Sustainable AASTMT

Brief Description 

The Arab Academy for Science, Technology, and Maritime Transport (AASTMT) supports the principles of entrepreneurial education and enhancing competitiveness and sustainability not only among the Egyptian economy but also within the broader Arab economy.

AASTMT established its Entrepreneurship Center “AASTEC” in 2015, with the objective of empowering youth to drive the realization of sustainable economic growth in the region. The Center works to be the regional hub that empowers youth and supports startups and businesses throughout the Arab region and Africa. The aim of the “Entrepreneurship, innovation, and Industry Support Policy” is to support creativity and innovation as one of AASTMT's top priorities. 

Also, the policy targeting the expansion of long-distance education programs and professional training, for AAST students and entrepreneurs, mobilizes the outputs of scientific research, linking it to the challenges that exist in various economic and industrial sectors, and recommends innovative solutions that support different industries.

AASTMT sector-focused incubators aim to create a base of innovators, developers, and entrepreneurs who develop competitive prototypes and applications that support industry localization and replace imports.

Scope 

AASTMT seeks through its “Entrepreneurship, innovation, and industry support policy” to support its various entities to invest in its students, professors, and researchers; linking them to the market needs with the aim of creating quality jobs that contribute to sustainable economic development in the Arab region and Egypt. 

This policy applies to all academic and non-academic staff employed by the Arab Academy for Science, Technology, and Maritime Transport including all faculties, divisions, and departments. The geographical coverage of the policy covers all AASTMT campuses in Egypt and the Arab region.

Aims of the Policy 

The policy aims at achieving sustainability of the academic and practical excellence of the Arab Academy, supporting entrepreneurial education and best use of the academic research and the physical and human resources at AAST to connect with industry needs and challenges. The policy aims to spread the entrepreneurship culture, not only for AASTians but also for entrepreneurs and Arab and local communities, the aim is to enhance competitiveness and sustainability, boosting employability, and job creation in the Arab and Egyptian Economy.

Introduction

AASTMT established its Entrepreneurship Center in 2015, with the objective of empowering youth to drive the realization of sustainable economic growth in the region. The Center works to be the regional hub that empowers youth and supports startups and businesses throughout the Arab region and Africa, with the aim to build a generation of youth entrepreneurs and change agents to positively impact the social and economic conditions of Arab economies by enabling environment for growth, which stimulates innovative initiatives and private business functioning through utilizing the resources of the Arab Academy and its extended network.

AAST Entrepreneur Center “AAST EC” prepared a clear strategy for supporting Egyptian, and Arab startups, entrepreneurs, and university students, through its different programs, that serve not only the AAST Community: undergraduate, postgraduate, and Alumni, but also, the youth, entrepreneurs, and startups in Egypt and the region. 

The strategy aims at building & connecting a healthy ecosystem for entrepreneurship in the Arab, and African regions and the Egyptian governorates and local communities with the promising youth to help establish a robust region and Egypt’s development. Also, the policy developed aimed to support the efforts of the Arab Academy towards transforming into an entrepreneurial university, for that reason AAST established a specialized academy to support startups namely “AAST Startups School”.

AAST EC launched its sector-focused incubators at AAST EC, considered the first of its kind in the region that aims at building and connecting entrepreneurial ecosystems in the leading economic sectors, specifically the supply chain and logistic incubator, Mashreq tourism incubator, and MASAR Agribusiness incubator and recently the incubator for people with disability (Good Will Incubator), in addition to a national entrepreneurship competition named (Egypt Rally competition).

A recent program was launched namely “Rally Accelerate” which focused on operating startups in five industrial sectors, it’s a fully advanced program that focuses on registered startups who are eager to develop and grow their startups, reaching scalability and international expansion where the winners have awarded international visit to European and German ecosystems to better gain the required knowledge, in addition to the opportunity to pitch and showcase of their startups in front of many investors, VCs, business leaders in international summits.

Specialized programs directed to students and fresh graduates (AAST Youth incubator and AAST’s Grade to Business program also meet the founder’s initiative), all these programs aim at better engagement of students with AASTMT staff and management to boost innovation and entrepreneurial culture and supporting students to develop their own projects in the market. 

Engagement of AASTMT staff from different faculties, departments, and campuses is also crucial for efficient connection with the students to mentor and coach their innovative ideas and link to the industry needs.

