StartUp Bus Africa

Christopher Pruijsen co-founder of Startup Bus Africa and Sterio.me explains the startups that were created on the bus.

[co-founder sterio.me - Christopher Prujsen - Startup Bus Africa]

(Silvia Lombardo) Hi, I'm with one of the co-founders of Startup Bus Africa

and, hi! Can you tell me how the Startup Bus Africa was started?

(Christopher Prujsen) Yes. Hi to all.

I'm Christopher Prujsen and Startup Bus Africa was started over 6 months ago,

when Magnus, the original co-founder of the Danish Startup Bus and myself

were involved in the UK Founder Bus,

came together and "OK, let's start doing a bus in Africa,

because there is much more potential there for real impact and change."

And then we grew the team

and Fabian, from Germany, took the lead of the team.

He is one of the co-founders of FounderBus originally in Germany

and we grew a team with local partners in Zimbabwe and South Africa.

It has been absolutely phenomenal to make Startup Bus Africa happen,

and such a big success it was.

(Lombardo) Can you tell us more about the team and also the entrepreneurs

who took part in the bus?

(Prujsen) Definitely yes!

So our team included for example Francis in Zimbabwe

who has done some really fantastic things there, including getting EcoNet,

the largest [inaudible] company in the country, on board as a sponsor.

And then Stuart Minnaar, who is a serial entrepreneur from South Africa

and one of the [inaudible] Global Shapers who really helped us a lot

in getting the [inaudible] on board and getting local accelerators in Cape Town to work.

There is Elvis, who is the executive director of the eKasi entrepreneurs,

who hosted us for our final event in Cape Town.

(Lombardo) And which startups won in the end?

(Prujsen) I guess [check] it was the Buspreneurs, an amazing bunch

with 15 from the African continent and 15 from the rest of the world,

and 8 startups to [inaudible].

These startups include everything from healthcare, mobile phone [check], energy

and the startups that won all are operating in industries that no one else is addressing at the moment,

that would solve [check] real problems in Africa.

So the winner is Workforce,

which tackles the problem of unemployment in the construction work and market in Africa,

where currently, you have lines of day workers lined up to get a day's work.

Then you have Funeral.y,

which solves the problem of funeral management in Africa:

everyone dies and everyone needs a funeral at some point.

In Africa, often times people who have family members who pass away,

they have to take big loans, which cripple the family,

and they helped to solve that. (2:16)