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L-R; Vincent Reynolds, Chairman of Local Enterprise Office, An Taoiseach Enda Kenny, Minister Richard Bruton for Enterprise, Jobs and Innovation, & Minister John Perry for Small Business |
New
competition launched to find Waterford’s Best Young Entrepreneur (Under
30) with investment of up to €25,000 available for winner.
Winners
in Waterford will proceed to regional and national finals with aim of finding
Ireland’s Best Young Entrepreneur
The Taoiseach and the Minister for Jobs,
Enterprise and Innovation launched a new competition to find Ireland’s Best
Young Entrepreneur, with a total fund of €2million available to invest in
winning businesses at entrepreneurs in every county in the country.
In Waterford
the competition to find Waterford’s
Best Young Entrepreneur will be run by the new Local Enterprise Office. Winners
will be named in three categories – best new idea, best start-up, best new
venture for established business – as well as an overall winner who will be Waterford’s Best Young Entrepreneur.
The Waterford
Local Enterprise Office will have a total fund of €50,000 to invest in the
three winning businesses, according to criteria including the prospects and
investment needs of each business. The overall winner of Waterford’s Best Young Entrepreneur can receive an investment of up
to €25,000.
Mentoring, marketing and other supports
will also be available to participating businesses at various stages of the
competition.
Lar Power, Director of Economic
Development, Waterford City and County Council believes this initiative is
particularly important to Waterford, “Following the success of Waterford in the
National Student Enterprise Awards this year I am looking forward to seeing
what ‘under 30’ sector entrepreneurs in the City and County enter this
competition. Waterford’s small business enterprises in particular require as
much assistance as they can get and the new Local Enterprise Office in
Waterford is fully prepared to help these young and innovative future
entrepreneurs make their ideas turn into a commercial reality.”
Ciaran Cullen of the Local Enterprise
Office complimented the scale of the competition, “This size of investment for
these young start-up businesses is a significant statement of intent. The
investment is more than just monetary, the boot camps, mentoring and national
exposure will give the best of these entries the boost they require at this
stage of their development.”
The competition is open to individuals aged
30 and under and will be judged under three distinct categories:
- · best new idea
- · best start-up business
- · best established business with new add-on
The first stage will be a county-based
competition (run by the 31 LEOs) leading to the naming of the Best Young
Entrepreneur in each county. This stage will include boot camps and mentoring
programmes. This will be followed by regional finals and ultimately national
finals with one business-person being crowned Ireland’s Best Young Entrepreneur
before the end of the year.
There have been expressions of interest
from television production companies on the possibility of covering the later
stages of the competition in a reality TV format.
The aim of the initiative is to encourage
and support a culture of entrepreneurship among young people in Ireland, to
promote entrepreneurship as a career choice, and to encourage the establishment
and development of new innovative businesses by Ireland’s young entrepreneurs.
This is hugely important for job-creation as two thirds of all new jobs are
generated by businesses in the first five years of existence – more start-ups
and a thriving entrepreneurial culture will lead to more jobs being created.
This project is an integral part of the
Action Plan for Jobs 2014 and is supported by the Department of Jobs,
Enterprise and Innovation through the Local Enterprise Offices.
Applying is simple – go to
localenterprise.ie or your Local Enterprise Office in Waterford City or
Dungarvan – and the deadline is 30th June 2014.
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