Nigeria’s Chioma Ukonu has emerged as the first runner-up at The Chivas Venture competition which took place in Los Angeles recently.
She emerged after a high staked pitch of her idea, RecyclePoints, an incentive based recycling scheme, in front of a high profile panel including Oscar-winning actress, philanthropist and businesswoman, Halle Berry.
The Chivas Venture, the brand’s global search for the world’s most promising social entrepreneurs, rewarded all five finalists the remaining share of the $1m fund at the final pitch event.
Recycle Points is a waste recycling and social benefit venture that operates an incentive-based scheme which collects recyclable materials from individuals and rewards them with “points”, which they can accumulate and redeem for cash or other useful items offered through their “i-Recycle Store”. Recycle Points employ young “wastebusters” to ride electric tricycles to collect these recyclable waste from door to door and employ unemployed women in the community to process these items and then sell off to recycling plants to use as raw materials for new products.
The Final Pitch event was attended by a range of high profile entrepreneurs and movie stars including Academy Award Winner, Javier Bardem and Hollywood Actor, Don Cheadle, both of who have starred in Chivas Regal’s Win The Right Way film.
Other finalists who got funding on the night were Bioestibas ($50,000) from Colombia, a company that produces ecological stowage made with flower waste, that would normally be polluting the environment; I-Drop Water ($50,000) from South Africa who install purification and dispensing units at the point of sale and Intendu ($50,000) from Israel who have developed a videogame platform specifically designed for brain training. The games involve dynamic scenarios and body movement that mirror real life, and features technology that adapts in real-time to the user’s needs.
The judging panel which included Adam Braun, Sonal Shah, Alex Ricard and Halle Berry, assessed each business based on their ability to create sustainable change through a viable business model and potential to scale.
Talking about her win, Chioma Ukonu said “I am extremely thankful and grateful for this opportunity and the support of the Chivas team in Nigeria, the public for their efforts in securing me the additional funds. When we entered this competition, our dream was to win enough in funding to roll out this business model in other parts of Nigeria and with this funding, we are able to do just that quicker.”