4th KIPCO Tmkeen Award for Young Entrepreneurs KIPCO Group judges and Tmkeen volunteersKUWAIT CITY, Oct 30: KIPCO – the Kuwait Projects Company – and the Youth Empowerment Organization (Tmkeen) announced the names of the three e-media and technology businesses that have advanced to the final judging round of the Fourth KIPCO Tmkeen Award for Young Entrepreneurs. The three businesses that qualified are Nutribox – an interactive healthy living platform, Technocare – a smart watch and application that help monitor people with Alzheimer’s, and Zidnei – an application that provides tuition for secondary school students.The entrepreneurs gave a 5-7 minute presentation about their companies in the preliminary judging round. The judges were KIPCO Group professionals representing Burgan Bank, Gulf Insurance Group, OSN, United Real Estate, KAMCO Investment Company, Qurain Petrochemical Industries, United Networks, AUK and Marina FM. Ms Eman Al Awadhi, KIPCO’s Group Communications Director, said: “The number of businesses competing for the award is growing every year, and with it rises the diversity of innovative business plans, the level of professionalism displayed by the business owners and great potential that we see in the pitches. This has made it challenging for our judges to decide which of the contestants qualify for the final round. The number of positive ideas we saw today indicate that more and more of Kuwait’s young people are turning towards entrepreneurship. I would like to thank all the entrepreneurs who took part in this round, and I extend my appreciation to all the KIPCO professionals who formed the judging panels and took this opportunity to extend their experiences and insights to the young people who took part in the event.”Mr Ali Al Ibrahim, CEO of the Youth Empowerment Organization, said: “We are pleased with the turnout for this year’s award. The presentations were very promising, and we hope that this has been a learning experience for entrepreneurs on how to successfully pitch their businesses to potential investors. We hope that these young business owners will continue to seek the guidance of the KIPCO professionals they have interacted with on the judging panels today, and benefit from their expertise as they expand their businesses. We wish the top three finalists all the best in the final judging round.”The final judging round will take place on November 5, during the first day of the Youth Empowerment Symposium. The finalists will be required to give a more detailed presentation about their businesses before a live audience. This year’s winner will be rewarded with $100,000 worth of services from the KIPCO Group as well as $15,000 in cash. In addition, the second and third place winners will be rewarded with $10,000 and $5,000 respectively. The winner will be announced on November 6.