The public transportation market in the Caribbean is in urgent need of modernization, as lack of information and poorly planned transit systems cause significant social and economic challenges. Locals and tourists using buses and taxis often have limited information on the status or arrival time of their transportation, resulting in lost time, being late for work or school, missed appointments, and frustration. Similarly, people who manage these vehicles (owners or insurers) have little or no information on how they are being driven, even though they often occupy the highest risk categories. Caribbean Transit Solutions, based in Barbados, plans to change all this. They provide real-time and on-demand information on public transit as well as private fleets of vehicles.

A new mobile application called Findrpro has received $5,000 USD investment via the LINK-Caribbean programme’s 5-5-5 pitch competition.

With Slush, the world’s leading start-up and technology event, coming up Nov. 30-Dec. 1 in Helsinki, Finland, two entrepreneurs from Jamaica are awash with excitement as they gear up to participate in this premier event. The entrepreneurs earned spots in the Slush Global Impact Accelerator (GIA) boot camp program in a competition held by PitchIT Caribbean, and will join other impact-driven entrepreneurs from around the globe. 

The Caribbean has great potential for crowdfunding, provided that the right enabling environment is put in place to promote it. Crowdfunding is the art of raising funds through social, professional, and public networks using the internet. With the rise of this form of financing, there are many crowdfunding success stories, but in the Caribbean among the most successful campaigns is that of the Jamaica bobsled team. In 2014, the team raised over $155,000 using the Indiegogo and Crowdtilt crowdfunding platforms to fund its participation in the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Russia. 

Crowdfunding in the Caribbean could bolster early stage capital markets, entrepreneurship, creativity, economic growth, and employment – provided that policymakers create the right environment. This was revealed in the report “Crowdfunding’s Potential in the Caribbean: A Preliminary Assessment,” commissioned and recently released by infoDev, a global innovation and entrepreneurship program at the World Bank Group.

Three teams from Jamaica copped the top spots in the recently held virtual PitchIT Caribbean SLUSH GIA competition. They are now lined up for a coveted interview spot with the Slush 2017 Global Impact Accelerator program panel in Finland. The successful teams are Link Your Purpose, an online career development and mentoring platform; First Responders Technology Ltd, a mobile platform to enable emergency response services; and Braata Box & Co., an online marketplace for local craftspeople, makers, and artisans. The teams were selected from a field of over 40 entries from across CARICOM.

As the halfway point of the two-year LINK-Caribbean Angel Investment program approaches, over $500,000 USD has been awarded to 14 Caribbean companies to support their development to attract angel investment. The World Bank Group, together with the Caribbean Export Development Agency, launched LINK-Caribbean last September, funded by the government of Canada. The investment facilitation program aims to enable early-stage Caribbean entrepreneurs to raise capital from private investors, particularly business angel investors.

Building on the success of its 2016 Acceleration Program, the Women Innovators Network in the Caribbean (WINC) is launching its 2017 program. The eight-month peer learning program, which begins in November 2017, is designed to help growth-oriented women entrepreneurs innovate and boost the growth of their businesses.

To sustain its momentum and improve upon its mandate, the World Bank Group’s Caribbean Climate Innovation Center (CCIC) will host key representatives from the Bank, government of Canada, CCIC consortium members Scientific Research Council (SRC) and the Caribbean Industrial Research Institute (CARIRI) as well as other top regional partners for sustainability and economic impact talks at the Holiday Inn in Montego Bay, Jamaica from June 1-2. 

$75,000 in cash and prizes will be up for grabs when 25 finalists from around the Caribbean region vie for honours in the PitchIT Caribbean Challenge tech entrepreneur competition, scheduled for June 13-17, 2017 in St. Kitts and Nevis. 

The Caribbean Export Development Agency co-hosted the inaugural Caribbean Angel Investor Forum in Montego Bay on May 12, 2017, together with the World Bank Group. The event, which attracted some of the region’s most influential business people, came together to lay the foundation for a more buoyant and active Angel Investor ecosystem within the Caribbean.  

