16 different start-ups from across Pakistan pitched their business ideas to a set of decorated judges during the Huawei Cloud Start-up program. The program is a global support program launched by HUAWEI CLOUD for global startups. The main purpose is to help and accelerate the business growth of technology startups and ecosystem partners.
Eligible start-ups who applied and selected to join the program will receive free cloud resources, professional technical trainings, GTM support, mentorship and marketing benefits. Huawei started the program together with Ignite, NIC’s, and their partners. The partnership hopes to enable a “Digital Pakistan” and aims to bolster the implementation of Cloud technology through knowledge sharing.A panel of highly reputed people from the Government and private sector were selected to be judges. Each start-up was given seven minutes for pitching and five minutes for question and answers.
With the intent to accelerate startups growth, Huawei established a startup advisory committee composed of Specialists support including legal counsel, CTO, CDO, corporate marketing, industry experts,senior executives at Huawei, founders of established startups, venture capital firms and government officials.
The top 10 will be on boarded in three different levels and get Huawei Cloud credits and benefits mentioned. The three tiers include Tier 1, ‘Hall of Fame’ which will include the top three teams, Tier 2’All Star’, comprised of the top 4-6 and Tier 3, ‘Rookie’, startups that ended with the 7-10 positions. The 16 startups were shortlisted after an application process that included giving their company name and/or team profile, describing their product/solutions, market analysis, reports for the last three years and projections for the next three.
Mr. ZeeshanKhattak, Chief Commercial Officer of Pakistan Software Export Board stated at the occasion, “Thank you for providing me the opportunity to be a part of such an interactive session. I believe that such events help foster entrepreneurship and innovation. Furthermore, such events also motivate and encourage new & potential talent in ICT eco-system.”