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SHOWCASING THE KINGDOM’S START-UP POTENTIAL ON THE GLOBAL STAGE KAUST-backed start-ups reach the finals of the Entrepreneurship World Cup For the second year in a row, KAUST partnered with the MiSk Global Forum to host the 2020 Entrepreneurship World Cup (EWC). The EWC is the world’s largest pitch competition for start-ups, and in 2020 over 170,000 start-ups from around the world applied. KAUST entrepreneurs were looking to repeat their success from 2019 when Red Sea Farms, a university start-up developing ways to irrigate agriculture with saltwater, placed third overall in the competition. This year, three Saudi start-ups – including two from KAUST – made it to the virtual global finals in October 2020, where 100 contestants competed for the top prize of $500,000. To secure a place in the global finals, KAUST’s start-ups first had to go through the competitive Saudi national finals held in September 2020. The national competition received 15,000 applications from local entrepreneurs, of which 15 were selected to pitch on a virtual stage to a panel of judges. Out of those, six companies were selected for consideration for the global finals, with the top-three finalists automatically proceeding and the other three given a place in the international semifinals. Talon Dust Control and Edama Organic Solutions, both graduates of the university’s start-up accelerator TAQADAM, placed first and second, respectively, in the national competition and automatically qualified for the global finals. Talon graduated from the 2019 TAQADAM class and produces environmentally friendly dust control and soil stabilization solutions for Saudi Arabia’s dry and water-scarce conditions. Founded in 2017 and based in the KAUST Research and Technology Park, Edama recycles organic waste into soil-improvement products that are tailored to increase the efficiency of desert agriculture. During two days of the EWC global finals, the participating start-ups competed in a series of stages until only five remained. The top prize went to Singaporean biotech start-up TurtleTree Labs, which develops milk using cell-based technology. While the KAUST entrants did not make it to the final round, each of the 100 start-ups received a package of in-kind services valued at $850,000. Overall, the competition was a major success. It once again demonstrated the talent of KAUST researchers, while reaffirming the university’s growing role as a facilitator of entrepreneurial drive and business creation in the Kingdom.
HATTAN AHMED Head of the KAUST Entrepreneurship Center
KAUST IS A NATURAL PARTNER OF THE ENTREPRENEURSHIP WORLD CUP, AS BOTH ORGANIZATIONS SHARE THE MUTUAL AMBITION OF ATTRACTING TECH START-UPS AND PREMIER GLOBAL TALENT SO THAT SAUDI ARABIA CAN SERVE AS AN EMINENT HUB FOR ENTREPRENEURSHIP.
ENTREPRENEURSHIP WORLD CUP “All of us on the Entrepreneurship World Cup team are glad that KAUST is so deeply involved in the organization, not only because they share our view that young people are the greatest asset for overcoming the challenge of change, but because their world-leading expertise will help our global finalists achieve their potential.” Abdulrahman Al Suhaymi, Lead for the Entrepreneurship World Cup at MiSK
