As part of the Global Entrepreneurship Week #GEW the 13th #Enkopa Panel Series entitled “BPO/ITO/KPO: Pitching Ethiopia as an Emerging Offshoring Hub” held on December 3, 2022, at Haile Grand Hotel Addis Ababa with more than 300 attendees. The Enkopa panel sessions centered around the Unique value proposition of Ethiopia on Business Process Outsourcing (BPO).

Cheap electricity, connectivity, talent, and time zone that is more suitable to create overlapping hours and labor cost gives Ethiopia an opportunity to become an offshoring hub for multinationals companies.

H.E Ato Nigussu, State Minster at the Ministry of Labor and Skills was present along with many public officials, entrepreneurs, representatives from large corporations as well as development partners.

In his closing remarks, H.E Nigussu Tilahun stated that the Ethiopian government is now recognizing the potential that outsourcing brings in terms of hard currency and GDP increase.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3kqoZGNhIM

The Ministry of Labor and Skills in collaboration with the United Nation Development Program and Center for African Leadership Studies/xHub Addis recognized 22 digital high growth entrepreneurs that have graduated from the ‘Ahun two Incubation Program for Digital Entrepreneurs’ on the closing ceremony of Global Entrepreneurship Week. From the total graduates selected 12 startups received 5000 USD in seed funding to accelerate their growth.

The overall objective of the incubation program was to equip entrepreneurs with advanced entrepreneurship skills, business skills, marketing strategy, business planning, and etc. The goal of the program is to have at least 25% of the startups have a customer contract, commitment letter, or service procurement by the end of the 5th month after graduation. Over a period of 5 years, 40% of the startups are expected to grow their revenue double the size of the national economy growth rate.

The startups are engaged in various sectors, including ICT, manufacturing, health, transport, agriculture, and art & entertainment.

At the session of the program, the guest of honor Negeri Lencho (PhD) – House of Representatives Chairman of the Standing Committee on Human Resource Development, Employment and Technology – congratulated the start-ups and he indicated the government remains committed to working with all of the startups to support and strengthen the innovation ecosystem in Ethiopia.

In his closing remarks, H.E Nigussu Tilahun – MoLS State Minister – stressed that MoLS will continue to leverage the public-private partnership model to support startups in collaboration with development partners.