Winners of Startup Weekend Bahrain Announced

Startup Weekend Bahrain, organised by Batelco was hailed a huge success by all competitors, mentors, speakers and judges as the 54 hour weekend event came to a close at Batelco’s Staff centre, Saturday 19^th November.
Ten teams worked around the clock from Thursday night through to Saturday evening to develop a business model in the hope of winning the top cash prize of BD4000. The 10 competing business ideas were Charitime, Paycell, Ally Pha, EveryWeb, Peasy, Future Mobi Network, Student Tube, Gozilla, Recell and Search Bahrain.
On Saturday evening, each team was given five minutes to present their business plans in front of a panel of judges made up of experienced senior management and business leaders. Following in-depth discussion Charitime was declared the winner, with Student Tube being awarded second place and Paycell the third spot. The top three teams have walked away with BD4000, BD2000 and BD1000 respectively.
The final presentations, which were filmed, will now also be reviewed by Tenmou, the Bahrain Business Angel Company, with a view to providing any ideas deemed to have economic potential with up to BD20,000 funding to develop and launch the business.
The first placed three teams will be given free enrollment into Bahrain Development Bank’s (BDB’s) Entrepreneurship Development Programme. Additionally, BDB who evaluated the projects during the weekend as part of their Pre-Seed Capital Support Scheme, that is jointly run with Tamkeen and which includes a grant of up to BD5000, announced that three of the ten teams – Peasy, Student Tube, and Ally PHA, have been shortlisted for further evaluation and an announcement will be made soon.
Furthermore, Batelco Innovation Centre as part of its ‘Ideas’ project is providing one team considered to have the most innovative idea, with the Startup Pack prize which consists of a Smartphone, Tablet, Personal  Computer and High Speed Broadband Connection for one year. The selected team idea for this prize is Charitime.
Batelco extends much appreciation to the speakers and mentors from leading companies including Mumtalakat, Microsoft, Ericsson, BDB, O2, Venture Coms, Dynavate Technologies, 4 Spots and Batelco, who all volunteered their time to support the teams in developing their business ideas during the event.
Batelco also wishes to extend its gratitude to a number of local companies who ensured the event’s success via their invaluable sponsorship:-
Platinum Sponsor: Mumtalakat
Silver Sponsor: Ericsson
Bronze Sponsor: The General Organization for Youth & Sport (GOYS)
Technology Partner: Microsoft
Strategic Partners: Bahrain Development Bank (BDB) and Tamkeen
Contributing Partners: Gulf Air, Nescafe, Red Bull, GMI, University of Bahrain, Expression Computers, Mathias Tourism, Aries Designs &Trading, Union Press, Palace Enterprises, Sofitel Bahrain Zallaq Thalassa Sea & Spa and the Intercontinental Regency, Bahrain.
Media Sponsors: GDN, Gulf Weekly, CoEds, Business In Gulf, Al Watan, Al Ayam, Akhbar Al Khaleej, Al Wasat, Daily Tribune, Radio Voice and Amwaj TV.
For full details about the weekend’s happenings visit the Startup website at bahrain.startupweekend.org to view videos, photos and news.