Portland’s startup ecosystem is still relatively immature. But that doesn’t mean that our current knowledge isn’t valuable to nascent startup scenes. Portland’s Rogue Venture Partners and Mercy Corps are hoping to share their knowledge overseas by standing up Gaza Sky Geeks in the Gaza Strip.
Mercy Corps and Rogue Venture Partners have combined forces in order to turn Gaza Sky Geeks into a true accelerator program to take the most promising business ideas to the next level. Six teams will be selected this fall as the first cohort for a three month intensive program. Each team will receive working capital, advanced technical training, and a global network of mentors to help them refine their business plans and prepare for a regional investor road show.
“The talents of highly educated, highly motivated young people across the Middle East, and specifically in the Palestinian Territories, have been vastly underutilized,” said Tom Sperry, managing director of Rogue Venture Partners. “We feel privileged to partner with a world class organization like Mercy Corps to make a fundamental difference in how people invest and support promising entrepreneurs in this region.”
For more information on the accelerator, follow @GazaSkyGeeks on Twitter or like the Gaza Sky Geeks page on Facebook.
