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Tel Aviv start-up prize to focus on SA women in tech

South African women tech-innovators are the focus of this year’s Start-Up Tel Aviv South Africa initiative by the Embassy of Israel.

The global Start-up Tel Aviv competition gives step-ups an opportunity to spend a week in the third biggest high-tech start-up hub in the world.

This competition is open to all South African women who are the founders or senior managers of any company in the hi-tech field which is in early stage seed funding. This year the competition has a particular focus on women tech leaders and aims to reward innovation and entrepreneurship in the hi-tech sector.

The prize is an opportunity to travel to Israel for a full week of meetings, workshops and networking opportunities with some of the world’s leading tech and start-up experts.  The winner will travel to Israel for and intense, all-expense-paid, five-day startup experience in the heart of Tel Aviv in September 2016, during the innovative DLD Festival.

Start-Up Tel Aviv South Africa has selected a team of internationally respected judges to select one woman who is actively involved in an innovative company that has developed a unique, sustainable and scalable technology driven business.

Judges on the panel include: Noluthando Gosa, former Investment Analyst and a longstanding member of a number of professional organisations like the Institute of Directors of South Africa, Business Women’s Association of SA (Gauteng) and the Black Business Council; Tanya Kovarsky, the PR and Communications Lead of Core Group and an award-winning parenting blogger with more than 12 years of experience in magazine and newspaper journalism; Hillary Joffe, one of South Africa’s leading financial journalists; Toby Shapshack, publisher of Stuff Magazine, and Arthur Goldstuck, award-winning writer, analyst and founder of World Wide Worx.

The judges will be looking for a truly innovative business spearheaded by a woman, as explained further by one of the judges, Israeli Ambassador to South Africa Arthur Lenk: “Start-Up Tel Aviv South Africa, now in its third year, aims to share the energy of Israel’s start-up culture with women in the tech-sector of South Africa through supporting truly innovative start-ups. We know that in South Africa there are widely creative people who will gain from exposure to the world renowned innovation eco-system in Tel Aviv.

“Our Start-Up Tel Aviv South Africa content is of benefit to both South Africa and Israel by highlighting the benefits of outside the box  creative thinking and honouring the best new woman ‘startupist’ in South Africa.”

The prize winner will travel to the DLD Festival in Tel Aviv to participate in lectures, workshops and meetings with leading Israeli investors and professionals. The winning start-up experience takes place during the DLD Festival week (www.dldtelaviv.com), Israel’s largest international hi-tech gathering, featuring hundreds of start ups, VCs, angel investors and leading multinationals, including top technological talent, the highest venture capital investments per capita and multinational centres for industry leaders such as Intel, Google, and Microsoft, Kimberly-Clark, Amazon, GM, Amdocs and Facebook.

The South African winner will also have the opportunity to meet investors, designers, artists, scientists, and cultural drivers from Israel and abroad.

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