The goal of the tiphub Africa Mentor Program (TAM) is to assist entrepreneurs to:

Develop viable and sustainable business models

Access contacts to establish traction for their business (i.e. reference clients, suppliers
and other potential stakeholders)

TAM will provide entrepreneurs with access to many stakeholder categories for information,
feedback industry perspective and market validation. We have selected three categories of
mentors: Academic, Entrepreneurship, and Funding. Weve selected professors and Washington
DC based African entrepreneurship thought leaders to provide a thorough grounding of essential
concepts of African business realities. Entrepreneurship mentors include people with hands-on
successful startup and development experience. Funding mentors are drawn from venture capital,
angel funding and development finance institution partners. In addition to strategic advice,
funding mentors will provide eventual access to follow-on funding sources. Tiphub will
continually build out an extensive mentor network that will allow mentors the ability to connect
with each other.

Background on tiphub
tiphub is an innovation factory based Washington DC that supports both technology and social
enterprise led innovation in African markets and the African diaspora. We leverage the Diaspora
and the dynamic Washington DC international development ecosystem to provide funding,
business training, mentors, an accelerator program and consulting services.
The initial cohort of tiphub entrepreneurs will be selected from the pool of applicants for the
tiphub African Access Academy. The African Access Academy is our pre-accelerator program
specially designed to facilitate 20-25 impact-driven entrepreneurs to accelerate their business
idea. Held over the course of 4 alternating weekends and instructed by African development
leaders.
Accelerator Methodology
There are two core concepts to the Tiphub methodology: business validation through early
stakeholder engagement and customer revenue focus. Tiphub believes strongly that no single
development model suits all startups equally. Each team will initially develop a custom, 12-24
week program that meets the needs of the startups business model and correlates with team
strengths and weaknesses. For example, teams in the B2B space, for whom direct sales
techniques are important will receive sales training assistance. Other teams with B2C social
enterprise models may receive support on rural consumer distribution channel partners and
stakeholder relations. Each custom team program will be adjusted weekly according to their own
business model refinements and to optimize team progress.

Best Practices Adopted

Tiphub has extensively researched accelerator best practices including Startup Chile, TechStars,
YCombinator, RockHealth, USAID African Diaspora Marketplace, Flat6Labs, NewMe
Accelerator, Code2040 and others. We have conducted recent on-site and remote visits to
1776DC, 1871, Startup Chile US Embassy presentation, Harvard African Business Conference
Venture Competition. In addition we interviewed numerous graduates of other accelerators
including: RockHealth, Fortify Ventures, MassChallenge, Rocket Internet, MEST Ghana,
Harambe Endeavour Alliance and 88mph.
Tiphub has adopted a rapid cycle variation of Steve Blanks Customer Development Model as
outlined in The Startup Owners Manual which combines iterative cycles of agile
product/service development with meaningful customer feedback. A basic social enterprise &
technopreneurship model concept is quickly designed using Dev Appanahs Startup and Change
the World. The underlying business model assumptions and concepts are then tested, adjusted,
and continuously refined over the course of the program until a viable, scalable business
emerges.
Profile of tiphub entrepreneur

Passionate about Africa & their bold venture

Demonstrated Success & Leadership Skills
Innovative & Willing to Fail
Thrives in Ambiguity
Intimate African Market Experience

Objective Venture Assessment Criteria

Venture Intake Interview

Weekly call discussing goals/priorities

Monthly Google Hangout/Skype meetings
Up to 3 Hours Monthly

(12-24 weeks)

Discuss strategies for resources and partnerships

Review business model and implementation strategies

 Listen, clarify, reflect and challenge

Introduce entrepreneurs to reference customers and stakeholders

Both mentors and entrepreneurs are expected to participate in regular evaluations of

program effectiveness. We will assess multiple factors including frequency of contact,
quality of engagement, status of goals, as well as entrepreneurial engagement in African
startup community. The evaluation may also include the following dimensions

Quality of constructive relationship

Ongoing quality improvement
Degree of rapport established
Availability of mentor when needed
Relative comfort level enjoy by both
Quality of information shared

Speaking Opportunities: Each mentor will receive speaking opportunities as they

arise at tiphub events
Sharing Upside Potential: Mentors, depending upon the venture, may be able to
participate in the upside of their advice through a mentor-sharing agreement.
(Mentor Shares is a tool for Start-ups and Mentors to formalize their relationship.
Specifically, Mentor Shares is a way for Start-ups to give a share of the company [in
the form of options] to Mentors in exchange for advice, help with business or
technical tasks and other contributions to the Startup.)
Dinners: Every other month for the duration of mentorship tiphub will organize,
schedule and sponsor a dinner for the mentors and the entrepreneurs