SE Mini Accelerator

SE Mini Accelerator, Nairobi

December 13, 2013 - News

The first SE Mini Accelerator has just come to an end. 8 entrepreneurs, representing 7 social innovations, participated in the two-week program that took place in Kenya, Nairobi, during the period of November 25 – December 6. SE Mini Accelerator was conducted in partnership with Action Aid’s Global Platform “Training4Change”, which has 10 training centers all over the world. SE Forum and Training4Change are looking to continue the partnership in the years to come, and together build the capacity amongst social entrepreneurs all around the world in order to more effectively address some of the worlds most pressing problems.

The eight social entrepreneurs, where seven were originally from Kenya and one from Uganda, came together with the aim to build their business capacity in order to strengthen their enterprises and be able to have an even bigger social impact in some of the worlds poorest countries. Their activities cover areas such as health care, waste management, agriculture, food security, education, green energy, targeting East Africa, where poverty and unemployment are currently major societal problems.

The program was quite intense. The participants worked day and night, even the one evening the training centre suffered from a blackout! SE Forum facilitators, Jessika Kjellgren and Andréa Råsberg, together with consultant Ruth Brännvall, introduced the nine building blocks of the Business Model Canvas, and the participants applied it to their enterprises with the help of SE Forum business toolbox that they were provided with.

” The SE Mini Accelerator was extremely useful. It jogged my mind and helped me to dig deeper into the business side of the project. It opened up my eyes at the many possibilities, now I see them everywhere”, said one of the participants.

The last day of the program the participants got the chance to pitch their business ideas to representatives of SE Forum, Action Aid, the non-profit impact investor Acumen Fund, and Innovate Kenya, a platform that promotes social innovation amongst youths. The room was filled with nervousness and excitement, and the outcomes were above expectations. Lots of mingling and exchanging of business cards was going on, which once again made it clear that this is only the beginning…

Read more about the enterprises by clicking the photos below.