Policy Statement

The Entrepreneurship, innovation, and industry support policy is responsible for supporting the efforts of the Arab Academy towards transforming into an entrepreneurial university and becoming the regional hub that empowers youth, pushing startups and businesses throughout Egypt and the Arab region, achieving sustainability of the academic and practical excellence, through the support of creativity and innovation; the continuous development, in cooperation with different international, regional and local partners. Also, the transfer of know-how, technical and scientific support in cooperation with top-notch universities, for the latest updates in the academic sciences and best practices in industry is the key to success.

The Entrepreneurship, innovation, and industry support policy supports innovation and links to industry, through:

• Providing improved framework conditions and knowledge to support industry and academia on how to innovate and accelerate innovative ideas “Stimulating Innovation” 
• New mechanisms to support industry and academia to turn those innovative ideas into actual products, processes, services, and business models “Enabling innovation “
• Support industry and academia to turn those innovative ideas into actual products, processes, services, and business models Facilitating innovation 
• Put new products and technologies on the market, be an integral part of national and global value chains “Commercialize innovation”.

Objectives

• Achieving sustainability of the academic and practical excellence of the Arab Academy, through the support of creativity and innovation. 
• Mobilize the outputs of scientific research, linking it to the challenges that exist in various sectors, and recommend innovative solutions that support different industries.
• A main objective is to operate as a center for technology transfer and enterprise creation, integrating with the innovation labs and industry-based innovation in the enterprise life cycle, and solve the challenge of missing the know-how and bridging the gap to the local industry.
• Spread the entrepreneurship culture, not only for AASTians but also for entrepreneurs and Arab and local communities supporting entrepreneurial education and enhancing competitiveness and sustainability.

Implementation and desired outcomes 

In general terms, the Entrepreneurship, innovation, and industry support policy, aims at scaling its programs nationally, regionally, and internationally with the objective to support the enablers of the entrepreneurship ecosystem, on one side, and on the other side to create more opportunities for startups and potential entrepreneurs, with clear linkage of industry support, AAST EC policy is to do that through supporting entrepreneurship enablers in addition to providing direct support to startups. 

Specific actions to be taken in both the medium and long term, first: the medium-term actions and related outcomes: 

• Direct or indirect support of 500 startups within the coming 3 years in Egypt, MENA region & Africa, through our incubation programs, Rally competition, and other platforms. 
• Inspiring and changing the culture of 5,000 potential entrepreneurs through our startup school different online entrepreneurship programs. 
• Having a unicorn among our portfolio of supported startups within 5 years. 
• Helping our supported network of startups create 3,000 job opportunities for youth within 3 years. 
• Support entrepreneurs in less developed and underserved areas in the country through customized programs targeting them. We already started the MASAAR incubator, MashreQ Tourism incubator, and TWT agribusiness incubator in upper Egypt.  
• Support people with disabilities and innovative ideas that provide solutions for people with disabilities, through the “GoodWill incubator”.
• Rally Accelerate focuses on the registered startups who are eager to develop and grow their startups, reaching scalability and international expansion, where the winners are awarded international visits to European and German ecosystems and have the opportunity to pitch and showcase their startups in front of many investors, VCs, business leaders in international summits.
• Support innovation in the tourism sector in the Arab region, through the Tourism Entrepreneurship Digital Program for Arab States (TED Arabs) “an integrated initiative that supports creating Eco-Systems in the Arab region for the entrepreneurs and innovators in the tourism sector, an expected outreach is 2,000 beneficiaries from all five pilot countries (Egypt-Saudi-Bahrain-Sudan, Comoros).
• Having 40 university-based startups and 5 spin-offs through our campuses, resulting from entrepreneurship courses, youth incubators, and other programs. 

Second: the long-term actions and outcomes: 

• Quality of life of youth: through supporting young entrepreneurs at universities, promoting the culture, and empowering their startups directly through our platforms like “Rally competition” or through supporting the enablers like entrepreneurship centers or incubators based in those universities. 

Economic development in Egypt: our sector-focused incubators are addressing critical sectors that have a direct impact on economic growth like tourism and supply chain, those industries are making a significant contribution to the Egyptian economy, and there is still a great opportunity for disruption.

Performance indicators

The following are examples of Performance indicators:

• Average of jobs/employment created. 
• Employment Growth 
• Number of Spin-Offs/Startups Created
• Average investment attracted.  
• Incubatee Profit Growth 
• No. of services enterprises/sectors served.

Internal Monitoring and Auditing 

Monitoring is undertaken according to the logical framework, and the technical, and financial reports produced under the above-mentioned outputs, as well as the frequency of project management meetings. ​​​​​​​