On the 14th of November, MITEF (MIT Enterprise Forum) for Pakistan held the final rounds of its Business Acceleration program to award the winners of the competition.
MITEF, directly affiliated with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) through MIT Technology Review, is a global organization which invest its efforts in empowering budding entrepreneurs to help them create world-class technology companies. MITEF Pakistan’s mission is to “improve the economic well being of the people of Pakistan through development of an Entrepreneurship Promotion Program for Pakistan.”
Every year, they conduct Business Acceleration Program in which companies and startups from Pakistan go through four months of training and mentoring to compete in the program’s three different categories,
- Established Company
- Women-led Established Company/ Startup
- Technology Research/ Start-ups Team
A total of 26 finalists made it to the final round and on Saturday, November 14th, the winners along with the runner ups were revealed at a conference at Monevpick Hotel, Karachi. The winners of this program get to attend a fully-funded entrepreneurship development programme (EDP) at MIT in Cambridge, US
Winners
- Established Company: OutDoor Advertising Assets
OutDoor Advertising Assets is a data logistics company that focuses on real-time collection, assessment and distribution of static data. - Women-led Established Company/ Startup: doctHERS
A health-focussed startup, the main aim of doctHERs is to establish clinics in under served areas across Pakistan. With the help of mobile and internet enabled technologies and video-conferencing, this startup aims to connect female doctors with millions of under-served patients in real-time.
- Technology Research/ Start-ups Team: QueB Technologies
Queb Technoligies is a software solution provider that designs products that focus heavily on business and customer interaction. They won for their research and work in developing a physical retail (walk-in) customer management system.
Runner-Ups
- Established Company:
Bilytica Private Limited
The first runner up, Bylytica is a Business Intelligence and Analytics Solutions company that provides business services like advanced analytics, dashboards and portals, BI architecture and query, reporting, and analysis. - CloudClinik was the second-runner up in this category. It is a cloud based EMR and Practice Management solution for doctors, clinics and healthcare facilities, eliminating the need for upfront software installation or IT expertise.
- Women-led Established Company/ Startup: EnovatRx
EnovatRx provides South Asia’s first e-Pharmacy Benefit Management System to provide access to quality medicines, electronic medical records and e-prescriptions for low-income workers. - Technology Research/ Start-ups Team: The Globe Tech Private Limited
Globe Tech Private Limited is professional search engine optimization(SEO) management firm that provides SEO, Web Development, Data Entry services and Web Hosting services.
The Business Acceleration Program has been incredibly successful in improving the revenue of most of the companies participating in this program, even 10 to 15 times for a few. Sofizar, a digital marketing agency and a former participant in this program, experienced a 30 times increase in its revenue in less than two and a half years, up from $1 Million to a whopping $30 Million.
Pakistan ICT industry – the glass that remains half full