Course Overview

Are you an aspiring entrepreneur looking to transform your idea into reality, or an ambitious founder navigating the early stages of creation of your startup? Then this course is for you. From developing your entrepreneurial mindset, assembling a strong team around you, developing and testing Minimum Viable Products, to marketing your solution and measuring your performance, as well as pitching and fundraising, this course covers it all. Launching a business is as much a rewarding and fulfilling experience as it is a difficult one fraught with challenges. This course will equip you with the right knowledge, assembled with the expertise of the speakers and course creators, to make your journey a little bit easier. There has never been a better time for entrepreneurs to launch their ideas, especially in a world where most industries are transforming at ever increasing speeds. These changes are creating countless opportunities for entrepreneurs to shape the future by unlocking new value, and by creating an impact on their industries, their economies, and society in general.

Course Modules:

• Orientation: Entrepreneurial Mindset and Ideation

• Module 01: Design Thinking & Business Idea Validation

• Module 02: Lean Startup & Business Model

• Module 03: Running Experiments (Prototype & MVP)

• Module 04: Designing a Professional UX

• Module 05: Competitors Analysis, Industry Mapping, Market Sizing

• Module 06: Digital Marketing Strategies and Campaigns

• Module 07: Business and Legal Structure, and Co-Founders

• Module 08: Building a Successful Team

• Module 09: Metrics and Progress Measurements (KPIs)

• Module 10: Financial Projections and Startup Valuation

• Module 11: Startup Funding & Investment

• Module 12: Art of Pitching and Storytelling

Seedstars x Edlal Collaboration

Seedstars and Edlal are joining forces to create an online entrepreneurial course for aspiring entrepreneurs. That aims to contribute to the vision and direction of the future of entrepreneurial education. Most ecosystems have a vibrant aspiring and early-stage entrepreneurs community. They need to be equipped with tools to face the "Valley of Death" and grow towards their product-market fit (break-even point and beyond). 2022 has marked a turning point in the use of technology for educational purposes. Online learning is increasingly becoming the go-to for creating a tool-box of soft and hard skills for entrepreneurship-development worldwide.

Seedstars

Seedstars is a Swiss-based private group of companies with a mission to impact people’s lives in emerging markets through technology and entrepreneurship. Seedstars organized 82 events in 74 ecosystems, opened the 7th hub Seedspace, and their portfolio consists of 25 seed-stage ventures. Seedstars is present in 80+ emerging ecosystems. More than 100,000 people from all over the world belong to the Seedstars network, including 2,000 investors. More than 40,000 entrepreneurs from emerging markets became participants of our events and programs. The alumni network of the Seedstars World competition counts for 275 startups. We know that 85% of the companies still exist; they have created over 2,500 direct jobs and fundraised over USD 250,000,000.

Edlal

Edlal is the leading e-learning web-based platform and smartphone app in the MENA, that offers high-quality, certified, specialized and professional online training programs in Arabic for individuals and organizations. Edlal is well-aligned with the United Nation SDGs 2030 agenda to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all. Edlal has over 300,000 users, from 50+ countries. Edlal provides 70+ online courses for free, and over 700,000 enrollments in the courses.

Module 01: Design Thinking & Business Idea Validation

Module Overview:

A successful startup begins with an idea. That idea needs to run through several stages, from concept to visualization. The design thinking process helps entrepreneurs to understand the user, challenge assumptions, and redefine problems in an attempt to identify alternative strategies and solutions.

What you'll learn:

You will learn the steps necessary to take a design from concept, to customer, to structure and business model execution. From the design process to mapping out and planning for your challenges, learn how to write an appropriate business model logically, creatively, and executively.

Speaker:Mike Pinder

Co-Founder Wicked Acceleration Labs

Mike is a highly inquisitive innovation expert and senior innovation consultant with a broad skill set spanning 13+ years of industry experience. He's lucky enough to apply his skills, knowledge, and interests to his work with a variety of Fortune500 companies. Mike facilitates and enables teams and organisations to create a positive business impact. Viewed as an industry leader, Mike has given keynotes on innovation internationally. He has helped B2C and B2B companies structure innovation strategy, embed capabilities and execute programs with GE, AB-Inbev, ING Bank, Logitech, Zeppelin Foundation (ZF), Engie, Valmet, Bpost and more.

Module 02: Lean Startup & Business Model

Module Overview:

Insight on how to begin a start-up and how to plan out the first official business model for success. Through mapping out a hypothesis, iteration cycles, product development and more to understand how to effectively measure your idea in order to generate data for finances, metrics, and more.

