UCT recognises that entrepreneurship unlocks the doors of opportunity in a country beset by high unemployment rates. This this end, in addition to training, mentoring and support, UCT offers financial incentives and competitive opportunities for student ventures and entrepreneurs:
- Bertha Centre / Student Seed Fund — the Student Seed Fund (run by UCT’s Bertha Centre) offers test funding up to R20 000 and seed funding up to R100 000 for social-enterprise and student ventures.
- The Pitch UCT (2024) — applications for The Pitch UCT 2024 opened in April 2024. The Pitch is a long-running student entrepreneurship competition that awards monetary prizes/seed funding and mentorship to winners. In 2024, a total of R50 000 was awarded in prize funds to the top three pitches:
- Genius UP, a tutoring enterprise founded by student Blessing Mlambo, won first prize of R25 000 plus six months’ business mentorship, along with access to UCT’s entrepreneurial ecosystem and an all-expenses-paid spot at the Jamboree Entrepreneurial Festival in 2025.
- Second place went to Hussle, a service helping students find short-term jobs, which earned R15 000.
- VarsityBLOCK, aimed at simplifying student accommodation management, came third with R10 000.
- Hack@UCT 2024 - held in June 2024, this week-long bootcamp on Digital Financial Inclusion and Open Payments attracted international student participation. A total of ZAR65000 was awarded:
- The first prize of R35 000 was awarded to SecureLifeCover, a dynamic fintech solution which helps underserved South African communities manage funeral cover payments, ensuring no payment is missed and relieving families of financial stress during difficult times.
- The second prize (R20 000) went to Spend Secure, a platform which allows senders to earmark funds for specific purposes, preventing misuse by receivers, leveraging the granularity that can be achieved with the Grant Negotiation Authorization Protocol.
- The third prize (R10 000) was awarded to OpenFundsFO. UCT students tackled the issue of delayed bursary and scholarship payments with OpenFundsFO. The team built an impressive platform that showcases student profiles and enables direct donor funding, leveraging Open Payments for fast, transparent, and cross-border transactions.
- E-Track / Solution Space (2024 activity & support) - UCT GSB Solution Space ran the E-Track programme in 2024 (calls/applications posted mid-2024). While E-Track is primarily an accelerator/capacity-building programme, it operates alongside partners and corporate sponsors and has historically been part of funding/acceleration pathways for ventures. The e-Track Pitch Day 2024, awarded top financial grants to 5 start-ups:
- First place: Doorcas Africa (a social and disease reporting platform for livestock) – R100 000 grant funding
- Second place: GuaroFarms (micro-factories in shipping containers) - R75 000
- Third place: ElektroPlug (a tech subscription savings platform) – R50 000