School for Startups Romania
The
Brief
In support of the European Unions’ efforts to assist Romania, as a former Soviet Block nation, to transition to a market economy, the Post Privitization Foundation tasked S4S to develop and deliver an ambitious Accelerator program to help new entrepreneurs start and grow their business. In addition, S4S developed additional programming to help the entrepreneurs shift their attitudes towards capitalisam and entreprenuership, given their neophyte experience in a market economy.
The
activities
S4S developed an in-depth 1 year Accelerator program that included over 40 face to face teaching hours, one year of mentorship, a full online resource base and access to EU wide markets. The program ran in the cities of Cluj and Bucharest with 100 startups in each cohort. 200 young companies per year graduated from the program. The program ran for two years and saw almost 400 young companies graduate.
In addition, S4S worked with the largest television broadcaster to incorporate the popular entrepreneurship show, Lion’s Den (based on the UK show Dragons Den, known in the US as Shark Tank) into the program’s promotion and activity.
The
Result
The result of the program was that hundreds of new businesses were formed in the two key economic centres of Romania. Further, hundreds of thousands of people became familiar with the program and its achievements because of the linkup to popular tv. This supported S4S’s efforts to help change popular conceptions of entrepreneurship in Romania.