What you'll learn:

You’ll learn how to experiment your business model hypothesis and be able to measure data, finances. You’ll understand the lean canvas, value proposition and other business model methods from thought to execution and start your business.

Speaker:Christoph Baier

Managing Director at Ambivation

Christoph Baier is the managing director at Ambivation, Ambivation matches companies and startups for cooperation and open innovation. Christoph's personal focus is on software, real estate, industry and energy (PropTech, CleanTech, Artificial Intelligence, IIoT, Industry 4.0, Software as a Service, SaaS). He functions as a startup mentor in these sectors. Focused on creating value through entrepreneurship. Christoph is based in Berlin and Munich, though he is active globally.

Module 03: Running Experiments (Prototype & MVP)

Module Overview:

This module explains the differences with prototypes and the MVP experiment design and how to measure different stages while embracing the unknown and uncertain aspects of concepts, features, and customers. The successful entrepreneur knows how to take all these factors into consideration and market towards test validation appropriately.

What you'll learn:

Learn the differences between low and high fidelity, new features, faith assumptions and how to get your minimum viable products from your prototypes. With this in-depth overview of techniques and business viability models, you will learn how to become the MVP of your business and start out strong.

Speaker:Mike Pinder

Co-Founder Wicked Acceleration Labs

Mike is a highly inquisitive innovation expert and senior innovation consultant with a broad skill set spanning 13+ years of industry experience. He's lucky enough to apply his skills, knowledge, and interests to his work with a variety of Fortune500 companies. Mike facilitates and enables teams and organisations to create a positive business impact. Viewed as an industry leader, Mike has given keynotes on innovation internationally. He has helped B2C and B2B companies structure innovation strategy, embed capabilities and execute programs with GE, AB-Inbev, ING Bank, Logitech, Zeppelin Foundation (ZF), Engie, Valmet, Bpost and more.

Module 04: Designing a Professional UX

Module Overview:

This module explains how to design a professional user experience, from research, to journey, to design, metrics, and implementation. A successful business knows how to create an interface with the customer in mind. From interactive design to visual design, systems, metrics, and more – this course will set entrepreneurs up for long term success from the inside out.

What you'll learn:

UX is all about knowing your user and designing your product or service journey based on the user needs. Work through the experience economy and understand how to research, design, and implement a system with designers to offer best experience for your users.

Speaker:Helen Arvanitopoulos

Head of Design at Smartify

Helen Arvanitopoulos is currently Head of UX for the Centre of Excellence (CoE) for Aegon NV. Her role sees her working across Europe, Asia, and America. Helen engages in a human-centred, multi-disciplinary, collaborative approach to helping businesses build and grow their capabilities, ultimately transforming their organisations. Helen believes for design to make an impact, it must serve a purpose.

Module 05: Competitors Analysis, Industry Mapping, Market Sizing

Module Overview:

This module takes entrepreneurs through analysis of the market by comparing sizes, segments, business maturity, competition and more. Learn about the different types of segmentation, market sizes, and the four phases of maturity to become the expert needed to be to not only start, but effectively run a business from day one.

What you'll learn:

Learn how to properly analyse your competition so you know how to stand out amongst them. Engage with market segment, sizing and more to be able to effectively market yourself a step above your competitors.

Speaker:Tayfun Ugur

Private investment and ICT business development

Tayfun Uğur is a private investment and ICT business development, he graduated from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology with a B. Sc. in Electronics Engineering with First Class Honors, then received an MSc. degree in Mechanical Engineering. While in attendance, he was a teaching assistant and project engineer before returning to Turkey, where he received an MBA degree from Istanbul University Institute of Business Economics. Tayfun, a board member of the British Chamber of Commerce in Turkey (BCCT) responsible for technology. He is a founding member of the Turkish Informatics Foundation (TBV) and the Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV). Tayfun is applying his years of experience to developing a network of 'new world' and 'old world' resources in Turkey to facilitate clear vision, quick execution and rapid growth of startups and SME turnarounds, especially in ICT business with a global paradigm.

Module 06: Digital Marketing Strategies and Campaigns

Module Overview:

This module will walk participants through marketing strategies and campaigns designed with your business’s success in mind, from customer, to story, to sales and beyond. Understand how sales funnels work, get a better grip on the overview and long-term vision that is needed to implement SEO, B2B, and up a website conversion which leads to more long-term clients and increased revenue.

What you'll learn:

Learning digital marketing starts with learning about your customer. Once you know their persona, you can properly implement your brand’s story, marketing strategy, sales funnels, and up your conversion which means more sales, growth and success.

