Standard Chartered Women in Tech

About

The Standard Chartered Women in Technology Incubator is Africa’s leading incubator programme for female-led and founded businesses. It aligns with calls for more diversity in technology, entrepreneurship and for more opportunities for women to develop entrepreneurial and leadership excellence. This speaks to the bank’s Sustainability and Community Engagement strategy and focuses on supporting innovation, infrastructure and technology.

This programme is an initiative of Standard Chartered Bank Zambia in partnership with BongoHive, following the successful implementation of the Women in Tech programme in Kenya, Nigeria and Bahrain to mention a few.

The key objective of the incubator programme is to help Zambian women entrepreneurs or business owners who want to or are using digital technology to grow their business but lack the necessary support. The programme is designed to provide targeted support in areas of business operations, digitisation and digital transformation, accounting and financial management. The outcome of the programme is to support female-led entrepreneurial teams with training, mentorship and seed funding. 

Successful applicants will begin their journey with a 3-month incubation programme followed by a 6-month acceleration programme for selected participants from the incubation programme.

Who can Apply?

We are seeking to recruit the best entrepreneurial minds of women-led startup teams using digital technology as a key driver of innovation in business.

• The business owner must be a Zambian female founder or co-founder over 18 years of age and with an equal or majority stake;
• The business must be based and operating in Zambia;
• The business must already be using digital technology, or have a clear need to incorporate digital  technology to enable their business to grow 
• The business owner must be of Zambian nationality;
• The business must have been registered with PACRA for at least 3 months;
• The business owner may be seeking support for customer, product, and/or business model development;
• Key persons of the business (preferably 2 founders) must be available to undertake the 3-month incubation programme from March to May 2022; 
• The top 5 winners of the incubation programme must be able to attend a 6-month acceleration programme from July to December 2022.
• The prize fund is primarily for building digital technology and any balance to be used in the business.

Benefits

• Business Incubation – Three (3) months of learning experience in business management and operations;
• Personalised Mentorship – Personalised mentorship for all participants and their business needs;
• Access to legal, accounting, financial planning and tech support;
• Access to networking opportunities with fellow successful applicants and industry experts;
• Funding Opportunities – $10,000 equity-free grant seed funding for the top five (5) finalists from the incubation programme to assist with the implementation of technology in their businesses;
• Six (6) months ongoing support from Standard Chartered, BongoHive and a network of coaches and mentors to assist with go-to-market strategies and scaling-up for the top five (5) finalists;
• An opportunity to join BongoHive’s supportive Alumni Network.

Timeline

• Call for applications: 19 Nov 2021 – 16 Jan 2022
• Application Shortlisting: 17 Jan – 28 Jan 2022
• Shortlist Announcement: 31 Jan 2022
• Bootcamp (top 40): 7 Feb – 11 Feb 2022
• Bootcamp Pitches: 14 Feb – 18 Feb 2022
• Top 10 notification – 21 Feb 2022
• Incubation Phase: 7 March – 23 May 2022
• Demo Day and Award Ceremony: 9 June 2022 and 16 June 2022
• Acceleration Phase (Post Incubation Support):  20 June – 20 December