LebNet Boston is proud to host: A panel on the Lebanese startup ecosystem - October 1, 2019

Techstars, GSVlabs

2 Ave de Lafayette, Boston

MA 02111, USA

LebNet is hosting on October 1 a panel discussion moderated by Habib Haddad, the Managing Partner of E14 Fund, with Sami Abou Saab, the CEO of Beirut-based accelerator SPEED. The discussion will give an overview of the Lebanese startup ecosystem, the Central Bank initiative (Banque Du Liban), the current players in the market and how is SPEED playing a role in supporting the startups in Lebanon.  The panel will cover the below points:  

• Encourage mentors and industry experts to be involved and help them give back
  
  
• Showcase other ways investors can be involved
  
  
• Highlight the opportunity for entrepreneurs to come back to Lebanon and take part of the local ecosystem and Speed. Through partnerships with LebNet and Techstars, these entrepreneurs can leverage this opportunity and the connections it offers back to the US and other places around the world.

The event is free of charge, but registration is required. 

Moderator

Habib Haddad

Habib is a serial entrepreneur and an early stage investor. He is currently the Managing Partner of E14 the MIT Media Lab affiliated fund focused on early stage companies out of MIT. Prior to that he was the founding CEO Wamda, a platform of programs and networks that aims to accelerate entrepreneurship ecosystems across the Middle East and North Africa region. He also served as a Venture Partner of Wamda Capital, a growth capital VC fund. Before Wamda, Habib was based in Boston where he founded Yamli an award winning startup focused on linguistics and the Arabic language. In 2012 he sold the technology to Yahoo! He was also the founding member of Mok3, a venture backed MIT CSAIL spinoff that developed an image based modeling software. In 2009, the World Economic Forum recognized Habib as a Young Global Leader and was named as a top innovator under 35 (TR35) by the MIT Technology review in 2011. In 2013, He was the Vice Chair of the World Economic Forum council on entrepreneurship and currently sits on the Global Future Council on Systems and Platforms.

Speaker

Sami Abou Saab

Sami Abou Saab is currently the CEO of Speed, Lebanon’s first ecosystem-backed startup accelerator. He has been occupying this role since July 2015 and during his tenure, he officially launched Speed and recruited six batches with a total of 42 startups to accelerate. Part of his role, he has been mentoring startups in Lebanon and the MENA region and helped them grow in their early stages. Sami has more than 14 years of experience in technology, both in startups and big tech firms. Prior to Speed, he worked at Skype and Microsoft Corporation in the US, covering strategy, marketing, and channel modelling. In Silicon Valley, Sami started his own company, MobiLock, which was voted as the best startup in the Berkeley MBA program entrepreneurship class. Sami holds a Bachelor of Engineering from the American University of Beirut and an MBA from Berkeley-Haas and London Business School.