108 proud women entrepreneurs have graduated from the first Acceleration Program (AP) of the Women Innovators Network in the Caribbean (WINC). They represent a wide variety of sectors: retail, creative, cosmetology, baking, engineering, sports, and manufacturing.

The Women Innovators Network Caribbean (WINC) — a cornerstone initiative of the Entrepreneurship Program for Innovation in the Caribbean sponsored by the government of Canada — recently concluded its first acceleration program for women entrepreneurs. Designed to jump-start women-led enterprises across the region, the program provided local entrepreneurs with mentorship, training, and networking opportunities. One of them, Kenia Mattis, told us the story of her company and how WINC helped her succeed.

In the Caribbean, a growing number of women is pursuing technology careers, as developers, coders, and tech entrepreneurs.

Four of the Caribbean’s top mobile entrepreneurs traveled to Helsinki, Finland, to participate in the Slush Global Impact Accelerator, a two-week program designed to help impactful entrepreneurs from emerging markets accelerate their businesses and attract financing. We spoke with a business development specialist at Reperio, a Trinidad and Tobago-based language learning company.

How does an entrepreneur catch the attention of an angel investor? Jeremy Bauman, a senior consultant at the World Bank, shares a glimpse into the mind of an angel investor at the launch of LINK-Caribbean, an initiative to improve access to capital for Caribbean entrepreneurs.

Four of the Caribbean’s top mobile entrepreneurs traveled to Helsinki, Finland, to participate in the Slush Global Impact Accelerator, a two-week program designed to help impactful entrepreneurs from emerging markets accelerate their businesses and attract financing. We spoke with the founders of Jamaica-based start-ups BookFusion and CrimeBot.

As EPIC enters its sixth year, several major milestones have been recorded. “We are steadily strengthening the capacity of business enablers and local angel investors, and increasing the number of investable growth-oriented entrepreneurs,” said Ganesh Rasagam, Practice Manager of the World Bank Group’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship Unit.

In this article, you’ll learn whether LINK-Caribbean's Investment Readiness Grant is appropriate for your business and how to prepare a winning application.

Bridgetown, BARBADOS, September 27, 2016. Caribbean start-up, early-stage and growth businesses now have another means for raising capital.

If he hadn’t claimed that abandoned computer he found while doing construction work, Dwayne Campbell would never have left his chemical engineering track — or developed a hot new digital book-publishing platform.

Accelerate Caribbean's third professional development webinar focused on how to build effective mentoring networks in the Caribbean. "Don't forget the diaspora," said Vimala Palaniswamy, cofounder of Demeter Entrepreneurs Support Network.

At an Accelerate Caribbean workshop, representatives of the World Bank Group and the governments of Jamaica and Canada discussed how to build a stronger ecosystem to help regional entrepreneurs launch and grow profitable businesses.

At the Development Bank of Jamaica's Venture Capital Conference, Nelson Gray discussed the myths and realities of angel investors, necessary tools for pitching, the deal workflow — and a strategy he calls the “Granny test.”

When Yekini Wallen Bryan returned to school for his final semester in January, the energy and electronics student never anticipated he would soon receive the grand prize in a clean-tech innovation competition.

A large crowd of young clean-tech entrepreneurs brought their ideas and enthusiasm to the first Green Tech Startup Bootcamp in the Caribbean, which was co-hosted by the Caribbean Climate Innovation Center on February 26-28, 2016.

Accelerate Caribbean partnered with Marlon Hill, a United States-based lawyer and champion of Caribbean entrepreneurship, to host a webinar on team building, marketing, and brand protection for Caribbean business owners.

New Leaf Power received a grant from the Caribbean Climate Innovation Center to develop a solar-powered lamp and charging device for a remote Jamaican fishing community. One year later, their lamps are lighting the way for disaster relief in Dominica.

