Azernews.Az

By Laman Ismayilova

TalentPort project became the winner of the start-up competition among women Global Startup Weekend Women Baku, held for the first time in Baku on February 9-11.

Nazanin Javadova and Sakina Naghizadeh will represent Azerbaijan on the Big Final Day which will take place in Paris on March 7.

The competition held under the slogan “No talk, all action” has received more than 50 applications and 11 teams have participated in Baku final.

Addressing the event, French ambassador to Azerbaijan Aurelia Bouchez expressed her gratitude to the local organizers and wished the winner productive journey to Paris.

One of the event organizers and the head of NEXT Step Innovation Center Rashad Eyvazov stressed that the project aims to gather participants around innovative ideas in a short time and to increase their knowledge and experience in the field of entrepreneurship.

Startup Weekend Women kicked off for the first time last year in Paris. It has already turned into a global event covering 30 countries. Azerbaijan`s participation in the project will strengthen among women such concepts as start-up, building of own business, entrepreneurial activity. It will also contribute to the increase in the number of women entrepreneurs.

The winning team was selected by the jury consisting of the experts: The Advisor to the Executive Director of SOFAZ – Nargiz Nasrullayeva-Muduroghlu, Public Affairs Officer of US Embassy to Azerbaijan – Caroline Savage, the Founder of Red Communications – Tatyana Mikayilova, and the Country Representative of the International Finance Corporation in Azerbaijan – Aliya Azimova.

Within three days the participants also got the opportunity to receive business consultation from the mentors.

The winners of local contest are the following teams:

TalentPort took the first place. The winner team has received the opportunity to pitch her startup idea in front of International Jury, the flight ticket to Paris & hotel stay form such global sponsors as RCI Bank & Services, AccorHotels, Air France, Wavestone, Air Liquide, La Tribune. From local sponsors they received an acceptance to the Sup.az acceleration program of Next Step innovation center.

The second place went to SuperNanny project, while Creyofu ranked third.

The sponsor of the first Global Startup Weekend Women in Azerbaijan was the State-owned Bank – Azeri Turk Bank.

Media partners of the event are Trend.az, Day.az, Milli.az, Azernews.az

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Laman Ismayilova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Lam_Ismayilova

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