Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen has urged the Non-Residence Bangladeshis (NRBs) to launch their ‘startups’ business with their world standard skill as Bangladesh needs their support to realize its visionary development goals.
“We look forward to our expatriate Bangladeshis and NRBs to come and have their startups established in Bangladesh taking advantage to hugely attractive government offers and facilities,” he said.
The foreign minister was speaking at the final Bangladesh round of “Startup World Cup-2020” as the chief guest at a city hotel on Saturday night.
A startup is a young company founded by one or more entrepreneurs in order to develop a unique product or service and bring it to market.
Foreign ministry, ICT division, Venture Capital and Private Equity Association of Bangladesh (VCPEAB), International Finance Corporation (IFC) and eGeneration organised the Startup World Cup-2020 to mark the beginning of the countdown of Mujib Borsho.
The foreign minister said Bangladesh had set a target of having two million ICT skilled persons, establishment of e-governance and earning a revenue of five billion US dollars by 2021 and declared tax holiday till 2024, only one percent import tax for materials of hardware industry and exceptional cash incentive of 10 percent for ICT export to help achieve these targets.
“I hope that not only the local entrepreneurs, the foreign innovators will also be greatly encouraged to take the rare advantages offered by the government to launch their startups in Bangladesh,” Momen said.
Saying that most of the startups in the country are based on software operating in digital environment, he urged the young innovators to venture into social, economic, industrial and educational startups in addition to predominantly software-based ones.
“I would urge you to come up with startups in the priority areas of Bangladesh like poverty reduction, education, climate change and disaster management, women empowerment, achievement of SDGs, migration and labour, easing trade and commerce,” he said.Private industry and investment adviser to the Prime Minister, state minister of ICT Division Zunaid Ahmed Palak and foreign secretary Masud Bin Momen also spoke on the occasion.
Gaze technology has won the regional finale of the competition in Bangladesh for their intelligent video analytics software platform. They will go to the Silicon Valley in the USA to compete for the Champion title of Startup World Cup-2020.
“AlterYouth” and “Truck Lagbe” came in first and second runner-up respectively with Poshapets and Cookups coming fourth and fifth while all of these companies will go to Silicon Valley through support of ICT division.
