Entrepreneur Academe, Angel Academe’s mentoring programme for women tech founders – Open for Application!
We’re delighted to announce that applications are now open for the second edition ofEntrepreneur Academe, our mentoring programme for women tech founders. The programme is supported by the City of London Corporation (CoL), the governing body for London’s “Square Mile” business district, and powered by the Angel Academe community of mentors, advisors and angel investors.
Entrepreneur Academe is part of CoL’s ongoing commitment to support enterprise and small businesses in the City and its neighbouring boroughs. Angel Academe’s mission is to increase the number of women in the technology startup “support ecosystem”, especially as angel investors but also as mentors and advisors. During the last 2 years we’ve built an active community of women and men who are passionate about supporting early stage tech companies, especially those founded by women.
During the course of the 9-month programme, 15-20 participants will meet monthly and receive access to high quality advice from our large network of very experienced business people with the objective of accelerating their business. The programme will be tailored to address the most important issues raised by participants, but topics include: business and financial planning; technology and product development; PR, sales, marketing and social media; investment-readiness and so on.
We will provide a mix of “expert sessions”, mentoring, peer accountability and support in a group setting to sharpen both business and personal skills. The programme is also a great opportunity for founders to network, build relationships, learn from other people’s experiences and share their own.
Our first year has been a tremendous success. We had over 60 mentors take part and so far our current cohort of companies (BuyMyWardrobe, Frugl, CitySwish, Andiamo, Sian’s Plan, Search Strategy, Zealify, Ebartex, ByFlock and Supapass) have raised over £1million in seed funding between them while also doubling their turnover and employment and there’s more to come – the current programme formally ends next month and we’ll announce more detailed results then.
Lauren Hine, Founder and CEO of Zealify says: “Entrepreneur Academe has provided invaluable support over the last 12 months, both through mentoring and peer discussions. I’ve been able to open up opportunities in my business that I wasn’t previously aware of, all through the mentoring and support of the Entrepreneur Academe cohort and mentors.”
The new programme will kick off in April 2015. The competition to select our new entrepreneurs will begin in Feb and the application deadline is31st March. Apply here.
Please note: Entrepreneur Academe is for high growth potential female entrepreneurs with a registered business based in the City of London or one of its 5 neighbouring boroughs (Hackney; Tower Hamlets; Southwark; Lambeth; Westminster; Camden or Islington).
We’re also looking for additional mentors to join our existing pool of experienced business people, both women and men. We’re particularly keen to attract tech entrepreneurs who’ve raising funding for their own business or experienced angel investors, but our mentors come from across all disciplines. If you’d like to join us, please tell us a little about yourself here.
