Awards to USA, Canada, and International Women Entrepreneurs in Recognition of Innovative Business Activities in Technological and Scientific Fields

Cartier Women's Initiative (CWI) - Science and Technology Pioneer Award

Agency

Corporation

GrantWatch ID#

203490

Funding Source

Cartier Womens Initiative

Geographic Focus

All USA
USA Territories: American Samoa (USA); Guam (USA); Puerto Rico (USA); Virgin Islands (USA); Northern Mariana Islands (USA);
USA Compact Free Associations:The Federated States of Micronesia (USA) Marshall Islands (USA) Republic of Palau (USA)
International, Israel and Canada.

Important Dates

Deadline: 06/30/23 6:00 PM Central European Summer Time (CEST)

Grant Description

Awards to USA, Canada, and International women entrepreneurs in recognition of innovative business activities. The purpose of the award is to honor entrepreneurs in the technology and science fields and to support their ongoing efforts. Award recipients will be given financial support, human support, including training and workshops, and social support, including networking opportunities and business development support.

This award is especially dedicated to recognizing women impact entrepreneurs at the forefront of scientific and technological innovation. Open to women entrepreneurs from any country and sector, this award highlights disruptive solutions built around unique, protected, or hard-to-reproduce technological or scientific advances that require heavy R&D, a long commercialization cycle, high capital intensity, technology risk, and complexity.

The fellows, representing the top three businesses from each of the nine regions, will receive:

Financial Capital Support:

US$ 100,000 grant for each first-place awardee
US$ 60,000 grant for each second-place awardee
US$ 30,000 grant for each third-place awardee

Human Capital Support:

The fellowship program is the human capital support provided to selected fellows. It aims to equip the selected fellows with the necessary skills to grow their business and to build their leadership capacity by drawing upon the experience and expertise of academics, practitioners, industry experts, and entrepreneurs and by enabling peer learning. The fellowship program focuses on several key areas of human capital support for women impact entrepreneurs and offers a combination of 1:1 training and collective workshops.

1:1 training in specific business areas
1:1 advice sessions with subject matter experts in CWI Community
Community peer learning and networking sessions
Online and in-person leadership communications and media training workshops
In-person INSEAD Social Entrepreneurship Programme
1:1 leadership capacity executive coaching by The Women’s Impact Alliance (formerly The Coaching Fellowship)

Social Capital Support:

Throughout the program, Cartier Women's Initiative strives to highlight the social and environmental impact created by their fellows and bridge connections between women impact entrepreneurs and their supporters.

International exposure and media visibility
Access to an online and offline community of 700+ experts and peers
Ongoing support for the development of the fellows’ businesses

For further information, see https://www.cartierwomensinitiative.com/fellowship.

Recipient

Additional Eligibility Criteria

This program is open to women entrepreneurs from any country and sector.

The Science & Technology Pioneer Award of the Cartier Women’s Initiative is looking for women-led impact-driven businesses. Entrepreneurs across all sectors and geographies are encouraged to apply. To be considered for the Science & Technology Pioneer Award, the applicant and her business must meet the following eligibility criteria:

- Technological & scientific innovation: The business should be based on the development of a new technology, a complex engineering process, or a scientific discovery, and not only on a disruptive business model. Development of the technology and product, from idea (TRL 1)* to commercialization (TRL 9)* should take at least 2 years.

- Technology readiness levels (TRLs) are commonly used to estimate the maturity of technologies. The framework enables consistent, uniform discussions of technical maturity across different types of technology. The detailed framework can be found here (page 50).

- For-profit: The business should be designed to generate sufficient revenue to support its operations and return some level of profit to its owners. Non-profit enterprises are not eligible. That said, the business does not have to be profitable at the time of application.

- Early-stage: The business should be in the initial phase of its development or growth. It must have at least a proof of concept, a prototype, or be in the process of producing one (minimum TRL 4) and must not have been commercializing its final product/service for more than 6 years.

- Positive impact: The business should demonstrate the potential to have a significant positive impact in its industry. It should contribute to at least one of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs are a collection of 17 global goals set by the United Nations General Assembly in 2015 for the year 2030. The SDGs are a call for action by all countries to promote prosperity while protecting the environment. They cover a series of social, economic, and environmental development issues.

- Leadership: The applicant must be a woman and she must fill one of the main leadership positions, for example as CEO, COO, CTO, General Manager, or Managing Director of the business.

