We’re celebrating National Entrepreneurship Week February 12-19, 2022! National Entrepreneurship Week is a congressionally-chartered week celebrating entrepreneurship and empowering innovators. The mission of this week is to democratize entrepreneurship by empowering all voices of entrepreneurship across the country through education, connection, and collaboration. This is an important mission GIST is proud to share in, as we work to connect the best of American innovation with the global entrepreneurship community, fostering dialogue and seeding opportunity. The American entrepreneurship community is a key part of our initiative, and something we are proud to share with the world through our domestic programming. 

From visits to NASA’s space center to traveling to places as diverse as Detroit and Silicon Valley, GIST works with innovators to create opportunities for mutual growth and exchange between American innovation and the global entrepreneurship community in our domestic programming. One key program that is a foundation for this work is GIST Business Incubation. 
GIST Business Incubation brings together the best international science and technology innovators and American businesses to increase cross-market access, open doors for joint ventures, and gain investor exposure. It also provides the U.S. startup ecosystem the opportunity to forge new connections with entrepreneurs abroad. In 2019 GIST Business Incubation launched in 10 cities across the U.S., bringing 29 innovative, global startups to unique, startup ecosystems. 

The program provided entrepreneurs with exposure to the U.S. market and startup resources. While in residence with the program, participants worked on refining their ideas, building their business plans, and finding the right market for their product, as well as having the opportunity to network within the startup ecosystem where they were placed. During the inaugural 2019 year, innovators were able to engage with various incubator partners and have some incredible experiences. Several startup founders at the Center for Entrepreneurship Innovation incubator had the opportunity to meet Apple computing legend, Steve Wozniak, at a tech networking event, DesTechAZ; Participants at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs had the chance to meet with Senator Cory Gardner; Innovators at The Station incubator in Houston, Texas had an opportunity to visit NASA Johnson Space Center, and women-led startup founders learned about angel investment and leadership at the Center for Entrepreneurship Innovation in Phoenix, Arizona. 

From Yakau Buta (Belarus), of StringersHub to Alyona Glushko (Ukraine) of iCardy to Allan Atuheire (Uganda) of MFEYTI and Chee Wei Yap (Malaysia) of HiGi Energy, founders from across the globe had the chance to dive deeply into the American innovation ecosystem and create lasting relationships in U.S. markets. 

Opportunities for global founders to connect with American entrepreneurship continues today, with one of our most recent initiatives bringing select Ukrainian founders to CES Las Vegas, where they had the opportunity to share their innovations with the best of the world and also had the chance to pitch to investors in Silicon Valley. 

The GIST Initiative looks forward to continuing to foster connections between the American and global entrepreneurship communities, and are proud to celebrate National Entrepreneurship Week 2022. There are numerous opportunities to get involved, from participating in the week's events or joining the ecosystem. Don’t miss out on the chance to be part of our efforts to connect American innovation with the world; sign up for our newsletter and join our GIST community.