The NilePreneurs initiative, launched by the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) and implemented by the Nile University, has announced about EGP 1bn increase in the sales of companies benefiting from the incubation and export support programmes offered by the initiative since its launch in 2019 until the end of 2022.
Heba Labib, Executive Director of the initiative, said in the initiative’s harvest report for the year 2022, that the initiative provided more than 2,000 job opportunities through the supported companies, and more than 150 businesswomen were supported as founding partners of startups, and small and medium enterprises, in addition to training and networking more than 1000 companies with investors and industry experts, the initiative has also helped more than 260 companies achieve digital transformation.
She added that the initiative’s incubation programs have contributed to supporting creative solutions in strategic national sectors, such as information technology, artificial intelligence, and creative industries. These sectors contribute to achieving sustainable development throughout Egypt, and have also achieved significant impacts on environmental sustainability by supporting projects concerned with reducing greenhouse gases and waste. and air, water and soil pollutants.
She pointed out that the initiative worked with SMEs to develop various industries in Egypt in various sectors, including the industrial, agricultural, chemical, furniture, construction and engineering sectors, in addition to contributing to achieving sustainable growth in other industries such as the dairy industry and biodegradable plastic through the Development Center. value chains.
According to Labib, since its official launch in 2019 until the end of 2022, the NilePreneurs initiative has worked to support entrepreneurship and innovation in Egypt through integrated packages of services that included 6 different programs offered to owners of emerging ideas and projects to help them establish their own projects or expand and grow and face challenges in the markets.
She explained that the initiative’s Business Development Service Centers programme covers most of Egypt’s governorates to provide advisory support and non-financial solutions to small and medium enterprises and owners of newly established projects, through nine main services, namely, creating ideas for new projects, facilitating access to training programs, establishing projects, facilitating registration activity and obtaining licenses, facilitating obtaining feasibility studies, business plan and business model, credit file processing, financial analysis, knowledge dissemination, and networking.
She pointed out that the business development services centers that were established under the supervision of CBE and in cooperation with 14 banks, the Ministry of Youth and Sports and a number of universities have provided about 250,000 non-financial services since the start of operation in July 2019 until the end of 2022, and therefore for more than 100,000 beneficiaries of businesses and project owners, 30% of whom are women, through 67 business development service centres covering most of the country.
She pointed out that the Nile Pioneers business incubators greatly contributed to enabling creative solutions in strategic national sectors with different axes through five specialized business incubators, including the pre-incubation program.
She revealed that after receiving more than 2,000 applications to benefit from a programme in the incubators of the NilePreneurs initiative, about 237 start-up companies were incubated in various fields, of which 100 companies have already started selling their products, and have achieved sales of more than EGP 145m, in addition to creating more than 1,700 jobs, and the incubating companies also received financing from investors at a value of approximately EGP 75m
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She added that the initiative has been expanding partnerships with other entities with the aim of supporting entrepreneurs and project owners more in various sectors, as a partnership was concluded with the Export Council for Chemical Industries and Fertilizers, and the Export Council for Printing, Packaging, Paper, Books, and Artistic Works.
