Voting is Now Open for Global Startup Battle: Dropifi Needs Your Vote
Dropifi, the Accra startup weekend winner is currently vying for the top prize at the Global Startup Battle. All the Startup Weekend global events winners are taking part in the second edition of Global Startup Battle! Vote Now!
Dropifi wants to put a widget at the contact us pages of companies to allow easy communication between prospective customers and businesses.
Startup Weekend, a non-profit organization based in Seattle, Washington, announced the Global Startup Battle to challenge and inspire entrepreneurs from around the world during Global Entrepreneurship Week.
48 teams have been entered into the Global Startup Battle, and voting begun at 12pm Noon PST on November 22 and end on November 28 at 11PM PST.
Get all of your friends to vote for Dropifi! Use emails, Facebook, Twitter etc, to generate buzz for Dropifi. Everyone can vote once.
Vote now and share. Winner will be announced on November 30.
- Grand Prize: A Table at Launch Pad at the Launch Conference (San Francisco) to meet the top investors in Silicon Valley in March 2012! Includes flight for 2 team members.
- A slot at the DEMO Asia Startup Pavilion in Singapore, February 2012
- 40 Hours of Web Design from BTrax
- PR Launch Package from the Kauffman Foundation
- Meetings with Brad Feld, Managing Director of Foundry Group and Andy Sack, Director of TechStars Seattle and Managing Partner of Founders Coop.
- A blog post and newsletter promotion from Startup Weekend
- 1 year of bragging rights as the winner of the largest startup competition in the world!
Dropifi Wins Accra Startup Weekend
Dropifi, a web messaging platform that turns your contacts into loyal customers has won the top prize at the just ended Accra Startup Weekend. Dropifi competed with 7 other teams. Dropifi wants to put a widget at the contact us pages of companies to allow easy communication between prospective customers and businesses.
Dropifi also provides a dashboard to businesses to analyse information, comments or feedback from website visitors for easy and quick response. Messages received on the dashboard provided to the company are anyalsed for both negative and positive feedback to make it easy for the business to manage contacts and respond to them accordingly.
The teams were judged on three equally-weighed criteria: business model, customer validation and execution.
Dropifi will be entered into the Global Startup Battle. The winner of the Global Startup Battle will have a slot at the DEMO Asia conference in their Startup Showcase. Dropifi will also make a video pitch to a Silicon Valley investor for potential funding. A special one year package from Teambox.com has also been arranged for the winning team. The team has also been awarded an HP laptop. SMS products and services from SMSGH will be given to the team to market their service for one year. A special introduction to Ghana Multimedia Incubation Center, Ghana Venture Capital Trust Fund and Ghana Angel Investor network.
The 7 Teams of Accra Startup Weekend
13 ideas emerged out of Friday night. 7 teams have now been formed. The second day of Accra Startup Weekend is almost here. The 7 teams are:
- Dropifi- A web messaging platform that turns your contacts into loyal customers.
- Maiddle- A web service for matching housekeepers to potential clients.
- Identifi-A mobile app that identify your location and helps you get to your destination.
- Panic-eye-A single key alert activity app which wants to be the future of 911.
- DigiDoc-A web application that will be used by doctors in analyzing patient X-rays and scans everywhere leading to prompt response that will help save lives.
- Djumah- A professional networking platform that leverages the power of social networking of both employers and job seekers to identify the most trusted and qualified candidates.
- TeamTaunt- A social element of sports that creates perhaps the most passion among sports fans but that is not accurately tackled by the various sports network is fan rivalry.
Good luck teams!
Startup Weekend Accra Kicks off With 13 Great Ideas
The startup Weekend Accra started today at the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology, MEST. It intriguing to watch young people come out with innovative world class ideas that can transform society. These are the ideas they came up with.
DROPIFI
It is a web messaging platform that turns your contacts into loyal customers.
Identifi
A mobile service app. That identify your location and help you to your destination.
MAIDDLE
A web service for matching housekeepers to potential clients
DIGIDOC
A web application that will be used by doctors in analyzing patient X-rays and scans everywhere these leading to prompt response that will help save lives.
TEAM TAUNT
The aspect of sports that creates the most passion is rivalry.
TWASKR
A planning tool that allows you to plan your activities with full knowledge of other activities that will be going on around you. Activities including those of friends, weather, traffic forecast, local announcement.
GAS’YO
Know the LPG filling station. The closest to your home, where gas is still available to refill your empty bottle!
è Beyond the app, we transform old containers into retail shops where you can leave your bottle of gas empty and get it back fully charged tomorrow. We do this mangic! By collecting the bottles and refilling during night-time!
Liaisons
Out-sourced decentralized online platform for customer service.
Iserve
An SMS platform that will provide local information about tradesmen in your locality when they are available and their competing rates.
AirPay
Pay for goods and services online with you mobile money account.
TWASKR
A planning tool that allows you to plan your activities with full knowledge of other activities that will be going on around you. Activities including those of friends, weather, traffic forecast, local announcement.
PANIC – EYE
A single key alert activity app which will be the future of 911. Its disruptive technology for the future.
SAFEGUARD
A mobile or web app that connects an individual to appropriate help (family, police, etc.) in times of emergency.
Pitch & Team Formation Process
What to bring
- Laptop
- Business cards
- Something to take notes on
- Lots of energy
Pitches
Pitches on Friday night be in a “pitch-fire” format, which means you will have just 60 seconds to get the audience interested in your idea. You will have no slides or props – just a microphone and a smile. You won’t have time to go over features, so just focus on the core of the idea and make your enthusiasm contagious. Here is the format for pitches that we recommend:
- Who are you and what is your background? (5-10 Seconds)
- What is the problem that you product is solving? Or, begin with a story (10-20 Seconds)
- Explain the product and how it solves the problem (10-20 seconds)
- Who do you need on your team (a developer, marketing, designer?) (5-10 seconds)
- Finally, make up a name for your startup so the facilitator can give it a title
Voting & Forming Teams
After pitches, you will have more time to mingle. If you pitched an idea, this is your time to start recruiting others that are interested in your idea. If you did not pitch, or if you are having trouble finding others to join your team, use this time to seek out those that pitched other ideas that you found interesting.
Next, the crowd votes on their favorite pitches. This is a simply a way to encourage quick team forming. This is by no means an exclusive process and if you pitch an idea and it is not voted as one of the top ideas, you are more than welcome to work on it if you find some other people who want to work on the idea with you. From there we will form teams and these are the startup ideas that will be worked on over the weekend.
