Startup teams and innovators invited to apply to “from idea to market” competition

YEREVAN, June 30. / ARKA /. The U.S. Civilian Research & Development Foundation (CRDF) in partnership with the Enterprise Incubator Foundation (EIF) and the Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Armenia, invites all interested startup teams, innovators, scientists and technology entrepreneurs to apply to the annual STEP “From Idea to Market” Competition, EIF says in a press release.

The competition is designed to ignite the spark of technology entrepreneurship and to advance innovative technology-based ideas to the market in the following areas critical to Armenia’s development - ICT, Engineering and High Tech Innovation, Clean Technologies, Agriculture. Winning teams will receive $7,500 from CRDF Global; 2,800,000 AMD from the Ministry of Economy. 

Completed application forms should be submitted to EIF for pre-screening on eligibility and completeness via e-mail by July 28, 2014, 18:00, Yerevan time at the following e-mail address:[email protected].

Final application forms must be submitted electronically to CRDF Global in English by August 8, 2014 23:59 EST at www.crdfglobal.org/fromideatomarket and resubmitted to EIF both in English and Armenian at [email protected].

Detailed announcement of competition, including proposals submission procedure, and Application Form (both English and Armenian) can be downloaded or received via email by sending request letter to [email protected].

The STEP project was created in 2006 by EIF jointly with the U.S. Civilian Research & Development Foundation (CRDF) and the Government of Armenia. 

The purpose of STEP is to help engineers, researchers, and scientists move their innovative products to market, create new ventures, and to encourage effective partnerships with established companies. STEP also supports economic growth by facilitating efforts by Armenian scientists to establish connections with local and international companies so they may collaborate in a mutually beneficial way.

Each year within STEP project EIF implements a number of activities in partnership with the Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Armenia and CRDF, which include the Business Partnership Grant (BPG) program, Venture Conference, Cluster Seminars, Business trainings for scientific community, Legal and accounting seminars, and match-making events. -0-