- Ownership: The business must be majority owned by its founders and team members at the time of application. Moreover, one of the following conditions must be met: (1) a woman or multiple women are the largest shareholder(s) of founder equity (not total equity), or (2) the applicant owns a share greater or equal to that of her co-founder(s), or (3) if not part of the founding team, the applicant owns a share greater or equal to that of the business (co-)founder(s). Sole proprietorships are ineligible for the Science & Technology Pioneer Award.

- Legal entry age: The applicant must be at least 18 years of age on the day of the application deadline (June 30, 2023).

- English proficiency: A good command of the English language is required. We require the Common European Framework of Reference Level B2 or above. This level requires an understanding of the main ideas of complex text, technical discussion in business and your field of specialization, and an ability to interact with fluency and spontaneity with native speakers. English proficiency is important because this is the common language for the Cartier Women's Initiative team, its partners, the jury members and the overall community. Being proficient will allow the fellow to fully participate in the community and in the fellowship. Applicants with disabilities are encouraged to apply, and every effort will be made to include them appropriately.

- Time commitment: The applicant must commit to participating in the fellowship program from January 2024 to December 2024. Fellows will be expected to dedicate up to 4 hours/week virtually to the program from January 2024 to May 2024 and up to 2 hours/week virtually from June 2024 to December 2024. In addition to the virtual training, fellows will also be expected to attend one week of in-person training in May 2024. Beyond the fellowship, there are also two days of on-site filming of the fellow and their business in the first quarter of 2024. Fellows will also be required to report their impact for 3 years following the completion of their fellowship.

Additional Geographic Information:

The fellows represent the top businesses from each of the nine regions:
• Latin America and the Caribbean
• North America
• Europe
• Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa
• Anglophone and Lusophone Africa
• Middle East and North Africa
• East Asia
• South Asia and Central Asia
• Oceania

Ineligible

Non-profit enterprises are not eligible.

Pre-Application Information

Key dates:
• The application form will be open from Wednesday, May 10, 2023 to Friday, June 30, 2023.
• The cut-off time on Friday, June 30, 2023 is 6pm Central European Summer Time (CEST).
• Initial selection decisions will be sent out on August 1, 2023. All applicants will be notified by December 1, 2023.

The applicant should be the author of the application. Only one application will be accepted per business. Furthermore, a business will only be considered for one award category, so pick the category where your business fits the best. Businesses that submit applications to multiple award categories will be disqualified.

Fellow selection process:
From November 1 to November 17, 2023, the 5 shortlisted Candidates of each Category are invited to give a 10 minute presentation about their Business to the Jury, followed by a 20 minutes Q&A. The Jury then ranks the top 3 Fellows per Awards Category on the basis of their presentation, their application form and the due diligence assessment conducted by an independent third party. First-place, second-place and third-place Awardees in each Category are announced during the Awards Ceremony in May 2024. Starting January 2024, they become the CWI Fellows for the 2024 edition of the Program (“Fellows”).

Fellowship Overview: https://www.cartierwomensinitiative.com/fellowship

FAQs: https://www.cartierwomensinitiative.com/faq

About the Cartier Women's Initiative: https://www.cartierwomensinitiative.com/about

Number of Grants

27 - Selected fellows represent the top three businesses from each of the nine regions.

Estimated Size of Grant

Selected fellows will receive:
1. Financial Capital Support:
- US$ 100,000 grant for each first-place awardee
- US$ 60,000 grant for each second-place awardee
- US$ 30,000 grant for each third-place awardee
2. Human Capital Support - A combination of 1:1 training and collective workshops
3. Social Capital Support - Exposure, media visibility, access to experts and peers, and business development support

Term of Contract

The applicant must commit to participating in the fellowship program from January 2024 to December 2024.

Contact Information

To apply online: https://www.cwi-portal.com/submit/258130/2024-science-technology-pioneer-award

For technical support, use the contact form at https://submittable1.my.site.com/submittablehelp/s/14873512.

Cartier Women's Initiative
33 Rue Boissy d'Anglas
75008 Paris
France
contact@cartierwomensinitiative.com

Awards to USA, Canada, and International Women Entrepreneurs in Recognition of Innovative Business Activities in Technological and Scientific Fields

Cartier Women's Initiative (CWI) - Science and Technology Pioneer Award

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