Home – Startups Without Borders
WORLD’S MOST INCLUSIVE STARTUP ECOSYSTEM
Startups Without Borders builds entrepreneurial ecosystems for founders whose journey was shaped by displacement. Through training and access to capital, networks, and markets, we equip entrepreneurs with skills to build and grow businesses, turning overlooked talent into a driving force for innovation.
We support resilient, global founders.
Because talent doesn’t have a passport.
OUR ECOSYSTEM MODEL
Capacity Building & Skills
Equipping entrepreneurs with the knowledge, skills, and investment readiness to launch, grow, and scale successful businesses.
Access to Capital
Unlocking access to funding by connecting founders with investors, financial institutions, and capital opportunities.
Access to Market
Creating match-making opportunities that unlock access to capital, markets, strategic partnerships, and growth.
Ecosystem & Policy Engagement
Strengthening entrepreneurial ecosystems by engaging governments, universities, corporations, and institutions to expand opportunity and remove systemic barriers.
Narrative Change & Market Influence
Shifting perceptions of newcomer entrepreneurs through media, storytelling, and advocacy, increasing their visibility, legitimacy, and access to opportunity.
Recognized by the Obama Foundation
TRUSTED BY
Alumni stories
Hadeel Galal
Hadeel Galal was 23 years old when war broke out in her home country of Sudan. Having to leave her promising path in banking, she resettled in Cairo and decided to start over supporting her mother’s sewing project. Through the Refugee Launchpad Program, she launched an e-commerce platform for her business Hadeel Designs, expanding her reach and increasing profits by 1,513% in 6 months. Today, Hadeel is growing her brand with the support of our network of mentors and partners.
Khaled Megahed
Khaled moved from Egypt to Italy 10 years ago but, despite having many entrepreneurial ideas, he never found the opportunity to turn them into a business. After taking part in the Diversity Innovation Days program, he launched Parko, a startup that leverages AI and IoT to transform urban mobility. Today, he has started partnerships in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE, signed agreements with 5 Italian universities, completed a PoC with Enjoy, Italy’s largest car-sharing platform, and is planning Parko’s implementation with the Rome city council.
Yasmeen Darwish
Inspired by electricity cuts in Lebanon, Yasmine Darwish founded DonaLeb, a startup that unites people, businesses, and nonprofits through virtual fitness challenges to drive collective social impact. After taking part in the Startups on the Move Incubation Program, she engaged over 140,000 users and 52 companies, won the World Summit Awards 2022, and secured $100,000 in investment. She has also been featured on Forbes 30 Under 30 for Social Impact.
PARTNER STORIES
Our partnership with Meta began at our 2019 Summit. Since then, we have collaborated on 5 programs across different regions, including Boost With Facebook, which trained 1,500 entrepreneurs across MENA and Europe; Boost Without Borders in Palestine, supporting 500 SMBs and 50 startups with digital tools, TOT, and investment readiness; African Diaspora Creatives, empowering African diaspora entrepreneurs; and stages and workshops featuring real-life influencer examples that generated top audience engagement at our summits.
In 2023, we collaborated with Misr Italia and Cairo Business Park, the entrepreneurship hub in East Cairo. Our aim was to host the “Go Borderless” summit, the fourth edition of Startups without Borders. The event brought together tech giants, innovative entrepreneurs, and impactful investors from Europe and around the world. This year, we increased our impact, attendance, and international participation.
GoDaddy partnered with us to establish themselves as digital tool experts for startups and engage with the startup community in the Middle East, with a focus on promoting their Arabic Website Builder. We created a program that trained 500 businesses to build their websites and strengthen their digital presence, as well as customized content for our summit, including sessions to help startups build their online presence and gamified activities
We collaborated with Spark and Google to launch the Startups on the Move Incubation program in 2022, which trained 130 refugee and local entrepreneurs in Lebanon, Palestine, and Iraq to develop their business ideas. The program also included three networking events in Ramallah, Beirut, and Erbil, where over 250 entrepreneurs, ecosystem players, and investors came together.
UNFPA partnered with Startups Without Borders to launch the GenF Mentorship Programme, a visionary initiative empowering women entrepreneurs in 15 countries in the Arab region and Africa to accelerate social businesses addressing women’s health and empowerment. The programme provides tailored mentoring, skills training, coaching, and networking opportunities. By supporting women-led ventures, the program helps participants grow sustainable businesses, creating positive ripple effects for their communities and promoting greater gender equality in entrepreneurship.
OUR APPROACH
A UNIQUE CROSS-BORDER NETWORK
With over 20,000 entrepreneurs, 700 mentors and investors, and 500 partners from the private and public sector in 15+ countries, our network functions as market infrastructure, enabling founders to access funding, partnerships, supply chains, and international markets. By bridging fragmented ecosystems, we reduce information asymmetries and accelerate the integration of underrepresented entrepreneurs into mainstream economic systems.
OUR SYSTEMS CHANGE APPROACH
Our multi-layered ecosystem integrates capacity building, capital access, network activation, localized engagement, and information dissemination into a coherent infrastructure model. Rather than delivering isolated interventions, our 5 interconnected platforms reinforce one another and generate compounding value over time, enabling newcomer entrepreneurs to access capital, markets, and opportunity.
AN EVIDENCE-BASED MODEL
Evidence shows that migrants and refugees are highly entrepreneurial yet face disproportionate barriers to capital, markets, and institutions. By enabling access to these systems, our model converts entrepreneurial activity into measurable economic outcomes aligned with international durable solutions frameworks, driving revenue growth, job creation, and long term resilience for communities and economies alike.
WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT US
“We met the first investor for our startup dKilo thanks to the Startups Without Borders Summit. We cannot wait to see the next events in store for us.”
Mohamed Mousa / Egyptian entrepreneur
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I spent my weekend inspired and energized at the Startups Without Borders Summit. It was truly heartwarming to interact with impressive entrepreneurs breaking the boundaries of innovation and crossing the borders of creativity.
Mirna Arif / General Manager of Microsoft Egypt
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“Startups Without Borders fostered a supportive environment where I felt comfortable sharing even my wildest ideas. It extended beyond a mere program; it fostered a sense of family. The mentors’ diverse expertise and the safe space they provided were invaluable.”
Carol Zakhour / Syrian entrepreneur
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AS SEEN IN
Latest Updates
Startups Without Borders Announces New U.S. Nonprofit Arm at SXSW
Startups Without Borders Announces the Launch of a U.S. Nonprofit Arm at SXSW to Advance Entrepreneurship Opportunities for Migrant and Refugee Founders. Startups Without Borders, a global organization building entrepreneurship…
Startups Without Borders’ Founder Valentina Primo Selected as Obama Scholar 2025-2026
The Obama Foundation this week announced that Argentine-Italian entrepreneur Valentina Primo, founder and CEO of Startups Without Borders, will be part of its eighth cohort of Obama Scholars at Columbia…
Save the Children partners with Startups Without Borders to launch the Refugee Launchpad
The Refugee Launchpad is an incubation program to support refugee entrepreneurs in Egypt through Startups Without Borders’ network of mentors, partners, and startups. By SWB Team Save the Children Italy…
UNFPA partners with Startups Without Borders to launch the GenF mentorship programme for women
The GenF Mentorship program will support female entrepreneurs in the MENA and Africa who are creating innovative solutions in areas related to sexual and reproductive health, such as family planning,…
