Khmer Tourism for the Future, organized by Impact Hub Phnom Penh and and co-funded by Khmer Enterprise, a unit under the Ministry of Economy and Finance, and the Ministry of Tourism, has found 6 winning teams during semi-final pitch on November 20, 2020 at Khmer Enterprise Office to receive USD 5,000 seed fund from Khmer Enterprise to develop their startups and businesses and to participate in a 6-month entrepreneurial incubation program .
The program is part of a larger initiative to grow alternative business models for the goal of increasing demand among domestic targets and ultimately meeting that demand through validation of the local market.
After 2 months of intensive pre-incubation phase of Khmer Tourism for the Future organized by Impact Hub Phnom Penh, 6 out of 10 startups in the tourism sector were announced as the winners of Khmer Tourism for the Future Pitch Night (Semi-Final Pitch) to receive seed fund and access to a 6-month entrepreneurial incubation program.
The six selected teams, in no particular order, are:
Unseentra: is a web platform, where travel operators, local guide, tourist attraction sites can sell their adventurous, local oriented travel activities and experiences packages to travelers from around the world. The platform allows operators to efficiently manage their operations, booking, and most importantly gaining sales numbers by accessing new markets.
Haystome: is a platform which connects tourists with local artisans to experience various Art & craft through masterclasses.
WeFarm: They have been supporting youth and young farmers on sustainable farming since 2018. They have organized training courses to learn on sustainable agriculture topics and community-based tourism.
Solo Landscape: is an adventure tour operator for explorers and nature lovers who share the same desire to get out of their own comfort zone and to reconnect with themselves. Beside running tours, Solo Landscape is committed to support the training of local guides in waste management practices and hosting skills.
YEA Catalyst: is an agency working in partnership with CBETs to strengthen management capacity, develop diversified products and brand their destination to marketplaces.
CRDT Tours: is a non-profit operator supporting CBET by developing educational and community development tours.
They organize 1-7 days trips to remote destinations in Cambodia, where tourists can enjoy an immersive learning experience in the local community while staying in a rural homestay and contributing to local community project development.
The other four teams that joined the programme were:
Uot App: is the trip lover community App. They have 3 main functions:
អ្នកអួត(Show-off-er) is the function for trip lover community for sharing and commenting on travel content (pictures and videos)
ផ្សាយអួត (Advertising) is the function for advertising for the business owners who have product or service related to tourism
អួតតគ្នា (Trip Article) is the function to share the trip article which is collected from our App user who experiences the authentic traveling with ease, fun and while saving money.
Yi Family Homestay: provides agro Tourism experience where both local communities and tourists can learn permaculture practices and sustainable lifestyle during their visit at Yi family eco-lodges.
Usher of @Runaway: is a guide booking platform connecting local experts with travelers all across Cambodia. The Passapp for guides!
Anyone who has local knowledge, and a desire to share the stories and hidden places of his areas can become a guide. Thanks to our review-based system, guides are encouraged to provide the best experience, and local tourists can choose the best guides that fit their personality and desires.
NTFP-EP: supports communities to set up and operate the Community-Based Ecotourism (CBET) in the upper Mekong river. They support to set up the institutional structure, build the capacity on leadership, management, facilitation and bookkeeping, coordinate with PDoT to conduct training on foodservice and hospitality, support CBET product development and market linkage, monitoring, coaching and mentoring.
Background Khmer Tourism for the Future:
On August the 13th, “Khmer Tourism for the Future” was launched as a startup incubation program designed to build resilience and drive innovation in an industry that has been drastically impacted by COVID-19. The incubator aims to provide young startups with intensive training and extensive support to re-imagine the sector in the next 12 months, and to pave a new future for sustainable community-based tourism. The program taps into the creativity of entrepreneurs with an environmental-friendly prototype or business model that has the potential to impact the domestic tourism sector across Cambodia. Up to November, 10 participating teams had undergone 2 months of training and mentoring by Impact Hub Phnom Penh along with more than 20 other professionals of various backgrounds and specializations in entrepreneurship. Now after the semi-final pitch on November 20th, 2020, 6 teams have already been selected to a 6-months incubation program at Impact Hub Phnom Penh, as well as awarded a cash prize of USD 5,000 each from Khmer Enterprise.
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Interested to know more about what happened during the Pitch Night? See below of the recorded Pitch Night event: