The Spark Entrepreneurship Camp Sets off to Take Over Gouna This Weekend  

After an incredibly inspiring edition last year which showcased star youngsters such as Deena Moussa and Marwan Rafaat, the Spark entrepreneurship camp is taking over the coastal city of El Gouna this weekend, kicking off a 10-day marathon of workshops, sessions, and inspirational talks to help promising youngsters turn their ideas into full-fledged projects. The programme kick-started yesterday, July 13^th and will run until July 25th.

Originally established by Sherife AbdelMessih in 2007 the program is set to span for two weeks, and is primarily concerned with finding, connecting, and harnessing the talents of some of the most bright young Egyptian minds. Previously, graduates of SPARK! have gone on to attend various prestigious universities including MIT, Harvard, McGill, Duke, and UPenn, as well as developed ground-breaking initiatives. 17-year-old Egyptian student Deena Moussa developed her very own product dubbed Hermostat V-Seal, which includes a chemical mechanism that can stop bleeding faster than common hospital medicine. Another company called Vound, which was cofounded by another SPARK! program graduate (who was also selected as one of Cairoscene’s 25 under 25 entrepreneurs), was successful in developing an Augmented Reality wearable device that allows deaf people to interpret sound waves. 

The camp’s Founder, Sherife AbdelMessih, says that this is his way of giving back to the Egyptian community. “As life gives us privilege and reward, we have to dedicate some of our resources to empowering others. There is a tremendous amount of talent in Egypt, we need to identify it and magnify it,” he says. “This is what separates developed countries from developing ones and we need to make this shift.” Stay tuned as Startup Scene heads over to El Gouna to discover this year’s talented youngsters. 

For more information, visit their website.

Photography: Valentina Primo.