Geneva, Switzerland, 27th, May 2019 - Seedstars World, the largest early-stage startup competition for emerging markets and fast-growing startup scenes, is coming back to the continent for the 7th time. The Seedstars World Tour will visit 26 Sub Saharan African countries this year and will visit Sierra Leone and Cabo Verde for the first time. This year, Seedstars  World has implemented some significant changes  to the format and will organise a number of side activities:

• Bootcamp for more: In each country, prior to the pitching event, Seedstars Will organise a local bootcamp inviting up to 30 pre-selected startups to participate.  
• More women: Seedstars Africa will aim to achieve gender balance on all levels through inviting more women as part of mentors, jury panels, speakers and increasing the number of women startups.
• Local Investor workshops: In partnership with EBAN, Seedstars will host a series of workshops specifically targeted at local investors.
• More prizes: In 2019 Seedstars aims to work with more local entrepreneurs. Therefore, Seedstars will award access to the Investment Readiness Program, a non-time bound personalised and data-driven acceleration program which will connect the entrepreneurs to global experts and mentors, emerging market-specific training materials based on best practices and access to the Seedstars Global investor network. Seedstars will award at least 1-month access to the top 10 startups invited to pitch locally.
• 100 million USD Seedstars Africa Ventures investment fund will be active later this year, making all applicants eligible to receive early stage investment. In addition, this fund will also cater to the Seedstars Alumni startups from the previous years.

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The applications are open for several cities and startups are invited to apply at https://www.seedstarsworld.com/competition/. After careful screening, the Seedstars team will shortlist up to ten of the best seed-stage startups per city to participate in training and 1:1 meetings with investors.