The ‘Scale Up Accelerator’ program to support digital entrepreneurship concluded last week as part of the Kingdom’s efforts to strengthen its position as a regional hub for digital companies and a destination for entrepreneurship, which comes in cooperation with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, (MCIT) PepsiCo and AstroLabs.
The closing ceremony of the ‘Scale Up Accelerator’ program was organized in Riyadh, in the presence of many entrepreneurs, investors and officials, who celebrated the success of the program by showcasing the achievements of the participants, highlighting the growth of entrepreneurship in the Kingdom, which is witnessing large-scale economic development, enabling it to transform into a thriving and attractive hub for SMEs.
The accelerator program was uniquely designed to generate a direct impact for all participating SMEs. While many SMEs had already launched their first E-commerce website, highlights from the top 40 participants reflected outstanding digitization and entrepreneurship skills. Eighty digital marketing campaigns were launched, 30 new websites were built, and 30 new business models were introduced to reveal 10% revenue growth for over half of the cohort’s top 40.
The program, sponsored by PepsiCo’s philanthropic arm],aims to unleash the full potential of SMEs in the Kingdom by enabling the transformation of local businesses into e-commerce interfaces. In its first edition, the program selected 103 contestants from more than 250 participants based on their business capabilities and models and the diversity of their cultural backgrounds.
The program also leveraged its resources to support young entrepreneurs and further enable them to transform their business vision into successful business ventures. Moreover, the participants came from many Saudi cities, including Riyadh, Jeddah and Makkah, as well as a number of other regions in the Kingdom, while a large number of participants specialized in many industries and fields including 37 participants from the handicrafts and gifts sector, 29 participants from the healthcare sector, 12 participants from the retail sector, 9 from the fashion sector, 8 participants from the food and beverages sector, and 7 participants from service providers.
Source: Saudi Press Agency
