The Next Web’s global startup competition Startup World is coming to San Francisco on the February 19th. The competition has seen over 100 startups pitch in Mexico City, Lima- Peru, Santiago- Chile, Buenos Aires, Rio De Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Cape Town, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania.
The initiative is set up to encourage and promote startup culture in emerging markets, and globally, by encouraging entrepreneurs to pitch in front of international media. There will also be lighting talks during the event on the state of global entrepreneurship. The Startup World team will be sharing what they learnt from startups in emerging markets.
If this is your sort of thing, you can answer 10 easy questions 
We will have a panel of all-star judges including tech-famous blogger Robert Scoble. If you would like to attend as an audience member you can sign up free here.
Startup World has identified 36 technology hubs globally and will be holding pitching competitions in each locations, with the grand final being held in Silicon Valley.
Grand Prize package includes:
- 3 month incubation period worth $30,000 at i/o Ventures
- 1 year of Rackspace hosting worth up to $24,000
- 5 million Echo real-time streams per month for 1 year worth $30,000
- International media coverage of your startup
San Francisco is our first stop of the North America tour. The winners of the regional pitch competitions will travel to Silicon Valley for a grand showdown in late 2013.
We would like to thank our main sponsors Hipmunk, Tropo, GreatApps , Eventbrite and Microsoft.
Check out Startup World’s videos from Cape Town and the main tour video.
STARTUP WORLD – TEASER from Alex Cahiz, Zero Budget Shooter on Vimeo.
Startup World: Cape Town Teaser from Alex Cahiz, Zero Budget Shooter on Vimeo.
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