Not too long ago we posted about the collaborative spaces challenge we have collaborated on with Zoomaal, the Arab crowdfunding platform. The challenge started off with a battle to unlock MENA countries for the next phase in the challenge. It resulted in a very competitive battle where in the end Egypt, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia, Algeria and Iraq qualified to continue and get a chance to compete for the $60.000 in matched funding. Initially only five countries with the most enablers would compete. Despite the war-torn realities and political turmoil of these countries and the region in general they have managed to transform what was supposed to be a pre-registration phase into a movement of people who are eager to grow and build something in their country. Due to the overwhelming responses the sixth country with the highest amount of enablers was also added.
Each of these countries now have a well-deserved chance to apply with their project and compete for matched funding of $10,000 per country. The projects that come from these countries can start their crowdfunding campaign on Zoomaal and have to finish their online application by January 12th 2015! If you have a collaborative space in one of the qualifying countries or want to build such a space go to the challenge page and apply before the deadline with your project.
Now that’s a good way to start the New Year!