In April, I will publish the 2018 ranking of the 30 Most Promising Young Entrepreneurs In Africa. Now in its seventh year, the list has become an influential and definitive guide to the most exceptional young innovators and entrepreneurial leaders who are building the companies that will rewrite Africa’s future.
I am looking to identify 30 of Africa’s brightest, most ambitious and unsung young entrepreneurial stars. To help compile the list, I am asking you, the reader to nominate entrepreneurs (aged 35 and under) who are making the most dramatic impact in Africa today in manufacturing, technology, real estate, media & entertainment, financial services, agriculture, fashion and the service industry. I am on the lookout for builders and leaders, innovators and risk takers; today’s upstarts, tomorrow’s moguls.
35 young African social entrepreneurs from 20 sub-Saharan countries in Africa get seed funding from the U.S. African Development Foundation (USADF)
Nominees must be citizens of one of the 54 African countries and their business must be based in an African country. And no lone rangers here; nominees must be entrepreneurs who have built businesses that employ at least 5 people. Preferably, the companies they have built should be generating revenues of at least $100,000, and be profitable. But if they are yet to break even, the entrepreneur must have created a viable product or service that’s filling a critical need and achieving reasonable traction with tremendous prospects. And the entrepreneurs must be ethical and socially responsible individuals, because entrepreneurs must help not just themselves but the communities that enable them prosper.
Send your nominations to best30africa@gmail.com or tweet me your nominations @MfonobongNsehe on or before the 28th of March 2018.