The World Bank Group and the Government Canada held a workshop for Caribbean entrepreneurs and regional partners. The workshop was the first joint event of the Caribbean Climate Innovation Center and Caribbean Mobile Innovation Program.

Harlo Mayne and Dr. Kert Edward, two clean technology entrepreneurs in EPIC’s climate innovation program, presented their hydrogen and solar energy prototypes at the First International Conference and Exhibition on Hydrogen held on November 3 to 4 at the University of Technology, Jamaica.

Jamaican tech entrepreneurs Nichole Crawford and Winnie Dzidonu-Genius traveled to Helsinki, Finland, to pitch their businesses at the Slush Global Impact Accelerator, a nine-day bootcamp for social impact entrepreneurs from emerging markets. The first-ever Global Impact Accelerator was a joint program of the World Bank Group, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland, and Slush.

A new peer mentorship-based program will support high-potential women entrepreneurs in the Caribbean. The eight-month intensive Acceleration Program will provide participants with a wide range of support services to innovate their businesses, improve their competitiveness, and boost their growth. The program will include one-on-one coaching, technical workshops, and opportunities to connect with successful women entrepreneurs.

In the last few decades, women in the Caribbean have made impressive strides to break through the glass ceiling and become successful entrepreneurs. The growing network of peers, mentors, and angel investors has provided women across the region with the tools and resources necessary to launch and grow new businesses.

A new report fills the information gap related to growth-oriented women entrepreneurs in the Caribbean by drawing on various data sources to estimate their numbers and sectors. The report also introduces the challenges Caribbean women face when attempting to grow their businesses.

Following a 5-week competition and rigorous selection process, Accelerate Caribbean is excited to announce ten business enablers from 7 islands in the Caribbean that will participate in its Business Incubation Clinic during 2015-2016.

Two mobile developer teams from Jamaica’s University of Technology were awarded the first and second prizes at a Caribbean CodeSprint/Hackathon held in Kingston on May 24-25.

First Angels Jamaica, a new Jamaican angel investor network, was officially launched today in Kingston. The network is geared towards helping growth-oriented entrepreneurs with capital and mentorship.

Two Jamaican entrepreneurs with connections to infoDev/EPIC’s training and facilitation in the Caribbean, Harlo Mayne and Jovan Evans, have won awards in that country’s 2014 Innovation Awards in Science and Technology.

The Caribbean Climate Innovation Center (CCIC) — a project of the World Bank and its global entrepreneurship program infoDev — has announced the 11 winners of its first regional Proof of Concept (PoC) competition. The successful applicants will receive grants of up to $50,000 to develop, test, and commercialize innovative, locally relevant climate technology solutions.

infoDev is proud to announce the launch of the Caribbean Mobile Innovation Program (CMIP), to be held at the University of the West Indies Regional Headquarters, Mona, Jamaica on June 10, 2014.

A total of 49 women entrepreneurs took part in the three-day workshops, representing growth-oriented and innovative businesses. They underwent intensive training in grow-your-business methodology aimed at strengthening their skill sets, networking acumen and access to mentoring, markets and finance. So far, 100 innovative growth entrepreneurs have been trained since 2013.

Caribbean students and techies descended on the headquarters of the University of the West Indies at Mona for Digital Jam 3.0 "Get Up, Start Up" on March 1-2. The juried Mobile Apps competition was the culmination of months of preparation by more than 50 teams of young programmers competing for an assortment of prizes, including a top prize of USD10,000.

The Caribbean Climate Innovation Center (CCIC) — a hub designed to help clean technology ventures transform the region to a low-carbon economy and create green jobs — has launched in Freeport, Trinidad & Tobago. The business hub is now accepting applications for grants of up to $50,000.

A new report by infoDev finds that the Caribbean diaspora is a sizeable, well-educated, and affluent demographic whose large majority is interested in investing in its countries of origin. Supported by the right incentives and policies, diaspora members could play an even larger role in contributing to the region’s development.