Growth seen in Qatar’s women entrepreneurs, says QSTP official

There has been an increase in the number of women in Qatar who are pursuing entrepreneurship through the various programmes being offered by Qatar Science and Technology Park (QSTP), part of Qatar Foundation Research, Development & Innovation (QF RDI), according to a top QSTP official.“Over the last three years, there has been steady growth among females in startups at QSTP. It is clearly happening in that area not only among non-Qataris but with Qatari women, as well,” QSTP executive director Yosouf al-Salehi told Gulf Times.He said, “We have noticed in the past period, that there are more and more women trying to join the different programmes being offered at QSTP, such as in the accelerator programme. They also want to discuss how to open their businesses through the incubation programme.Al-Salehi explained that the approach across all sectors in the country is to encourage women to open up their own businesses. These initiatives have “greatly inspired” more females to step up and become entrepreneurs, he also pointed out.“The journey towards entrepreneurship is not without challenges, and they come in all forms across all sectors. Having said that, we are trying to persuade them to venture into tech.“There are many women in Qatar whose companies are specialising in the F&B sector or food supply business. However, we are trying to unlock the area of tech to have more female entrepreneurs in this field. And we are working on having more women in Qatar to focus on tech startups,” al-Salehi emphasised.In the area of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics), it was previously reported that “Qatari women outnumber men in higher education, and participation of women in STEM education fields in Qatar is nearly 50% higher than the global average.”Al-Salehi pointed out that this is a very significant achievement in Qatar. But he noted that while being knowledgeable in STEM is an advantage, it is, likewise, important that an entrepreneur has the skills in running a business or a company.He stressed that entrepreneurs must be well-informed in areas, such as finance, leadership, and human resources how to manage people and recruit the right workforce, in order to successfully run their businesses.On its website, QSTP’s acceleration programmes include ‘XLR8’ and ‘ELV8’. XLR8 is a unique programme that helps promising innovators and entrepreneurs determine if their tech-based ideas have commercial viability, by giving entrepreneurs the tools needed to assess market fit, customer traction, and investor awareness.On the other hand, ELV8 is a 12-month growth accelerator programme that serves as a launchpad for the global growth of Qatar’s tech startups in order for them to expand their business into new international markets and will be delivered in partnership with Silicon Valley-based Plug and Play.Last year, QSTP announced a pioneering new partnership with Qatar Development Bank (QDB), which aims to enhance Qatar’s economy, boost RDI within the private sector, and support the nation’s start-up community.The partnership, which is targeting start-ups, entrepreneurs, and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), will see QSTP and QDB leverage both organisations’ incubator and accelerator initiatives through specialised workshops, boot camps, hackathons and investor pitching sessions. Co-investment opportunities will be explored for tech start-ups looking to deploy solutions locally and scale up globally, according to a previous report.