BongoHive closed off the year with 9 startups completing the final Discover Programme for the year 2019 on Friday, 22 November. The programme is designed for early-stage startups and aspiring entrepreneurs to assist them in formulating their business ideas and creating launchable startups.

The 2-week programme involves daily training sessions at Bongohive, where the selected participants build business models, validate their products and the market and also learn how to create sound financial projections. The participants also receive training sessions from our partners Musa Dudhia & Co. and EY Zambia for legal and taxation advisory respectively. The programme concludes with a pitch event where the teams present their businesses to guests in attendance.

Judges for the final pitch session were Andrew Sikwanda, Senior Manager at PwC Zambia; Susan Mwenda-Mulongoti, Co-Founder of Zicon Media; and Gilbert Mwale, Founder of eMsika. They awarded the best pitch to Mighti, represented by Mwansa Matokwani. They are looking to produce protein from insect farming for human consumption and animal feed. 

The runner-up was Tilungisa Auto (Gerald Maboshe), who are developing an application to ease the process of finding mechanics. The third best pitch was awarded to Adlane (Amos Daka and Emmanuel Mushaushu) who want to bring advertising to the masses by advertising through screens in buses. 

Other programme participants were Chris Consultancy (Chris Musonda), Croft Property (Ernest Thornicroft), Custom Grader (Rogders Iradukunda), eSoweto (Kelvin Mupeta), Punzila (Jane Mazimba) and Zedtech (Chileleko Hantuba).

Congratulations to the 16 startups that took part in and completed the programme this year. We will be opening applications for the next cohort of Discover which will be held in January 2020.