About the author
There’s an exciting new program for entrepreneurs in Pakistan. As you can read below, Busines Acceleration Program is a joint effort of MIT Club of Pakistan Enterprise Forum and OPEN to promote innovation in Pakistan. Here’s the introduction about the BAP from the MITCEF website:
MITCEF-OPEN Business Acceleration Program’s (BAP) objective is to help IT/ITES Companies operating in Pakistan, to accelerate their business to the next level. This is part of the MITCEF and OPEN overall goal of building and sustaining the Entrepreneurial Echo system in Pakistan.
BAP aims to help accelerate some of the participating IT/ITES companies to the next level by putting these companies through a mentoring/coaching program. The participants of BAP would work towards preparing a Business Acceleration Plan ( BP). These BPs would be ranked by experts who would select the winner and runner-up teams. Two members of the winning team would be sponsored to attend the MIT Entrepreneurship Development Program at MIT in USA. The winner and runner-up BPs would also be presented to VCs who may offer “Term Sheets” to these companies. OPEN USA members would also offer to be on the Boad of Directors of the top companies.
So for all of you who have been procrastinating, this is the time to convert your ideas to a business plan!
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…. sahi dhonda tm nay
August 16th, 2007 at 3:50 pm
I think we are already missed some of the workshops
August 16th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
Can we still participate in this program? any member of MITEF can answer this?
August 16th, 2007 at 4:15 pm
I wish I can participate in this.
August 17th, 2007 at 9:06 pm
The submission info is available at:
http://mitcef-pakistan.org/bapsubmission.htm
Please let us know about your submission experience.
Yes, the first workshop was earlier this month but I hope there will be more.
August 17th, 2007 at 11:16 pm
Companies who want to participate in the Business Acceleration Program (BAP) can still do so as the Application Form (AF) submission date has been changed from August 15th to August 22nd. For details visit http://www.mitcef-pakistan.org/bap.htm . The eligibility criterion is available at http://www.mitcef-pakistan.org/rules.htm . The Application Form can be downloaded from: http://mitcef-pakistan.org/bapsubmission.htm . Please email queries to bapinfo@mitcef-pakistan.org .
August 18th, 2007 at 7:08 am
Sad to see this
Participants Eligibility Criterion:
• Only for registered IT/ITES Companies.
• Companies must have been in operation in Pakistan for at least 3 years.
• The average revenue for the past three years should be between US$ 0.1 to 3 Millions.
August 19th, 2007 at 9:07 pm
The date for the application has been extended from August 15th to August 22nd.
August 20th, 2007 at 11:07 pm
Is there any platform for young graduates/professional to present their ideas where we don;t have these kind of limitations?
August 21st, 2007 at 6:02 pm
I was reading the requirements to participate and the funniest thing was “At least three years of existence and annual revenues of more than $0.2M” If someone has sustained a business for over 3 years with annual revenues exceeding 0.2M in Pakistan, i dont really think they need mentoring, the should be a part of the mentoring team.
This should be directed towards fresh graduates with fresh ideas and no experience.
August 22nd, 2007 at 1:59 pm
@Anonymous – i totally agree, at-least they can offer a parallel track for fresh graduates.
August 22nd, 2007 at 5:29 pm
Have you seen the PTA competition for students?
http://greenwhite.org/2007/08/20/pta-gold-medals-for-outstanding-research-projects-in-it-telecom-for-students/
August 22nd, 2007 at 6:22 pm
Please note that there is a major Business Plan Competition planned by TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs) around December 2007 in Pakistan. This competition will target Start-ups and fresh graduates. MITCEF-OPEN decided not to compete with this activity thus offered a complimentary program. This ensures that both fresh graduates/start-up and existing companies who are struck at one level are helped to accelerate to the next level. Please note that for the industry in Pakistan to grow and prosper, we need organizations of all sizes from a few people shops to organizations that employ thousands of people. We have broken the 200 employees’ barrier and now need to break 1,000, 5,000 and 10,000 employees’ barriers.
It is my firm belief that we all need help and mentoring whether we are at US $ 20K, US$ 2M, US$ 20 M or more and there are people out there who can provide help. If this was not the case then Consulting firms like Earnest & Young, Peat Marwick, etc. would not be so successful.
August 22nd, 2007 at 6:56 pm
@Babar – Yes, i have seen that, it says “Final Year Student of HEC Recognized Universities”
@Zahir – It is good news for us, i have seen many videos of the TieCon 2007 held in india and it is a great idea to tie innovators and investors.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=TieCon&search=Search
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