Applications have opened for the Norrsken Impact Accelerator in Stockholm, Sweden, which offer selected early-stage startups from across the world access to support, mentorship and US$125,000 in funding.
Norrsken VC is a Ksh. 16 billion (€125 million) impact VC fund investing in the best entrepreneurs that solve societal issues using technology.
The vision for the Norrsken Impact Accelerator is to create change through investing in the next generation business models where the impact is a result of the core operations and impact and profit are simultaneous.
Norrsken Impact Accelerator is sector agnostic and is open to startups in any area of impact. Each year, the accelerator highlights one or more verticals in which they bring a little extra domain-specific expertise.
The Norrsken Impact Accelerator brings together a global collective of entrepreneurs and investors in Stockholm, Sweden. Among them are founders of more than 50 unicorns and companies such as Klarna, Mojang, Soundcloud, Kry, Good American, Meltwater, Voi, Rekindle and Brilliant.
In 2019 the foundation had launched operations in Kigali, Rwanda, which it said it planned to use as a base for investing across the East and Central African region, and last year it accepted 11 startups from Africa into the inaugural edition of the Norrsken Impact Accelerator.
Norrsken Impact Accelerator Program // Kwara Wins Best Pitch
African companies are again invited to apply for the 2022 edition of the accelerator, which is designed to find the world’s most promising impact startups and help them scale.
The programme includes an eight-week growth sprint at Norrsken House in Stockholm and mentorship from a roster of over 50 entrepreneurs, investors and unicorn founders.
All startups receive a US$125,000 upfront seed or pre-seed investment from the Norrsken Foundation.
Norrsken Impact Accelerator 2022 video trailer
“We constantly ask ourselves – is this company solving a real problem? We’re only interested in business models where profit and impact are truly inseparable. It should be the opposite of “if you buy one pair of shoes, we’ll give away a free pair to Africa”, said Funda Sezgi, Norrsken Impact Accelerator managing director and co-founder.
“We’re looking for startups that have the potential to drive lasting, generational positive change to the world, whilst simultaneously building successful, rapidly scalable businesses.”
Since being accepted into the 2021 programme, the 20 participating companies have raised more than US$17 million in seed or pre-seed funding.
Applications are open here until the end of 15th February 2022.
Norrsken Impact Accelerator 2021
In May 2021, our member Kwara was among 19 other startups from Sweden, the US, India, Rwanda, Ghana, Nigeria, and more that were selected to participate in the Norrsken Impact Accelerator in Europe’s unicorn capital: Stockholm, Sweden.
Out of the 19 startups, 11 of them were from Africa & four were from Kenya.
The Norrsken Impact Accelerator program aimed at helping startups scale during an 8-week sprint, hosted at Norrsken House Stockholm.
These startups received mentorship and tailored support from serial entrepreneurs, unicorn founders, business leaders, and topic experts.
The program concluded with a pitch in front of 150+ top international investors such as Accel and Norrsken VC.
There were applications from over 120 countries. This places Kwara in the top 1% of impact startups across the globe.
