RiseUp’16 Inspires The Crowd

Photo Credit: RiseUp Facebook Page. 

The fourth annual RiseUp summit took place on Friday December 9 to Sunday December 11, at the Greek Campus and AUC’s main campus in Downtown Cairo. RiseUp Summit has obviously developed to become the top entrepreneurship event in the Middle East and Africa, and one of the region’s biggest networking events. Thousands of people attended this year’s summit, which focused on five main tracks: Creative Economy, Science and Technology Innovation, CleanTech (the intersection of technology with environment, such as renewable energy, recyclables, water, and food), FinTech (the intersection of technology with financial products and services), and Entrepreneurship know-how.

“The region’s start-ups scene is getting bigger and better each year. We’re witnessing huge successes, but also a lot of challenges. Start-ups still lack access to funding, talent, know-how, markets and exposure. This is what RiseUp Summit is offering to the ecosystem this year: content that is 100% focused on these top five core needs,” said Abdelhameed Sharara, CEO and founder of RiseUp.

The new this year was the Creative Economy track, which was organized by the British Council. This track was captivating for the attendees, as it showed them the relationship between entrepreneurship and creative talents. It also brought the creative industries to meet during the summit including music, film, fashion, gaming, design, art, and theatre.

“Creativity needs to be understood as literacy along with technology. It is ignored in schools,” said Dr. Tom Fleming - Creative Economy and Cultural Policy Expert – in his talk “What is Creative Economy?” where he discussed the importance of supporting creative talents.

“Brand structure and identity are crucial for all successful designers,” said Mohanad Kojak while discussing the challenges that the designers face in a panel discussion with Amira Azzouz, founder of Fustany, Amina Khalil, founder of Amina K., Maria Munoz, Co-founder of Maison Pyramide, and Ines Gohar, Fashion Buyer and Consultant. Kojak also said as an advice for people who want to build a brand: “Find the brand essence. Keep your mind fresh and updated and always adapt.” 

In a surprising gesture, the British ambassador in Egypt; John Casson, announced his launch of a new 1£ million fund supporting Egypt start-ups who make a transformational social impact. In his talk, he encouraged entrepreneurs to not only make business but to build businesses that also create a better society.

British ambassador John Casson with the audience in RiseUp'16. Picture from his official Twitter account. 

The second interesting track in RiseUp summit 2016 was science and technology innovation, as it is obvious from its name; all the panels and talks discussed technology and science innovation and how to find solutions for our biggest problems while using them.

Omar Samra, the founder of Wild & Guanabana, talked about his own journey that was full of adventures, and about space travel. By his talk, he wanted to change the perspective people – especially in the Middle East – have about the space, and he stressed on the point that space is a real work field as any other field. He said that he’s not coming from any science background; however, he’s passionate about space and willing to travel and become Egypt’s first astronaut in space.

“The journey to Mars is not about finding a plan B for Earth, but to learn what happened there. Our natural urge for exploration is why we want to go to Mars, not to leave planet Earth.”

Omar Samra in his talk about space during RiseUp'16. 

More discussions, workshops, and talks were held about space, science, and technology. But, Cleantech had also been an important track in the 3-day summit. Most of the cleantech-themed talks and discussions have stressed on two main points; that the cleantech and the energy sector require some government support to create the right environment, and that the investors need to know the difference between cleantech market and other markets. 

RiseUp summit and CleanTech Arabia, an Egypt-based non-profit organization that aims to create world-class clusters of 'clean technology' businesses in the Arab World, had put the cleantech field as one of the five major themes of the year. The cleantech track discussed different hot topics, such as sustainable energy, agriculture, water and waste management.

The CleanTech track at RiseUp'16. Picture by CleanTech Arabia Facebook page.

“Average investment exit cycle for a venture capital is 7 years, but for a cleantech, it is 10 years. This is based on US data,” said Fred Walti – CEO of Los Angeles CleanTech Incubator (LACI)- in a panel discussion with Gautam Handa - Head of Corporate Development at Fourth Partner Energy Private Limited, Shehab Marzban - Deputy Minister at the Ministry of International Cooperation, David Van Djik - Director General at ABAN-, and Ayman Ismail – Founder of AUC VentureLab – as the moderator. The panelists discussed different financing schemes for funding startups, SMEs, and their clients. While also discussing the difference between financing Cleantech and any other kind of business, stating the challenges and opportunities.

