Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) – On 19 November, the fourth cycle of the program for supporting youth startup initiatives has started.

According to the results of the competitive selection, 43 start-up projects from Tashkent take part in the fourth cycle of the Startup Initiative program. This year, a separate selection of projects from the regions of Uzbekistan is carried out, for which local seminars and master classes will be organized in 5 regions covering more than 178 projects.

This year, the program covered all regions of Uzbekistan and received a record number of applications - 648. Participation in the program of youth in the regions has improved markedly, 359 against 289 from the capital region. And projects led by girls prevail in Tashkent - 79 against 66 projects from the regions. Tourism, travel and hospitality services are the most popular destinations for young people - 98 projects, followed by projects from social sectors: ecology, sports, education and the urban environment - 77 projects. The top three areas are closed by the field of medicine: pharmacology and biotechnology - 61 projects. This year, young people also see the prospect of developing startups in the fields of trade and services, agriculture and the food industry (AgroTech and FoodTech), transport and logistics services.

The beginning of the program will be an intensive five-day seminar where participants will learn the basics of starting a startup using the Lean Startup methodology (“lean startup”). After the educational part, young start-ups will move on to the practical implementation of their project - they will draw up a roadmap for the development of the project, start testing the value propositions of their projects, study the needs of the target audience, create working models and start testing sales channels.

Trackers will guide and advise projects during the program (i.e. experienced mentors accompanying the development of the team and advising on the achievement of goals). Over the next two months, workshops and expert consultations for specialized experts and successful entrepreneurs on various issues related to the implementation of startup projects will be organized for participants. A number of workshops and seminars / round tables are expected to be organized with the participation of experts from Russia, South Korea and the USA.

As a result of the program, graduating teams present their projects at Demo Day (Demonstration Day) in order to attract interested organizations and investors for the further development of their business projects. The top five projects following the results of Demo Day will receive cash in the form of gratuitous investments for the development of their startups.

This year, separate seminars and master classes, accompaniment of trackers, master classes and expert consultations will be held, in addition to Tashkent, in the Ferghana, Kashkadarya, Samarkand, Bukhara and Khorezm regions, in which it is planned to select more than 130 youth projects. Upon completion of the regional phase of the program, the best projects selected by the expert group will have the opportunity to present their projects in the final “Demo Day” in Tashkent.

“Based on the results of the interviews, we were convinced that the projects have become more interesting, more conceptual, and the teams are“ older ”. There are more teams that already have MVP (minimum working model). This is a good trend. The quality is clearly higher and it is very pleasing ”- Alisher Yusupov, Director of Brand.uz, mentor of the Startup Initiative program

Providing a link between the educational and private sectors, the program contributes to the creation of an effective interaction mechanism for searching, selecting and testing promising youth ideas, technologies and projects that meet the needs of the parties, and the development of the country’s innovative and entrepreneurial ecosystem.

The support program is implemented by the joint project of the United Nations Development Program and the Ministry of Employment and Labor Relations (MZTO) "Promoting Youth Employment in Uzbekistan", funded by the Russian Federation, in cooperation with the Youth Union of Uzbekistan, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Uzbekistan, the Technological Park of Software Products and Information Technologies ( IT-Park).

This year, the Youth Entrepreneurship Support Center and the Yoshlar Kelajagimiz Foundation under the Youth Union of Uzbekistan, the Digital Trust Development Support Fund for the Digital Economy, Uzpromstroymaterialy Association, East Telecom LLC, Westminster International University in Tashkent, also participate in the program. and coworking centers “Ground Zero” and “C Space”.