The UMP Team was led by Vice-Chancellor and Chairperson of CFERI Advisory Board, Professor Thoko Mayekiso, and CFERI Centre Manager, Dr Ogujiuba Kanayo, Entrepreneur Lecturer in Entrepreneurship Dr Mazanai Musara. The three students: Jesse Steyn, Nomdeni Khoza and Ngthabie Mpaza, developed an innovative app for women in business, which aims to simplify the way women businesses and stakeholders connect with each other.
Following their best pitch award, these students will now collaborate with UMP CFERI to develop the app and establish a sustainable business model for Women Entrepreneurs by creating a mutually beneficial portal for communication and connection.
UMP students were involved in the Start-Up for Studentpreneurs where they interacted with others from the consortium and exchanged business ideas. They were also taken to MRANTI Technology to experience one of Asia’s finest technology centers. The tour included a manufacturing house and a group workshop for science and technology.
The three students, who were selected based on their performance during the internal rounds of the 2022 EDHE Competition organised by the UMPCFERI, also had an entrepreneurship mentoring programme, hosted by APU, which featured panelists for academics and industry, that discussed a variety of interesting entrepreneurial topics.
UMP CFERI Centre Manager, Dr Ogujiuba Kanayo.
Opening doors for skills exchange
The summit comes four months after UMP signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the APU, which was to build capacity in supporting start-up and spin-out companies, as well as to exchange knowledge and skills among faculty, develop entrepreneurial students who will create employment, and build capacity for supporting start-up and spin-off companies.
The Entrepreneurship Summit was designed to share best practices on entrepreneurship programmes across universities, curriculum content and teaching delivery of entrepreneurship modules/courses, and support systems for start-ups. It also provided a platform for networking amongst participating universities for joint projects and research.
Some of the events included the global webinar discussions where Professor Mayekiso presented in one of the sessions, which was streamed live.
Students were assigned industry mentors who supported the Academic Mentors in planning their business pitches. The start-up programme was meant to enable students to develop and maintain start-up businesses. Upon completion of the training, all teams presented a business pitch.
The Malaysian programme also included the following:
- Entrepreneurship discussions and support for incubators.
- 2023 planning schedule for members of the consortium.
- Joint research discussion and book publication [entrepreneurship] in 2023 by the consortium.
- Enterprise Wednesday Talk by the Enterprise Team at APU.
Also in the programme was a tour of the APU campus and students were given the opportunity to visit the Augmented Reality Lab and experiment with ground-breaking Virtual-Reality Technology, where they were introduced to the university’s advanced IT and coding centre.
Professor Mayekiso took part in global webinar sessions which were streamed live.
Global connections
The other nine universities participating universities included: Tra Vinh University and Can Tho University, Vietnam; Universitas Trisakti, Universitas Indonesia, and Telkom University, Bandung from Indonesia; Palawan State University, Philippines; the Chea Sim University of Kamchaymear, Cambodia; and National University of Laos.
The visit is in line with the UMP’s mission to develop graduates that are innovative and entrepreneurial. The university established the Centre for Entrepreneurship Rapid Incubator (CFERI) to transform students with business ideas into entrepreneurs with viable businesses.
The universities will also jointly organise ideation bootcamp/competition or accelerator programmes, mentor sharing/training sessions for start-up/spin-off companies.
It will also provide advisory to start-up or spin-off companies on regulatory requirements and understanding of the market in each parties’ countries, and offer guidance relating to regulatory requirements, and/or venture capitalists or angel investors funding opportunities and undertake joint research in entrepreneurship.
Part of the agreement was to collaborate on mutual visits, access to facilities in the incubation centres, advisory to start-up/spin-off companies on regulatory requirements, understanding of the market in each parties’ countries and joint research relating to entrepreneurship. It also includes exchanging knowledge among faculty staff.
UMP delegates also experienced the wonderful Malaysian hospitality and visited beautiful sights, and cultural heritage sites including a visit to Batu Caves, Buddhist Temple, Museum, Twin Tower, and a World-Class Aquarium.
@ Story by Lisa Thabethe. Pictures supplied.