Allianz Malaysia and Impact Hub KL engaged local social entrepreneurs and potential participants for the first ever Investment Ready Program (IRP) during a Warm Up event at Sunway iLabs.
The event provided local change makers and aspiring social entrepreneurs a platform to learn more about the IRP, a unique acceleration program that is part of the ‘Encouraging Future Generations’ initiative by Allianz Group and Impact Hub that was purposefully tailored to serve driven entrepreneurs championing the social inclusion of children and youths across Brazil, Germany, Malaysia and Turkey.
Fostering social inclusion of children and young people is the cornerstone of this Investment Ready Programme. During the session, participants also received support and coaching from a panel of experienced entrepreneurs, investors, Allianz mentors and content experts.
“Pursuing innovative solutions is part and parcel of Allianz Malaysia’s business strategy and through the Investment Ready Program, we are more than excited to provide a platform and support local ideas which can potentially provide sustainable, long-term impact in our society,” said Joseph Gross, Chief Executive Officer of Allianz Life Insurance Malaysia Berhad.
“It’s great to have driven, like-minded entrepreneurs and our panel of experts under one roof here today as we come together to learn, synergise and transform ideas into reality. We hope that the teams will benefit from the knowledge sharing opportunity to glean everything they need to know in order to attract the right capital for their organisation and the tools to ensure they achieve their desired goals,” added Joseph.
"Impact Hub is a global network of people, places, and programs that inspire, connect and catalyze impact through entrepreneurial action and collaboration. We know how important it is to support the next generation of entrepreneurs who will make a difference to the lives of others. It’s hard to become impactful if your venture can’t be financially sustainable. Hence the intention of the programme is to discover and support entrepreneurs to take their impact to the next level by helping them ready themselves to receive investments. We can’t choose a better partner than Allianz to collaborate with as they share this vision and have the expertise and the resources to support the ventures in their journey to impactful sustainability,” said Dr Shariha Khalid, Chief Executive Officer of Impact Hub KL.
As part of the programme, 10 participating teams from the four countries will engage in a systematic review of their business model, strategy, and team before crafting a validated growth and investment plan over six months. Each local Allianz entity has also highlighted topics which are societal challenges faced locally. In Malaysia, they focus on diversity, education, health, environment, and safety and protection.
Beyond that, all participants will also be part of two multi-day workshop sessions in February and June in Munich, and have the chance to pitch in front of a jury for the Allianz Future Generations Award (€40, 000) at the end of the programme. Applications are open until 26 November 2017.
