What a year 2023 is turning out to be for Jibu. We have been honored as a Semifinalist of the 2022 Urban Innovation Challenge by Utopia and the World Economic Forum’s Urban Transformation Platform.
- Chosen from more than 300 startups nominated for the challenge, we are one of 16 semifinalists from cities in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
- Utopia and the World Economic Forum partnered to highlight leading innovators in eight of the world’s fastest-growing cities.
- Winning solutions demonstrate the critical role of startups in shaping new solutions based on local needs and conditions.
Nearly all of the world’s urban growth is taking place in fast-growing cities across Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Entrepreneurs are playing an increasingly important role in building decentralized solutions to improve quality of living across all systems in their cities.
Utopia and the World Economic Forum’s Urban Transformation platform partnered on an Urban Innovation Challenge to highlight the growth of startups that can improve the quality of life for local residents and mitigate social and environmental challenges associated with rapid urbanization. Participating cities included Bogotá, Buenos Aires, Lagos, Dhaka, Jakarta, Kigali, Nairobi, and Rio de Janeiro.
This recognition comes at an opportune time when Africa is going through a renaissance of innovation and economic self-reliance to alleviate its communities from poverty. Jibu has scaled a network of locally owned, economically independent franchises that provide safe drinking water to their communities while offering life-changing training and employment. With franchise stores strategically located throughout our 8 countries many families and communities have been impacted in the past ten years of operation. These local business people supply essential products like water, fortified porridge and liquid petroleum gas (LPG) with water being our flagship brand. This exposure to the global community gives us the opportunity to make a bigger positive impact in our communities.
“Cities of the Majority World across Asia, Africa, and Latin America are the arenas where the next era of humanity will be built. They’re where the vast majority of citizens will live and where the most important decisions will be made about what our societies and our planet becomes,” said Jonathan Hursh, Founding Partner of Utopia.
The startup semifinalists and winners of the challenge are Roam (Nairobi), BasiGo (Nairobi), Sanergy (Nairobi), LifeBank (Lagos), Eden Life (Lagos), Sunfi (Lagos), Ampersand (Kigali), Jibu (Kigali), AC Group (Kigali), Jatri (Dhaka), MedEasy (Dhaka), Hydroquo+ (Dhaka), Ula (Jakarta), Nodeflux (Jakarta), AT-LARS (Jakarta), Beep Health (Rio de Janeiro), Loggi (Rio de Janeiro), GreenAnt (Rio de Janeiro), Neu Energy (Bogota), Cubbo (Bogota), Greener (Buenos Aires), RobinFood (Bogota), Osana (Buenos Aires), and COMPOSTAME (Buenos Aires).
Global judges helped define the semifinalists and winners for each city. They are Iyinoluwa Aboyejii (Cofounder, Future Africa), Shin-pei Tsay (Director of Policy, Cities & Transportation, Uber), Rajan Anandan (Managing Director, Sequoia), Jennifer Musisi (Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative Leader in Residence), Nathan Blecharczyk (Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer, Airbnb), Tim Brown (Chair, IDEO), Shivani Siroya (Founder and CEO, Tala), and Prem Ramaswami (President of Urban Products, Sidewalk Labs).
Follow along with the conversation about the future of these fast-growing emergent cities of the Majority World here.
About Utopia
Utopia is building a platform to help entrepreneurs build tech startups to improve quality of life in their fast-growing cities across Asia, Africa, and Latin America. (@utopia.so)
About the World Economic Forum
The World Economic Forum’s urban transformation platform advances public-private collaboration in cities, enabling more resilient and future-ready communities and local economies. (@worldeconomicforum)
