Dhiraagu and SparkHub kicked off Techstars Startup Weekend Maldives 2019 today.

The chief guest of this ceremony was Fazleena Fakir, Managing Director of Business Center Corporation.

Techstars Startup Weekend is a model developed by Techstars, powered by Google for Startups. It is a 54-hour weekend event, during which groups of developers, business managers, startup enthusiasts, marketing gurus, graphic artists and more, pitch ideas for new startup companies, form teams around those ideas, and work to develop a working prototype, demo, or presentation by end of the 54 hours.

Over 50 participants with varying backgrounds and experiences in entrepreneurship, creativity, and software development are taking part in the Startup weekend Maldives 2019.

The teams will be mentored as part of the 54-hour learning process of an entrepreneurial journey by a pool comprising of industry specialists and entrepreneurs.

Speaker and mentors of Techstars Startup Weekend 2019 are:

• Mahmoud Dasser, Chief Marketing Officer, Dhiraagu
• Naail Abdul Rahman – Managing Partner at Intellea Partnership
• Emau Saleem – Art Director at Think Advertising
• Aishath Adnan – Co-Founder of Women in Tech Maldives
• Ahmed Zeenad – Managing Director of SME Development Finance Corporate (SDFC)
• Hasan Hilmy – Co-founder and CEO of Blazon Inc
• Fareeha Shareef – Executive Director at FJS Consulting Pvt Ltd
• Mohamed Shafraz Hafiz – Deputy Director of Digital Marketing & Social Media at Kandima Maldives
• Madeeh Ahmed – Taxation Advisor at CTL Strategies
• Ahmed Shinau Abdul Gadir - Manager of Business Development at Dhiraagu
• Junaina Ahmed – Legal Expert

The event will be facilitated by Techstars certified facilitator Dhanish Athif, who is also the co founder and COO of MyBump Media, Malaysia with sessions on lean canvas, customer validation, prototyping and pitching.

The event provides valuable opportunities to network with like-minded people and to get advice from the best experts in the industry who are present to discuss and advise the participants on startup ideas.

Techstars Startup Weekend events are held around the world, in over 150 countries. With over 2,900 events and 193,000 participants to date, it is one of the biggest global startup event series.

Further to Startup Weekend Maldives 2019, Dhiraagu and Sparkhub have been collaborating together to strengthen the local start up culture by introducing global initiatives like the Lean Startup Machine- the world’s leading startup workshop, Angelhack, the first international hackathon in Maldives and through the Startup Grind X events. The focus is to foster the entrepreneurial mindset and pave the way for the development of the startup ecosystem in Maldives.

 


15 November 2019