Press Release – Tuesday April 21, 2021

Benguerir, April 27th, 2021 – Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P) announces the launch of UM6P Ventures, its science and technology venture capital firm, to promote access to early stage capital for startups in Morocco and the greater Africa region.

Candidate entrepreneurs taking part in UM6P Ventures Network programs, such as partner incubators and accelerators, can access pre-seed capital in order to transition from a project to an actual startup. Seed capital, direct or with regional co-investors, is available for maturing startups to ensure capital continuation and further progress of early ventures. In particular, dedicated funds and mechanisms are designed to support science and technology candidate startups.

At the earliest stages of startup development, one-dimensional solutions may have shortcomings: incubation, acceleration or capital alone are not sufficient to develop a performant and vibrant startup economy in the continent. Networks need to be at the nexus of incubation-acceleration programs, resources, vertical domain expertise and go-to-market capabilities.

UM6P Ventures taps into the vast UM6P resources and network. Hicham El Habti, President of UM6P, commented: “We are pleased to contribute our learning by doing environment to the entrepreneur network, where talent can experiment with and combine their entrepreneurial endeavor with education and research. An actual hands-on-environment is equipped and staffed with subject matter experts. We aim to catalyze new business models for science and technology innovation throughout our network and will provide the necessary springboard platform to push our regional potential forward. We are particularly eager to cross-pollinate the UM6P network with UM6P Ventures Network partners. To get there, we want to join forces. The network is at the core of our logic and we will continue to develop it.”

UM6P Ventures augments its network with capital via direct or joint investments with partner Business Angels or VC funds.
“We are very satisfied with the deal flow quality that has emerged from the initial cohorts of our partner programs. We are currently funding at seed level a minimum of 10 startups that have been incubated in our programs. This figure will ramp up very quickly within the next few months, and across our partners. Focused on intellectual property, science, and technology, UM6P Ventures currently holds portfolio positions in health sciences, decision-based agriculture, AI, and Industry 4.0. We ultimately seek to demonstrate the pertinent value proposition of our regional network and simplify access to early stage capital,” said Yasser Biaz, CEO of UM6P Ventures.