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De Beers is giving almost R40 million to reputable American university, Stanford, to facilitate a business programme for more than 100 established businesses across three countries.
The programme consist of two parts, one for established entrepreneurs, and the other part for start-ups, but the latter is only available in Botswana while the former also includes candidates from South Africa and Namibia.
De Beers hosted a breakfast session this week to announce and recruit potential candidates into the programme on which it has partnered with Stanford University’s Seed Transformation Programme.
The $3 million De Beers investment would be spread over three years, said Pat Dambe, De Beers’ vice-president of corporate affairs and government relations.
Representatives from Stanford would travel to the candidates.
Dambe said the programme was mainly aimed at upscaling and assisting business to create more jobs.
“If a business can upscale it can create more jobs,” she said.
“This initiative forms part of De Beers’ ongoing commitment to supporting the development of a diversified and sustainable economy in the countries in which it operates.
De Beers continues to align its objectives as a business to the development plans of the governments in which they operate. As part of this, the company has focused its efforts on economic diversification, youth employment and skills development and innovation, to establish sustainable growth specifically within Botswana, Namibia and South Africa,” she said.
Although the programme was not accredited, Jeffrey Prickett, director of global operations at Stanford Seed, said the programme was invaluable to participants and targeted companies with a proven track record.
Prickett said the business people targeted were entrepreneurs – therefore qualified – and the programme was not a qualification.
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