Speaker:Inna Armstrong

Co-Founder of CleverBooks

Dr. Inna Armstrong is a senior executive professional with multinational experience, a professional speaker and Co-Founder of CleverBooks. Inna specialises in strategic planning, go-to-market, digital sales and marketing, multicultural relations, marketing strategy, quality management, cross-cultural communication, negotiation, customer engagement, international business development, digital transformation, and strategic communications. Inna's current focus is influencing changes in the education system through a strategic application of the most innovative EdTech, thus helping educators embrace 21st-century teaching.

Module 07: Business and Legal Structure, and Co-Founders

Module Overview:

This module will go in-depth with the legal side of business structures, funding, and more. Including red flags to watch for when it comes to vesting, shareholders, and rights. As a business owner and entrepreneur, you need to know the red flags to look for, in order to better assess potential issues before they arise, whether it’s something with a co-founder or otherwise.

What you'll learn:

Learn the ins and outs of international property rights, vesting, and what it means to have co-founders in this detailed course about the legal side of business structures.

Speaker:Fadi Bizri

Venture Partner at BY Venture Partners

Fadi is a Venture Partner at B&Y Venture Partners. They invest in high-potential technology startups in MENA/EU/US. BYVP with a focus on seed-stage startups in MENA and international growth-stage startups. Fadi co-founded SE Factory, an advanced coding academy helping low-income youth in Lebanon become job-ready professional software engineers. Fadi is a board director and former founding manager at Speed@BDD, managed Bader Young Entrepreneurs Program and co-founded Seeqnce. Fadi holds a Master's in Electrical Engineering from the Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal and a Bachelor's in Computer Engineering from the American University of Beirut.

Module 08: Building a Successful Team

Module Overview:

Building the right team members determine success of a start-up. This module will teach what to look for when starting to organize a company’s structure, selecting the key players on a team, what roles to fill, and how to create agile team and positive team culture.

What you'll learn:

Learn about everything from recruitment to onboarding, team building, team training, and more. Fostering a high emotionally-intelligent team culture is the key to success, and what will make your business stand out and last in the long run.

Speaker:Maha Abouelenein

Managing Director, Organizational Consultants and Founder of Digital and Savvy

Maha is a communication professional and entrepreneur with over 28 years of experience with global corporate giants, high-growth tech startups, high-net-worth individuals, and top governments. Maha is all about relationships – building them, nurturing them and has a reputation for delivering results and managing projects from inception to execution with creative, strategic, and analytical drive. She is the founder of Organizational Consultants, a strategic communications consulting firm with offices in the USA and Dubai. She manages the personal brand PR for Gary Vaynerchuk, consults for other high-profile individuals and companies, is the CEO and Co-Founder of Now Gaming, and is an Executive Coach for PepTalk. Maha holds a Master's Degree in Communications from Minnesota State University and an Undergraduate Degree in International Business and Marketing. Maha serves on the Advisory Board of AllStargg, an esports company, and is a Mentor in Residence for TechStars. She is also on the esports Advisory Board for the Special Olympics. She is the host of SavvyTalk, a podcast about all things communications, and resides in Minnesota.

Module 09: Metrics and Progress Measurements (KPIs)

Module Overview:

Lessons on how measure KPI is how entrepreneurs will be able to define the businesses success. This module explains the KPIs, metrics, sales, marketing, and more. Know how to best arrange the hierarchy of the business, how to prioritize, what to handle, and when. Getting a business successfully from A to B.

What you'll learn:

Learn how to measure your business metrics with valuable data. From sales and marketing to product development and other Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). Implementing AAARRR funnel, you’ll be able to implement changes when and where necessary to grow your business.

Speaker:Jon Attwell

Growth Programs at Seedstars

Jon Attwell is a growth specialist with a performance marketing toolset. He has 10 plus years of experience with investor firms, high-growth startups, and marketing agencies. He specializes in launching and growing paid search, display, social, affiliate, email, and referral channels. Jon has worked alongside organizations the world over such as EMEA: Souq, eMag, OLX, DStv, GOtv, SuperSport, Showmax, Bounce Nigeria, Takealot, Spree, Superbalist, Mr Delivery, Luno, DeliveryHero, OLX, LetGo, Codecademy, Udemy, Movile, Coinsph. He also directs on-site and app conversion optimization for consumer brands. In collaboration with the Seedstars Investment Team, Jon designs and hosts a series of growth programs for promising startups operating in developing markets.

Module 10: Financial Projections and Startup Valuation

Module Overview:

Finances are arguably the most important factor of any business and knowing the ins and outs can help the entrepreneur determine what’s working, what’s not, and what needs evaluation. A successful entrepreneur knows the three types of financial statements for their business, and the two major parts of the finance model. Finance is the key to success, and those who succeed, understand the ins and outs fully.

