Twelve business professionals and top notch experts in banking, finance, marketing and management volunteered to judge business plans submitted to “Realizing Your Dream,” a business plan competition sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Serbia Contingency Planning and Economic Security Program (SCOPES). Winners of the competition, conducted in seven underserved municipalities in southern Serbia, will be announced by US Ambassador Michael C. Polt at an event being planned for the end of June.
Twelve business professionals and top notch experts in banking, finance, marketing and management volunteered to judge business plans submitted to “Realizing Your Dream,” a business plan competition sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Serbia Contingency Planning and Economic Security Program (SCOPES). Winners of the competition, conducted in seven underserved municipalities in southern Serbia, will be announced by US Ambassador Michael C. Polt at an event being planned for the end of June.
Twelve volunteer judges who will review business plans were recruited from Alpha Bank Serbia, Communis advertising agency, Copernicus Capital venture capital firm, Eurobank EFG Štedionica, Findomestic Bank, Hypo Alpe Adria Bank, Idea Plus Communications advertising agency, A & P d.o.o. authorized Pepsi Cola bottling company, Raiffeisen Bank, and SEAF South Balkan Fund.
Local business owners and aspiring entrepreneurs submitted for review more than 550 concepts, the first step in the competition. Of those, SCOPES accepted 135 to be submitted as full business plans. In each municipality during March and April, the Program provided training in business plan preparation focusing on overall business planning, marketing and communications, and finances. “The initial concepts we reviewed show that southern Serbia entrepreneurs have solid, creative ideas for developing new businesses or expanding existing companies,” said Brian Holst, Director of SCOPES. “We’re confident that among the completed plans we’ll find solid opportunities that will increase jobs and improve the livelihoods of citizens of these underserved municipalities.”
The Economic Security component of the SCOPES Program is conducting the competition to identify businesses with opportunities in the project’s targeted municipalities: Bujanovac, Medvedja and Presevo in the south, Kursumlija and Kraljevo in the south central, and Novi Pazar and Prijepolje in the west central region. Economic Security’s aim is to increase access to economic opportunities and create jobs for targeted vulnerable population in targeted areas such as chronically unemployed and redundant workers, IDPs and refugees, youth, rural poor, etc.