Christopher Pruijsen of StartupBus Africa
Enterprising entrepreneurs and coders will travel by bus through South Africa in the coming weeks, with the intention of developing apps to solve health and environmental problems for a competition that will be judged by Virgin Group CEO Richard Branson.
At the Dublin Web Summit we caught up with Christopher Pruijsen, a strategic adviser to an initiative that will see 15 entrepreneurs and 15 hackers and product developers travel around South Africa for the first time this November to develop apps for the social good.
StartupBus is to develop apps in time for a pitch event that will be judged by Branson.
Of the participants, 50pc of them will be coders, 25pc will be designers, and 25pc will be business developers all focused on the areas of mobile, healthcare and energy.
The goal is to support entrepreneurs in Africa, help international entrepreneurs understand the African market, and create lasting ties between both – and finally, of course, the founding of new start-ups in the areas of interest.
“We will drive from Harare, Zimbabwe, to Cape Town, South Africa, via Johannesburg, with 30 entrepreneurs on the bus – 15 from Africa and 15 from rest of world, including hackers and product designers, and as they travel they are developing apps in healthcare and energy that they hope will solve problems in Africa during those days.
“Richard Branson will be viewing final pitches on Google Hangouts on 22 November in Cape Town,” Pruijsen said.