What you'll learn:

Learn how to manage income, cash flow, a balance sheet, unit metrics, economics and more so you can successfully start and maintain your business from day one. You will learn how to balance your finances, how to set up financial projections, predict revenue, expenses, and quarterly margins to appropriately plan ahead.

Speaker:Jenny Ahlzen

Partner and Co-Founder at Amam Ventures

Jenny is a partner and Co-Founder of Amam Ventures on a quest for purpose-driven impact, gender parity and adventure! Her work involves supporting and investing in tech-enabled companies committed to equal opportunities and those eager to bring about positive change in the Middle East. She is passionate about using tech to democratise access to technical assistance, improve philanthropy, get measurable results on women's economic participation in the Arab world, raise the investment profession's standards, and contribute to solving the access to finance puzzle through the use of innovative financing tools.

Module 11: Startup Funding & Investment

Module Overview:

In this module participants will understand how to invest and fund a start-up without having to host a fundraiser. There are many different types of liquidation, fundraisers, and bootstrapping stages. Knowing the differences is key to understanding what type of funding a business needs, when, and how to go about getting it.

What you'll learn:

Learn about the different types of investors, how to implement a Fundraising strategy, valuation and negation, and how to create and read a term sheet. When you learn how to think in ROI, you can better know how to prepare your cap table for investors and set yourself up for long-term success in every business season.

Speaker:Charlie Graham-Brown

Chief Investment Officer & Partner at Seedstars

Charlie Graham-Brown is a Chief Investment Officer & Partner at Seedstars, Charlie studied at The University of Leeds, UK, with a year at the Georgia Institute of Technology, USA and holds a Master of Engineering First Class Honours degree. Transitioning into finance following an MBA at the Collège des Ingénieurs, Charlie later became a CFA charter holder. Today Charlie is an investment professional and entrepreneur focused on emerging and developing markets and handles global seed-stage VC investments at Seedstars. The platform educates thousands of tech founders each year and facilitates the scale-up of high-growth companies. Since 2017 Charlie has led the investment activities.

Module 12: Art of Pitching and Storytelling

Module Overview:

Successful entrepreneurs required the art of pitching and storytelling. This module will help entrepreneurs to develop a sales worthy, tight, efficient pitch to attract investors to the start-up. Create executive summaries and pitch decks for the business and understand how the exit of founding shareholders affects liquidity.

What you'll learn:

Learn the art of pitching through the process of creating a pitch deck, mapping, evolving, and storytelling. No pitch is honed without also knowing what makes a bad pitch. Learn the ins and outs here.

Speaker:Mona Ataya

CEO and Founder of Mumzworld

Mona Ataya is the CEO and Founder of Mumzworld, Mona has a track record of impressive and diverse international experience building global brands. After graduating with a dual honours degree in marketing and finance, she started at Procter & Gamble, Cincinnati, USA. After Procter & Gamble, Mona moved back to the Middle East region, working with another FMCG giant, Johnson and Johnson. In 2000, Mona joined a startup team as the VP of Marketing and Co-founder of Bayt. After becoming a mother and experiencing the challenges parents face in shopping, Mona launched Mumzworld in 2010, the Middle East’s First and Largest shopping site for all things Mother, Baby and Child.

Orientation: Entrepreneurial Mindset and Ideation

Module Overview

The entrepreneurial mindset is a way of thinking that enables you to overcome challenges, be decisive, and accept responsibility for your outcomes. It is a constant need to improve your skills, learn from your mistakes, and take continuous action on your ideas. Anyone willing to do the work can develop an entrepreneurial mindset.

What you'll learn You’ll learn

why entrepreneurial mindset is so important in the view of many experts around the world, and the story of seedstars entrepreneurial journey, and how you should train to become proficient in this capability of building and creating values such as hack this system and in experiments.

Speaker: Alisee De Tonnac

CEO & Co-founder of Seedstars | Based in Switzerland

Alisee de Tonnac is the co-founder and co-CEO of Seedstars, a Swiss investment holding on a mission to impact people's lives in emerging and frontier markets through technology and entrepreneurship. Seedstars works with governments, development agencies, corporate partners, and private donors to develop emerging market entrepreneurship ecosystems, create jobs and fuel income growth. Alisee sits on several boards and is a member of the Swiss Innovation Council. She was nominated Social Entrepreneur Forbes 30 under 30, Innovation Fellow of Wired UK, Europe's most influential women in the startup and venture capital space and one of the 29 Powerful Women by Refinery29.