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02 July 2019 | Story Eloise Calitz | Photo Keagan Nkwaira
Entrepreneurship Intravarsity
Audience members listening attentively to the presentations at the Entrepreneurship Inter-varsity on the Bloemfontein Campus.

The UFS continuously creates opportunities for students to develop and explore platforms where they can showcase their talents and share their innovative concepts. In the light of this, it is important for the institution to become a preferred academic knowledge partner that can conceptualise, develop, and successfully commercialise research activities, and through this foster an innovative and entrepreneurial culture that aligns to its Integrated Transformation Plan.

This is why opportunities such as the Entrepreneurship Intervarsity Competition are so important, since it encourages students to demonstrate their entrepreneurial talent, and through this connect with investors and industry leaders to start up a business.

The competition

Student entrepreneurs across the 26 public universities in South Africa were invited to submit their innovative ideas as part of a competition supported by Entrepreneurship Development in Higher Education (EDHE), in collaboration with the Allan Gray Orbis Foundation. The opportunities created through this initiative are twofold:

     1. For student entrepreneurs to present their innovative ideas and businesses. 
     2. For universities to demonstrate their entrepreneurial talent and the ways in which              they support and grow the next generation of business leaders.

The competition takes place in five stages. The process started with each student submitting their short videos and applications on the official competition site. Each institution also had the opportunity to select student entrepreneurs to take part in the competition. Fifteen students pitched their ideas during internal rounds at the UFS on 30 May 2019. Of these students, four were selected to represent the UFS at the regional rounds of the Entrepreneurship Intervarsity, where the finalists will be chosen. 

The students were judged in four categories:

Category 1: Innovative Ideas
Category 2: Tech Businesses (existing businesses, formal or informal, undergrad or postgrad)
Category 3: Social Impact Businesses (existing businesses, formal or informal, undergrad or postgrad)
Category 4: General (existing businesses, formal or informal, undergrad or postgrad)

The following UFS entrants were selected to take part in the regional finals: 
Christopher Rothman for his liquid yeast culture that can be used in the fermentation of beer. 
Driaan-Lou Kemp for his patented water-saving device. 
Grace Mthembu for her electricity-saving system.
Martin Clarke for his idea to use drone technology for the mining industry


News Archive

Official opening: UFS earmarks R10-million to support national priorities
2006-02-06

 

The University of the Free State (UFS) is to align key areas of its academic and research efforts with national priorities through the introduction of five strategic clusters which would be funded by seedmoney of R10-million in 2006.

Speaking at the Official Opening of the UFS on Friday (3 February 2006), the Rector and Vice-Chancellor, Prof Frederick Fourie, said the academic and research work that will be done in the five strategic clusters would contribute to the development of Mangaung, the Free State, South Africa and Africa.

 “It makes sense to concentrate the university’s human resources, our infrastructure, financial resources and intellectual expertise to ensure that the UFS makes a contribution to the country and the African continent,” Prof Fourie said.

“Strategic clusters will be organised on the basis that these areas of knowledge could become in the short term the flagships of the UFS, meaning those areas where the university currently has or in the very near future is likely to have some competitive advantage,” Prof Fourie said.

According to Prof Fourie, this strategic-cluster approach will be in line with the approach being designed by the National Research Foundation (NRF) to take national priorities into account and would enhance the quality of scholarship at the UFS.

The five strategic areas in which research and academic investment at the UFS will be clustered are the following:

Enabling technologies / Technology for the future;
Food production, quality and food security for Africa;
Development;
Social transformation;
Water resource and ecosystem management;

“Such strategic clusters are understood not only as research areas but as areas that also encompass strong undergraduate and particularly postgraduate teaching and a potentially solid scientific basis for service learning and community service research,” Prof Fourie said.

Within each of these clusters specific niche areas will be identified. Clusters could focus on one or more aspects of a particular discipline or could involve more than one discipline in researching a particular issue.

He said not all academic work and research being done at the UFS would be clustered in this way. Sufficient resources and support have been put in place for general research excellence in the past five years.

“Some of the spin-offs can have an important impact on industrial development, for example in the chemicals industry and may also create a basis for cooperation with provincial, national and international partners,” he said. 

Media release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Media Representative
Tel:   (051) 401-2584
Cell:  083 645 2454
E-mail:  loaderl.stg@mail.uovs.ac.za
5 February 2006

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