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Stanford Graduate School of Business has entered into a $3 million, three-year partnership with De Beers Group to expand its entrepreneurship programs into Southern Africa.
The Seed Transformation Program launched in West Africa in 2013 and expanded to East Africa in 2016 and will start later this month in India. The partnership with De Beers will see it launch Stanford Seed, its one-year program Seed Transformation Program and Stanford Go-to-Market, the one-week entrepreneurship bootcamp in Botswana, Namibia and South Africa in 2018.
The Go-to-Market Programme is an intensive, one-week entrepreneurship bootcamp, taught by Stanford GSB faculty, held in cities around the globe. Botswana will host the first Stanford Go-to-Market programme in Africa, but the bootcamp may expand to include participants from other Southern African countries once fully established.
Applications for the Go-to-Market programme in Botswana will be accepted until October 6 and the cohort will convene in March 2018.
“We are excited to work with the young and established entrepreneurs in the Southern African region. As with our experiences in East and West Africa, we are coming to learn as much as we are to teach,” said Jesper Sørensen, professor of organisational behavior at Stanford GSB and faculty director of Stanford Seed.
“If the business and job growth that follows matches what we are seeing in our other locations, I anticipate this collaboration will be a very impactful initiative.”
The Seed Transformation Programme launched in West Africa in 2013 and expanded to East Africa in 2016. Faculty, staff, and coaches have trained more than 500 business leaders with the goal of promoting prosperity in these regions.
Both the Seed Transformation Program and Go-to-Market program will be headquartered at the Botswana Innovation Hub, in Gaborone, Botswana.
