A team from Ashesi, led by Business Administration faculty member Jewel Thompson, has been awarded a $100,000 grant to build a digital resource platform for women in entrepreneurship. The team’s project was named by the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneur’s Gender Equality Action Labs as part of eleven projects receiving funding this year.
The digital platform will help early, and medium-stage women entrepreneurs in Africa successfully manage and grow their businesses. The platform will include tailored capacity building, entrepreneurship training, technical advice, bespoke venture building support, and access to funding.
“This grant presents an opportunity for us to deepen collaboration between academia and industry,” shared Jewel Thompson. “Using the research available about entrepreneurship in emerging economies and a framework drawn from industry and technical support programs, we are looking to create an accessible platform for women to learn about effectively scaling their businesses.”
The Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) is a global network of organizations that propel entrepreneurship in developing economies. ANDE members provide critical financial, educational, and business support services to small and growing businesses (SGBs) based on the conviction that SGBs create jobs, stimulate long-term economic growth, and produce environmental and social benefits.
As part of the ANDE Gender Equality Initiative (AGEI), the Gender Equality Action Labs was established in 2019 with the support of USAID and the Visa Foundation. These labs help build supportive entrepreneurial ecosystems in emerging markets that are responsive to how women have been subject to gender bias and institutional exclusion. The initiative works to strengthen intermediaries that provide support to women-led small and growing businesses (SGBs) to fund more companies, build their capacity, connect them with appropriate sources of capital, and help them scale.
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