MIT Legatum Center/Clayton Christensen Institute 2022 Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp for African Entrepreneurs

Launching in early 2021, the Market-Creating Innovation Bootcamp is an eight-session curriculum designed to empower emerging market innovators with principles and frameworks necessary to create new markets that make products affordable. The bootcamp curriculum is anchored around the principles outlined in The Prosperity Paradox: How Innovation Can Lift Nations Out of Poverty, written by the late Harvard Business School professor Clayton M. Christensen. 

Bootcamps will be hosted in multiple countries across Africa during 2021 and will take place virtually until it is safe to host them in person. The bootcamp is designed to be dynamic and practical and is best suited for early-stage entrepreneurs who are in the process of piloting or refining an idea that seeks to solve a problem for a majority of people in a region.

The Bootcamp curriculum was designed jointly by the Clayton Christensen Institute and The Legatum Center for Development & Entrepreneurship at MIT. The Bootcamp will be facilitated by teams from both the Christensen Institute and the Legatum Center. The entire Bootcamp program has been generously supported by the Mastercard Foundation.

Why are we launching the Market-Creating Innovation Bootcamp?

The Need

Across the globe, access to basic healthcare, education, and utilities remains out of reach to large populations worldwide.

• Less than half of the global population is covered by essential health services.
• Remote learning remains out of reach for at least 500 million students.
• 789 million people lack electricity.

Conventional economic development methods have not been successful in addressing these issues. A different development paradigm that focuses on innovation and entrepreneurship is the critical missing piece in the economic prosperity puzzle.

The Solution

Hailed as “a better way to fight poverty, market-creating innovations (MCIs) create accessible products for populations of all income-levels through affordability, simplicity, and convenience. MCIs are unique in their ability to create new growth engines that lead to jobs, increased taxes, and the emergence of an entrepreneurial culture. By empowering market-creating innovators in emerging economies, the MCI Bootcamp seeks to build a robust foundation for inclusive and sustained economic prosperity for all.

• Table of Content
• About Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp
• Aim and Benefits of Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp
• Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp Courses
• Requirements for Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp Qualification
• Application Deadline
• How to Apply

About Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is among the Top Ranked Global Universities. The MIT community is driven by a shared purpose: to make a better world through education, research, and innovation. We are fun and quirky, elite but not elitist, inventive and artistic, obsessed with numbers, and welcoming to talented people regardless of where they come from. Founded to accelerate the nation’s industrial revolution, MIT is profoundly American. With ingenuity and drive, our graduates have invented fundamental technologies, launched new industries, and created millions of Amer... continue reading

Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp

Aim and Benefits of Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp

• Course: Participants will benefit from engaging sessions that fundamentally change how they think about innovation. 
• Community: Participants will join a unique and growing community of people (investors, entrepreneurs, and policymakers) committed to building market-creating innovations in emerging economies. 
• Coaching: Participants will gain access to some of the most reputable and forward-thinking innovators and investors committed to emerging economies. 
• Certification: Participants will get a Market-Creating Innovation Bootcamp Certificate of Completion after the program is completed.
• Access to Capital: Upon completion of the Bootcamp, participants will have an opportunity to create an investment pitch deck that may be shared with a select group of investors committed to investing in emerging market-focused innovations.

The cost of participation is $1,999, however, through a generous grant from the Mastercard Foundation, the Bootcamp will be free for all participants accepted into the program. If selected, it is expected that participants can fulfill the time requirements and will complete the full Bootcamp.

Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp Courses

Requirements for Market Creating Innovation Bootcamp Qualification

• The Bootcamp is best suited for early-stage entrepreneurs who are in the process of piloting or refining an idea that seeks to solve a problem for a majority of people in a region. (We encourage founders to apply). Participants must have, or plan to have, ventures in one or more of the seven partner countries.
• The Bootcamp will initially be available to participants with a business idea, or existing business, operating in one of these seven countries: Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Uganda. 
• The full Bootcamp is made up of eight sessions that will last approximately 90 minutes each. Participants can expect to spend an additional 60-90 minutes preparing for each session. The eight sessions will be offered over the course of a few days.

Application Deadline

How to Apply

Participants can apply on our website. At this time we’re considering all early-stage entrepreneurs with a vested interest in generating prosperity in their region.

For more details, visit MIT Legatum Center website.