This article was taken from the December 2014 issue of WIRED magazine. Be the first to read WIRED's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by subscribing online.
How do you spot undiscovered, genius startups? Go on a 34-city world tour, vetting 3,500 of them. "We were fed up with Silicon Valley and the usual European startup hubs. We wanted to find the great stories coming out of Nairobi or Tehran," says Alisée de Tonnac (right), cofounder of Seedstars World. The Geneva-based organisation runs startup competitions in emerging markets ranging from Moscow to Manila. Finalists from each city will convene in Geneva in February; the winner gets up to €500,000 from Seedstars World, plus crowdfunding investment.
De Tonnac launched the competition last year with Pierre-Alain Masson, who also founded Seedstars --the venture builder that backs Seedstars World. "I have lived all over the world, including in Singapore, Cambodia and Brazil," de Tonnac says. "I knew we could make a real impact with a project like this." She quit her corporate marketing job at L'Oréal and began contacting local incubators, accelerators, investors and co-working spaces in each city to set up indigenous judging hubs. The expert panel in each city sorted through about 100 applications to pick the 20 most promising startups for a live pitch. The competition ran in 20 cities in 2013, and the winner was crowdsourced translation platform Flitto from Seoul. "Together, the finalists have raised over $14 million (£8.5m) since our event," de Tonnac says. "And some have been accepted into top accelerators like Techstars, 500 Startups or MEST in Ghana."
In 2015, Seedstars World plans to expand to 50 cities, including in eastern Europe and the Middle East, with a particular focus on getting female founders involved. "The best thing we can do in emerging markets is create jobs," de Tonnac says. "Build up businesses and create a truly global network of entrepreneurs."
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
