Journey of a transformer

Hasanul Qader Mirza | Published: March 26, 2015 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00

Imagine, you own an incredible early stage startup in Bangladesh which can become the next big thing! But you do not have proper network, investors, and other technical resources required for expansion. To help you and your startup there are some amazing international business plan competitions around the globe. I had the opportunity to participate in a few of them and achieved significant success with my team. Global Social Entrepreneurship Competitions (GSEC), Global Social Venture Competition (GSVC), and I-Dare Business Plan Competition are some of them. Let me take this opportunity and talk about the I-Dare Business Plan Competition organised by Global Innovation through Science and Technology (GIST) and CRDF Global.
Our team Greennovation Technologies stood first in the competition and secured a substantial amount of grant from GIST. The grant money gave us the leverage to solve numerous issues like office set-up, machinery purchase and piloting of our project.
GIST arranged a Road Trip in four different cities across the United States for the winners of different competitions and boot-camps in 2012. I represented team Greennovation Technologies in the amazing road trip. The cities were Washington DC, New York, Boston and California.
GIST managed to design a complete set of activities to enhance the entrepreneurial learning and also created great opportunity for networking with the investors from US entrepreneurial eco-system. A number of Panel discussion gave us significant exposure to the investors there. Besides these the visit to Harvard Innovation Lab and Stanford Design Lab gave me notable knowledge of the innovative businesses the students are developing on a regular basis in the States. In Washington DC I had one of the most memorable moments of my life where I was a Panel Speaker on "Youth Entrepreneurship around the World" at the White House. I along with two other winners of GIST competition were in the panel. After coming back from the journey our team received a number of investment proposals from home and abroad. And our exposure to the media also attracted some retailers who showed interest in our business. This all was because of the GIST Initiative programme.
Being a GIST transformer, I was able to meet many new people and  build strong ties with them. Still today we are in touch and have long discussion over many issues in the social networking sites. I strongly believe that the GIST Initiative and US Department of States’ programmes have made me a better entrepreneur who now has a stable vision of achieving much by creating value for the society.  Exploring opportunities is one of keys of success in business and these business plan competitions can be a game changer for your business. My suggestion for the early stage entrepreneurs to apply in competitions like GSVC, Mass Challenge (an MIT Competition), GIST Tech-I, and more to have access to seed capital, legal resources, mentoring and other perks which they have to offer.  
The writer is a GIST transformer, a co-founder of Launch-Pad Bangladesh, email: mirza.ais@live.com