Deadline: Varies by Region
Applications are open for the Visa Everywhere Initiative Global Innovation Competition 2021. The Visa Everywhere Initiative is an open innovation program that helps startups like yours unlock new opportunities—and gives you a global platform to demonstrate your ground-breaking solutions.
The program first launched in the U.S. in 2015, and has since expanded to every corner of the world, recruiting startups from over 100 countries. Over the past five years, more than 7,000 startups have participated, and they’ve collectively raised more than $2.5 billion in funding.
This year, they are running a global startup competition and are looking for the brightest startups from around the world. One winner per region will be selected to compete in the global finals. If you’re a startup with great products already in market and gaining traction—and are looking for an extra push from a global, trusted brand like Visa to gain scale—this competition is perfect for you.
Prizes
Four monetary prizes will be awarded during the global finals event:
- Overall Winner: $50,000 USD
- Audience Favorite: $25,000 USD
- 2nd Place: $15,000 USD
- 3rd Place: $10,000 USD
The overall winner, 2nd place-winner, and 3rd place-winner are also eligible to win the Audience Favorite prize.
Eligibility
They are looking for products that deliver innovative payment and commerce solutions to consumers and businesses. These include but are not limited to:
- Enablers of digital services and digital issuers
- Crowdfunding
- Banking as a service
- BIN sponsors
- Issuer / processors
- Program managers
- Blockchain and cryptocurrency
- Alternative lending
- Personal financial management
- Money transfer and remittance
- Digital banking (aka neobanks)
- Digital wallets, P2P, and transfers
- Employee benefits
- Payables
- Corporate cards (aka expense management)
- Value-add for merchants and/or consumers in regard to finance
- Data and analytics
- ID, authentication, and security
- Insurtech
- Loyalty
- Merchant services and tools
- Process and pay infrastructure
- Retail technology
- Small/medium-sized business recovery
- Money movement (disbursements, intra-account, P2P, payments)
- Acceptance (e-commerce, mobile acceptance)
- Risk management (chargebacks, etc.)
- Brand management (community building, etc.)
Application
Visa will select the top 5 finalists for the 5 regions listed below. Next, each region will select a winner that will move forward to the global finals event.
- North America (This region has one of its five spots reserved for a minority-founded startup.)
- CEMEA (This region has one of its five spots reserved for an Ethiopian startup. It will be awarding additional monetary prizes—including $15k for the overall regional winner and $10k for the audience favorite.)
- Europe
- Asia Pacific
- Latin America (This region will award $5k to their winner.)
For more information, visit Visa Everywhere Initiative.
