The fifth stage of the programme to support youth start-up initiatives has been launched today, on the 9 March, in which 46 start-up projects from Tashkent are expected to participate. At this stage of the programme, seminars and trainings will also be organized in the regions of the republic for 273 project teams selected through the competition.

In this cycle, the programme is being conducted online for the first time and it covers all the regions of Uzbekistan. Despite the pandemic restrictions a record number of 905 applications have been received, 72% more than in the previous cycle.

Analysis of the competition’s statistics, providing information on the participants of the programme and their projects, has revealed the following facts:

• Out of the 273 projects that have passed the educational course, over 50% (or 144 projects) were initiated by students of higher educational institutions;
• 122 projects are at the idea stage, while another 121 (44%) already have a prototype, and 30 projects (11%) have been launched and already have their first customers and made their first sales;
• Each project team has an average of 3 participants. The ratio of male to female participants is 4 to 1.

By providing a connection between the educational sector and the private sector, this support programme contributes to the creation of an effective interaction mechanism for searching for, selecting and testing promising ideas, youth technologies and projects which meet the needs of the parties, and promotes the development of the country's innovative and entrepreneurial environment.

The programme is also being implemented this year with the participation of the Ministry of Higher and Secondary Specialised Education, the State Committee for Tourism Development, the Ministry of Innovative Development, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Uzbekistan, the khokimiyat of Tashkent city, IT-centres, the Westminster International University in Tashkent, DataSite Technology, Digital Trust, Ground Zero and C-Space co-working centres.

The most popular areas of focus for the youth include ‘EdTech’ (with 52 projects), followed by the ‘Commerce and Tertiary Sector’ (with 51 projects). The third most popular sector is ‘Social Technologies’ (with 26 projects). This year, young people also see the prospect for the development of start-ups in the areas of ‘AgroTech’, ‘FoodTech’ and ‘Transport and Logistics Services’.

The programme starts with an intensive five-day seminar where participants will learn the basics of launching a start-up using the Lean Start-up methodology. After the educational component the young start-up founders will proceed to the practical implementation of their projects – they will design a ‘roadmap’ for the development of their projects, test the value propositions of their projects, study the needs of the target audience, create working models, and start testing ‘manual’ sales.

The project groups will be guided and can consult with trackers, being experienced mentors who can support team development and give advice to every team on how to achieve their set goals. Over the next month, various events will be organized for the participants, such as master classes and expert consultations by specialists and successful entrepreneurs on various problems faced in implementing start-up projects.

This year, individual seminars and educational programmes, trackers’ support, master classes and expert consultations will be provided online in all regions of the country, not only in Tashkent, in which more than 273 youth projects are intended to participate. Upon completion of the regional stage of the programme, the best projects selected by the expert group will have the opportunity to be presented at the final ‘Demo Day’.

The support programme has been conducted by the ‘Promoting Youth Employment in Uzbekistan’ joint project of the United Nations Development Programme and the Ministry of Employment and Labour Relations (MLTO), with financial support from the Russian Federation. The project is implemented in cooperation with the Youth Affairs Agency, the ‘Yoshlar – kelajagimiz’ Foundation, the Centre for Youth Entrepreneurship Support, and the Technological Park of Software and Information Technologies (IT-Park).

The best 40 project groups from across the country, identified based on the results of the final presentations of their projects, will receive targeted grants of up to 50 million soums for the implementation of their projects (up to 3 projects from each region and up to 10 projects in Tashkent). The grants are provided by the ‘Yoshlar – kelajagimiz’ Foundation and the United Nations Development Programme in Uzbekistan, using funds allocated by the Government of Japan to mitigate the consequences of the pandemic.