Dr. Ahmed Shalaby, President & CEO of Tatweer Misr gave a speech at the United States Congress about “The Role of Academia in Entrepreneurial Ecosystems" during the 10th Annual George Washington University Global Entrepreneurship Research & Policy Conference held on the 3rd of October in Washington, D.C., with the presence of prominent academics , government leaders and influential members of the business community from 150 countries worldwide.
This year’s George Washington University (GWU) Global Entrepreneurship Research & Policy Conference is an integral part of the GW October Entrepreneurship Week activities, organized annually and recognized as the “destination event” for established entrepreneurs and those interested in entrepreneurship in the region. The week’s core mission is to increase awareness, opportunities, education, and funding for members of the GW community while driving entrepreneurial behaviors and creating measurable results. It is intended to stimulate engagement and collaboration in an environment that promotes a diversity of thought and perspective and provides networking opportunities as well as idea generation for interested participants.
During his speech at the US Congress, Dr. Shalaby highlighted that Egypt’s Entrepreneurial ecosystem has the potential to grow in several directions if given the proper tools and educational support. He explained “At Tatweer Misr, we understand that we might be able to design and build for happy and more sustainable lifestyles within our properties. We also know that our ability to unleash the potential of innovatively built and purposeful properties starts with the education of its users, both employees and residents.”
He continued, “This drove us to engrain our own DNA with innovative and entrepreneurial thinking. But we did not stop there. Ever since our inception, we have dedicated most of our social investment efforts towards fostering an entrepreneurial mindset among Egyptian university students, as well as building a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem across Egypt, and with universities as a starting point.”
Tatweer Misr collaborated with New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) with the sole purpose of creating an unprecedented grass-root movement to support entrepreneurial education with quality as their utmost priority, as it represents Egypt’s first American International Branch Campus (IBC). Moreover, Tatweer Misr plans to build on that momentum by continuing to partner with internationally acclaimed universities and schools, bringing them to Egypt to span across their 90-acre educational district at its new project, Bloomfields.
Also, part of Tatweer Misr’s activities in the entrepreneurial field, is their Annual Innovation Competition which was first launched in 2017, acknowledging the importance of early awareness of entrepreneurial education, especially for the innovative young minds. This competition provided a better insight on the capabilities of the youth and the power of their minds and creative ideas.
It’s also worth mentioning that one of the main purposes of George Washington Entrepreneurship week is to create momentum for the Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) organized annually by Global Entrepreneurship Network (GEN) in November in more than 170 countries, bringing together more than 10 million people in a collection of tens of thousands of events, activities and competitions with the aim of inspiring them to explore their potential as entrepreneurs while fostering connections and increasing collaboration within their ecosystems. GEW is scheduled to take place this year from 18th till the 24th of November 2019, Tatweer Misr has been the sponsor of this week since 2016 in Egypt and they have also signed an agreement to keep on sponsoring those fruitful activities for the upcoming 3 years.
