The registration for the third edition of the Omani’s Entrepreneurship Award has finally closed. The bright young minds have now been looking forward to seeing whether they proceed to the next stage.
This year’s edition of the Riyada‘s initiative consists of 15 awards distributed among three main categories: The Entrepreneurship Award, Entrepreneurship Award for SME, and the Entrepreneurship Award for Supporting Organization. The winner of the Best Entrepreneur Award will receive OMR 8,000; The Best Educational Initiative and the Best Media Initiative gets OMR 5,000 each. The Best Home Business’s cash prize is OMR 3,000. The Best Medium Business will have OMR 12,000 in its account, while the Best Small Business will receive OMR 7,000.
The competition has gained a lot of interest in the past two years. This time, Riyada received 391 online applications. An automated software will now filter all the forms. After that, the jury panel will organize workshops and interviews to meet the shortlisted applicants in person.
Badriya Al Hinai, the Project Manager of the Award, said that for the first time in three years, the registration and assessment are done electronically this year. In cooperation with Oman Telecommunications Company Omantel, Riyada has created a dedicated website to ease the application and selection process. Omantel will keep supporting the initiative in numerous ways, including with financing.
Until now, the Award has organized 15 workshops across the country, attended by 600 people from the public and private sector. The main aim of the project is to boost the capacity of the local SMEs and to develop a healthy startup ecosystem in the Kingdom.