregate funding.
- The venture must not have more than $10M USD in annual revenue.
- The venture must have a founder or co-founder that work or plan to work full-time on the venture.
- If selected as semi-finalists, ventures must provide supplemental financial information.
- If selected as finalists, ventures must have a founder or co-founder to attend an MIT-sponsored boot camp.
Individuals and teams are eligible.
For more information, visit http://zambezi.mit.edu/
