7th Cycle – Accelerator and Incubator Programme in Cyprus

Deadline: 20-Feb-22

Do you have an innovative idea? If yes then, Apply for the 7th Cycle of Accelerator and Incubator Programme!

With the accelerator and incubator programme, IDEA hosts startups for a period of 9 months, offering them the highest quality of training, workshops, mentorship, consultation and professional services so as to turn their innovative ideas into viable businesses.

Stages

The 9 month program is deployed in two phases:

• Stage A
  • The accelerator stage is tied to specific deliverables where the training, classes and workshops take place and the teams are evaluated to ensure that they qualify to progress to stage B.
  • Hard work and devotion is required by all teams on a weekly basis to maintain a passing rate.
• Stage B
  • Incubator, where they will enjoy even more benefits while finalizing the first version of their product or service (MVP).
  • During their hosting, they offer them strong support, such as legal, accounting, HR, marketing and technology services, through the network of their significant partners they also provide to them training, mentoring, seed capital, networking and access to investors when they are ready.

Categories

Business concept ideas may fall under any one or more of the following categories:

• Financial and insurance technology – Fintech & Insuretech
• Culture, Arts, Virtual museums
• Blockchain
• Al, AR, ML
• Health Sector
• Tourism — Information and communication (software, video etc)
• Agriculture, forestry, animal farming and fishing
• Mining and quarrying
• Manufacturing
• Electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply
• Sustainable Energy sector
• Water supply; sewerage; waste management and remediation activities
• Construction/ demolition
• Wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles
• Transporting and storage
• Accommodation/ Hotels and food service activities
• Real estate activities
• Professional, scientific and technical activities (legal, accounting, consulting, research)
• Administrative and support service activities (renting/leasing etc)
• Public administration; compulsory social security
• Education
• Human health and social work activities
• Arts, entertainment and recreation
• Other (as specified by the applicants)

Award Information

• They estimate the total package of cash & services IDEA offers to each startup, to be well over €58,000, depending on their commitment and utilization of services.
• Though IDEA itself is a non-profit organisation, they apply strict criteria & milestones, so that only hard-working startups will reach graduation from their program.

Benefits

Start-ups at IDEA enjoy a total estimated worth of up to €60.000 in benefits:

• €12.000 seed capital from the Bank of Cyprus
• Business creation training & mentoring from industry experts
• Specialized mentoring in Financial Technology – fintech – and cultural / art proposals
• Consultation in legal, accounting, ICT & Marketing areas
• Business development opportunities, networking, access to investors
• Enthusiastic in-house staff, nurturing in-residence entrepreneurs
• Utilisation of fully equipped co-working spaces for 9 months
• Extraversion activities in order to internationalise and expand their business abroad (such as participation in conferences in Israel & Europe)
• Weekly consultation sessions with a mature business person, so that the startups can receive customized feedback and personalised guidance
• In cooperation with Amazon Web Services (AWS) they offer the opportunity to provide startups with low cost, easy to use infrastructure needed to scale and grow any size business.
• AWS Activate is a program with resources designed to help startups get started on AWS.

Eligibility Criteria

In order to be eligible for the submission of an application to IDEA, all of the following requirements must be met:

• Innovative product
  • The creation and the launch of a product or service that has the element of innovation
  • It is a new solution to a new problem or
  • It solves an existing problem in a new, innovative way.
• Strong Team
  • Commitment: Invest significantly your personal time and work hard towards the creation of your company
  • Clear Roles: Contain Industry Knowledge, Business Skills, Software Developer Skills
  • Sense of urgency: Work fast, progress fast, deliver fast
  • Determination & perseverance: Show stamina and overcome difficulties and hardships
• Global Outlook
  • Your product/service can scale up and has a global outlook – can eventually expand outside Cyprus in other countries
  • Has exit potential – offers the opportunity to investors to invest in you and exit later
  • Has specific Target Market: Is addressed and satisfies the needs of a specific portion of the consumer-base
• Clear revenue model
  • Has realistic financial assumptions (“Know your numbers”)
  • Is targeted to revenue-generation and aims to eventually make profit
  • Ability to anticipate potential barriers/problems
• Relationship with IDEA programme
  • Physical presence
  • Give, take and share culture
  • Attend sessions
  • Submit deliverables
  • Meet deadlines
  • Progress!

For more information, visit https://ideacy.net/how-to-apply/