In the middle of breaking business news – mergers, acquisitions, IPOs and expansions – smaller entrepreneurial initiatives often pass unnoticed. Many of these innovative projects, however, do have an impact, whether by combating information monopoly, providing alternatives for entertainment activities or getting high quality food delivered right to our doors.
Introducing leisure games to the local entertainment scene
ION Entertainment, a company specialized in leisure and adventure sports, has introduced the first paintball field in Egypt. The company has a vision of introducing a number of adventure sports either for groups or companies looking for unique team building activities.The company started with Paintball, a game where two teams compete in a war-like setting with the aim of capturing the other team’s flag. During the game, each team tries to eliminate the players of the opposing team by tagging them with paintballs which contain a colored liquid that bursts once they hit any object. The game ends by either capturing the opponent’s flag or eliminating all its players.The business suffered a setback towards the end of the year. The equipment for the games has been delayed in customs since January 2007 and the company has been relying on their stock of paintballs, which they managed to get into Egypt through smaller personal shipments via courier services. “I don’t know exactly the reason behind this delay, the main partner in the company Youssry Esmat told Daily News Egypt. “It seems that nobody wants to take the responsibility for letting in items that they are not familiar with. This delay has driven some of the partners to pull out of the company, but now it is re-launching as “Universal Entertainment and re-opening its field under the name of “Zone 55 with new games including climbing, rope coursing, and crime scene investigation.
Getting lobster tail delivered right to your door
Last year, meat supplier and owner of AM Foods Jalal Abu Ghazaleh started up a new company “Gourmet Egypt in order to provide Egyptian consumers with high quality, posh food items.Gourmet Egypt brings high quality foods from all over the world – and ensures they are transported and stored in optimal conditions – to your doorstep through online or phone delivery orders.Some of the items available at Gourmet Egypt is Maine lobster tail, Swordfish Saku, Fisherman’s pride Butterfly Shrimps and boneless Aussie lamb meat. You can also see the ranking of each item on Gourmet’s website according to its popularity among customers. Orders are taken over the phone by dialing 19339 or online at www.gourmetegypt.com. While Gourmet Egypt was not the first company to provide an online delivery service in Egypt, it is definitely the first to provide a delivery service for such luxurious food items.
Standing against information monopoly
Daam for Information technology was established by open source activists with expertise in information technology management. The main objective of the organization is to combat the monopoly of information and help their clients overcome the difficulties associated with the collection, organization and provision of information.Daam works on two main fronts. The first is to prepare categorized information for researchers in a user friendly format and build databases in different fields. The second is promoting the culture of using open source software in an attempt to decreases the corporation monopoly of software.The team has been taking on different projects, particularly from NGOs and international organizations. It handles the whole process, starting from collecting information to digitalizing the content and presenting it on CDs or upload it to the internet – to decrease the cost of making it available to everyone.Daam’s main website (Al Daftar Khana www.id3m.com) is dedicated to presenting press materials published in different newspapers in an archived format. It’s easy to search the archive for topics of interest.
