Innovators working on justice and legal issues worldwide can apply for up to 20 000 EUR in equity-free grant money as part of the Hague Institute for Innovation of Law (HiiL) Justice Accelerator’s Innovating Justice Challenge.
The Call for Applications, which opened March 1 and remains open until June 30, encourages two types of application: first, startups with an idea and team may apply for funding in the Call for Innovations; second, individuals without a team or idea can apply for the Call for Talent.
The Call for Innovations has, over the last five years, awarded funding to over 60 innovative justice/legal technologies from all over the world. It is open to applicants with both a team and justice innovation idea.
In 2016, four startups and organisations from the Southern Africa region won funding through the Innovating Justice Challenge, including teams from South Africa and Malawi.
The Call for Talent is a search for individuals with a particular skill that they wish to apply to the cause of justice innovation. Up to 10 individuals will be selected and supported through innovation training, some travel to local events, support for their ideas, and future support.
Ten justice innovations will win training, up to 20k EUR in equity-free funding, access to a mentor network, and potential future funding.
Applications are particularly encouraged that address six main pain points of justice: employment justice, family justice, neighbor disputes, land disputes, crime and law enforcement, and migration/human trafficking. Applications are also welcome from other areas.
The criteria for selection include: innovations must be strictly justice related, and present viable routes to sustainability, scalability, and the ability to create social impact in their communities in providing access to justice. The innovations should provide a unique idea that does not already exist in a particular region.
To submit an application, innovators and individuals should visit https://innovatingjustice.com/en/apply. The Call for Application closes at 16:59 Central European Time on 30th June 2017.
Seedstars World Announces 11 Startups To Pitch At Seedstars World Cape Town
Seedstars World, the global seed-stage startup competition for emerging markets and fast-growing startup scenes, is returning to Cape Town on the 8th of June to scout for the best entrepreneurs in technology.
The South African competition is carried out with the support of local lead partner, Standard Bank and local ambassador Entrepreneur Traction. Additional support is provided by regional partners Enel and Merck and local partner Workshop 17, Seedspace Spin Street House and Payfast.
The event will take place at Workshop 17 with the startups to pitch to a panel of judges. The top startups will be advanced to the grand finale and compete again for the title of most promising seed-stage startup of Seedstars World South Africa 2017. The event is already fully sold out.
The 11 startups that are selected to participate at the Seedstars World pitching event are:
- Arts Alternative – Arts Alternative is an online platform for landlords to monetize properties listing their walls and brands to book available ad spaces
- Dietnostix – LIPOstix is the world’s first dedicated 3-in-1 fat burn urine test. It’s fast, easy to use, non-invasive and 99% accurate.
- EMG Technologies – EMGuidance solves a critical problem for medical professionals by aggregating medical content from regional experts in one app.
- GreenFingers Mobile – GreenFingers Mobile is a mobile first Software-as-a-Service technology platform to finance and manage large groups of smallholder farmers.
- Hi5 – Hi5 is a fast, fun and simple solution to assist companies with growth via recognition and ongoing regular co-worker feedback.
- Jumpin Rides (Pty) Ltd – Jumpin Rides is an online platform connecting drivers with empty seats in their car with passengers going the same way.
- Mbora – Mbora is a solar-powered IoT-enabled sensing suite that delivers real-time visibility to a service provider across its entire network
- MCX Technologies – MCX Technologies is a solution to augment or replace traditional farming with automated vertical farming, and drive down the cost through vertical integration and local manufacturing.
- Regenize – Regenize is a recycling company that’s focused on motivating South Africans to recycle through incentivization & education.
- Timu Trust – Timu Trust is an online platform that connects unemployed people with opportunities which they can complete within walking distance.
- Yoummday (Pty) Ltd – Yoummday is the world’s first Online Marketplace for Contact Centre Solutions like Telesales, Research, Service & Surveys, Secretarial or Translator.
PayU Moves To Connect Businesses To N200bn Online Payment Market
PayU has rolled out strategies to intensify efforts to connect businesses to Nigeria’s online payment market. Annual online payments in Nigeria is estimated to surpass N200 billion this year from N167 billion in 2016.
Country Manager of PayU Nigeria, Ms Juliet Nwanguma, says, “In order to pursue PayU’s aggressive expansion in the online payment market in Nigeria, we have identified businesses that can benefit from our global expertise across 16 markets where we offer over 250 payment options.”
With over 2.3 billion users world-wide, PayU is confident it can help businesses grow their market share and help them to achieve their business objectives.
Data recently released by the Nigeria Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS) showed that 5.5 million transactions worth N46.7 billion were generated through online sales in the first quarter of 2017. This is an increase in the quarterly average of 3.5 million transactions worth N33 billion in 2016. This 58% growth is a clear indication of the increased confidence and preference for online sales amongst Nigerians.
The double digit growth, according to Nwanguma, is far below the potential of the market for online payments in Nigeria.
Nwanguma noted that in a country of over 180 million people, consisting of 61 million active bank customers and where epayment transactions are worth N56 trillion in a year, the potential for online payments in Nigeria is huge and waiting to be tapped.
She disclosed that the mission of PayU is to leverage on Nigeria’s 97 million active internet users to popularise and increase online payments in Nigeria.
“At PayU, we believe that with the deployment of appropriate strategies and products which are designed to encourage more businesses to adopt online payment, the market in Nigeria can record triple digit growth in both volume and value of online payments. This is the driving philosophy of PayU’s operations in Nigeria,” she said.
“Since last year when we entered the Nigerian market, we have used our globally tested products such as tokenisation, recurring payments for subscription services and single click payments for faster checkout. Our range of services according to different business categories especially the PayU Easy service allows startups to start selling online instantly without the need of a bank account or trading history. ”
“PayU has succeeded in successfully assisting small, medium and large organisations with their online payments. In particular, the robust and flexible features of PayU Plus and PayU Enterprise have assisted merchants to grow and expand their online payment business,” Nwanguma concludes.
Private School Operator Curro Holdings Appoints New CEO
Private school operator Curro Holdings on Tuesday appointed Dr Chris van der Merwe as the group chief executive of its tertiary education business, Stadio Holdings, with effect from 1 July.
Stadio Holdings is an investment company which focuses on expansion and development in the tertiary education space, through its various brands. Its vision is to widen access to tertiary education through both contact and distance learning.
Van der Merwe already serves as a non-executive director on the board of Curro and will act as strategic advisor to Curro following his appointment at Stadio.
The JSE-listed independent schools group also re-affirmed its intention to unbundle and list Stadio Holdings separately during the course of this year after it expressed confidence in the tertiary education market in February.
Curro started expanding its tertiary education college, Embury Institute for Higher Education, whose original campus could accommodate 1,000 students, in 2016. Embury is a private tertiary education provider wholly owned by Stadio Holdings.
At the end of 2017, the company said, the Embury operations would move to a new facility in Durban that could accommodate 2,600 students. Two new campuses, Waterfall in Midrand and Montana in Pretoria, would be ready for full intake in 2018.
In February, Curro reported a 69 percent improvement in headline earnings, from R100 million to R169 million, in the year to the end of December 2016. (African News Agency)
