Buupass selected to Join Blackbox Connect 22

Buupass selected to Join Blackbox Connect 22

BuuPass founder, Iman Cooper, has been named among the 15 International Female Founders selected to Join Blackbox Connect 22

Buupass is a company that aims to provide seamless movement for people in Kenya and is Kenya’s first marketplace for bus, shuttle, and train bookings.

Iman, joins 14 more rising entrepreneurs, who will head to Silicon Valley from across the globe to participate in Blackbox Connect: Female Founders Edition.

The program consists of a two-week immersive residential experience in San Francisco, offering the opportunity for founders to live and learn together while connecting with top Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, investors, thought leaders, and executives in an intimate, open, and collaborative environment.

This year marks the 22nd program cycle of Blackbox Connect since its inception in 2011, and the fourth annual Female Founders Edition.

How Blackbox Connect 22 works

Participating founders — typically the CEOs of their companies and referred to affectionately as “Blackboxers” — step outside the day-to-day grind of running their companies and reexamine their intention from growth strategy to product design to team culture from a fresh and global perspective.

After two weeks of speaker sessions, interactive workshops, founder-to-founder learning, pitch coaching, and 1:1 mentoring, the program concludes with the Blackbox Global Startup Salon, a twist on the traditional Demo Day, in which Blackboxers present their company to a curated audience of investors and Silicon Valley tech leaders and receive meaningful feedback, guidance, and support. Interested parties can learn more and apply to attend the event here.

This cycle’s 15 selected founders hail from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, Indonesia, Ireland, Kenya, the Netherlands, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, and the United States, and represent a wide variety of sectors, including (but not limited to) healthtech, last-mile logistics, AR/VR, on-demand marketplaces, blockchain, and more.

The Female Founders Edition gives special opportunity to connect even more talented women to the mentorship, resources, knowledge, and networks they need to succeed and become role models for future generations of entrepreneurs.

Twelve of the selected founders are recipients of the Google for Entrepreneurs Scholarship, which provides all-expenses-paid participation in Blackbox Connect for founders nominated by members of the Google for Entrepreneurs partner network.

Since 2011, Blackbox has helped elevate more than 400 founders from 60+ countries to reach their full potential. Within 3–9 months of Blackbox Connect, over 60% of startups have gone on to raise funding and more than 90% continue to grow their businesses. There have been 10 exits to fuel the growth of global startup ecosystems.

How Buupass works

Buupass is a member of the ever-growing Nairobi Garage Community and was started in 2016 as a response to Hult Prize Challenge, by three students at Earlham College; Sonia Kabra, Iman Cooper, and Wyclife Omondi.

BuuPass allows Kenyans book and pay for your bus tickets in Kenya, from the comfort of their home or office, by dialling *877# (offline platform) or via Buupass Website. Buupass also works in many different spaces: travel, tech, transport, startups and entrepreneurship. Recipient of a Google for Entrepreneurs Scholarship.

Would you like to join these companies and many more, working from Nairobi’s most vibrant work space for innovative growing companies – book your tour.