 Walti also acknowledged that cleantech companies have much higher capital needs and a longer lead time – up to three years longer than usual – as he also said that the cleantech market can be difficult for investors to understand. “For example, Karmsolar, inarguably Egypt’s most successful cleantech startup, has not taken any traditional venture capital investment.”

“As entrepreneurs like to say, they’re changing the world, but what is more world-changing than clean technology,” said Ahmed Huzzayen, Co-founder at Cleantech Arabia.

On the other side, the Fintech track was as active as the cleantechs. RiseUp summit with 1864 accelerator and PayFort - as key organizers, brought the best and most important talks and discussions about all the important topics related to Fintech.

Most of the panels discussed the potential opportunities and challenges for banks within the fintech space. “Banks in Egypt are really keen to hack into the Fintech scene. They're open to new Fintech ideas,” said Ahmed Wadi - founder and CEO of Money fellow. While in another panel discussing the traditional payment systems and existing financial models and how to innovate them, Omar Kandil – Program Manager at Flat6Labs AbuDhabi- said: “The market size is expected to grow in the region by 2020 to up to $35 Billion.” While other panelists agreed that the number one challenge for fintech startups is the ability to regain the CAC (Cost of Acquiring Customers) at a scale that will make them profitable.

Also, everything people need to know about entrepreneurship in Egypt was discussed through workshops, panel discussions, talks, and sessions that were held under the main motive behind RiseUp summit: Entrepreneurship know-how.

“Find something that is a real pain point to people and fix it with a solution that will have a long-term impact, and spend your money in the most efficient way,” said Tino Wakid, General Manager of Uber Egypt, in a panel discussion about platforms for businesses with Omar El sahy, founder of Souq.com, and Waleed Abdelrahman, founder of Mumm, and Amir Barsoum, founder of Vezeeta. “Platforms are expensive business model to do. So, play on both side to be successful for a long period,” said Amir Barsoum, who also gave a talk about Vezeeta’s success story of scaling-up. He was asked when is the right time to scale up, he said that you should make sure you’re already in the market and you have your customers.

While another great talk was given by Tarek Fahim – Managing Partner of Endure Capital – who gave different pieces of advice for the audience about the early days or early stage of startups. “When you get the money focus on two main points: Focus on building your product, and sell/talk to customers about your product.”

Also, an inspiring panel discussion titled “Regional Strategies for Women Entrepreneur Success” was held by six successful women entrepreneurs from different Arab countries like Morocco, Tunisia, Jordan, Egypt, and Lebanon. “I don't want to be praised because of my gender, but for my results,” said the Moroccan Kenza Lahlou.

Arab Women Entrepreneurs in RiseUp'16. 

RiseUp Summit brought a huge list of speakers in almost any field you can think of, they also brought more than 50 startups as exhibitioners during the 3-day event such as TIEC incubated startups like; 3Bont, Dileny Tech, Mumm, Amm Amin, Findon, PayMe, Handaz, Nozol, Tyro, and WideBot. As well as, other startups like Affectiva, Appgain.io, Blink, BuduCloud, Livit, Voxera, Brainy Squad, Sunneya, Lynks, Shezlong, Cairo Solar, and Enpact.

On the other side, a very interesting part of the summit this year was the pitching competitions and the satellite events. RiseUp’16 brought some of the best pitch competitions and events worldwide to give the attendees the opportunity to challenge their entrepreneurial skills. The competitions included EBNI Competition, Microsoft Startup Competition, the Arab Mobile Challenge (AMC) and Mobile Challenge Africa (MCA), and Hack4Egypt.

The amazing team behind RiseUp'16 summit. Picture from RiseUp Facebook page. 

And then came the entertainment part; It mostly consisted of different bands, artists, or DJs. This year, the key entertainer was the amazing Hisham Kharma. To sum it all up, RiseUp 2016 summit was very interesting, beneficial, valuable, and most of all Inspirational. It makes us wait more excitingly to RiseUp’17.