The Gauteng Accelerator Programme (GAP) provides a very useful opportunity for entrepreneurs in the biosciences, green, ICT and health sectors. The opportunity consists of both incubation services, and seed funding. The process of selecting successful applicants is multi-staged, and as such provides a very important way to better develop a strategy for your business.
This initiative has been going for four years, and has the following indicators:
- Attracted over 400 entries.
- Invested over R5 million in seed funding and incubation support
- Supported 23 startups in the ICT, green, health technology and biotech sectors
GAP is an expanded version of the Gauteng Innovation Competition and GAP Biosciences programme which, over the past four years, attracted more than 400 entries and invested over R5 million in seed funding and incubation support into 23 startups in the ICT, green, health technology and biotech sectors.
About Gauteng Accelerator Programme
The 2014 Gauteng Accelerator Programme (GAP) innovation competitions are open for entries. The 14 winners will access specialised incubation services at The Innovation Hub valued at almost R2 million, and a cash awards and seed funding pool of R2.75 million.
Over the next 6 months competition participants and finalists will participate in workshops and business training hosted by leaders in the technology entrepreneurship field, culminating in the GAP awards ceremony on 20 November 2014. To accelerate your venture enter online before 1 June at www.theinnovationhub.com.
- GAP Biosciences winners share R1 million in seed funding and will be incubated at the prestigious new BioPark under construction at The Innovation Hub. The competition is run in partnership with the Technology Innovation Agency (TIA) and in collaboration with Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia and is a unique programme that assists scientists and entrepreneurs to pursue commercially viable opportunities for their cutting edge bioscience technologies. This year the competition also received sponsorship from Pfizer.
- GAP Green is run in collaboration with the South African Climate Innovation Centre, a World Bank clean tech incubator based at The Innovation Hub, and seeks emerging entrepreneurs developing green technology solutions related to energy security, water management, waste and sanitation, sustainable mobility and food security. The four winners also share R650,000 in cash and seed funding.
- GAP ICT aims to identify researchers and entrepreneurs working on ICT-based solutions to our country’s biggest challenges, from mobile applications used in classrooms to geo-spatial technologies for environmental and disaster management. GAP ICT is a joint project with mLab Southern Africa, also based at The Innovation Hub, which will host a competition hackathon in August 2014.
- GAP Medical – Health Technologies is run in partnership with the organisers of the World Innovation Day to be held in Geneva in 2014. The competition is focused on identifying and nurturing health innovations that will contribute to the improvement of health service delivery within hospitals, and winners access incubation at The Innovation Hub and share R450,000 in seed funding.
Key Dates
Competition opens: 01 April 2014
Competition closes: 23h59 on 01 June 2014
Adjudication & Semi-finalist: 02-06 June 2014
Smart Living Challenge Workshop: 24 June 2014
Business Training: 14-18 July 2014
Hackathon:15-17 August 2014
Submission of Business Models: 30 September 2014
Pitching/Judging: 30 October 2014
GAP Awards Ceremony:20 November 2014
Incubation starts:January 2015
Contact Details
If you have any queries about any of the competitions, please send an email to the competition email addresses below. Alternatively feel free to visit or call us at The Innovation Hub at any time on +27 (0)12 844 0000 to get more information. We will reply to your queries as soon as we can.
GAP Green: gapgreen@theinnovationhub.com
GAP Biosciences: gapbiosciences@theinnovationhub.com
GAP ICT: gapict@theinnovationhub.com
GAP Medical: gapmedical@theinnovationhub.com