A statement issued by MBC Africa and copied to the Ghana News Agency said it was organising the conference in collaboration with The Royal Netherlands Embassy Ghana and Truvalu Startups.

It said the GBT programme was a start-up accelerator designed for SME’s which includes mentorship and business development training that helps entrepreneurs to put in place good principles, practices and procedures for business grow and sustainability.

"The GBT Startup Investor Conference, with the theme, 'Are you ready for my money?', would provide a platform for a cohort annually of 20 young Ghanaian entrepreneurs and enablers to network, share knowledge, explore business opportunities; boost collaboration and access to business and financial connectors," it said.

It noted that the GBT programme would be climaxed with the Investor’s Conference, which would attract approximately 400 to 500 students, 150 entrepreneurs (Fashion, processing, Manufacturing, service, farming, production), 20 representatives from financial institutions, 20 representatives from funding institutions and 10 media personnel’s.

"For the selection process of the final 20 Entrepreneurs, for each annual program; there is a call for applications, which runs from 1st November each year through to 31st January of the following year," it said.

It said in the past two years there had been an average of 72 entrepreneurs per application cycle with respondents being from several African countries.   "We welcome all participants however; Ghanaian businesses are the main target," it said.

It said, leading up to the conference, there would be a range of activities including a rigorous, transparent process of critique, validation, interview and consensus for the 10 best businesses from our GBT programme.

They would be given the opportunity to conduct live pitches in front of the audience at the conference; they would be preparing to pitch and secure investments for their business! The statement said there would be a range of activities such as three sessions of live pitching, a business matching session to link over 20 investors with businesses and two master classes demystifying and giving real solutions to financial questions

Others are panel discussions, dealing with alternative financing and investment for risky start-ups and networking session, giving the audience chance to meet and discuss financial and business solutions with the panel and facilitators as well as like-minded entrepreneurs

It said there would be stands showcasing products and services from our programme and sponsors. The statement said sponsorship and investment opportunities organisations that were keen to support GBT 2018 by way of sponsorship and other means of collaboration are invited to contact GBT to arrange for meetings to discuss opportunities.

It said these organisations might include key stakeholders from the public and private sector, including local and multi-national companies, investment companies, institutional organisations and innovation hubs.

The MBC Africa provides an enabling environment for agribusinesses in Africa by integrating the business services they need, to grow onto one single platform.  The MBC Africa’s role is to identify, nurture and develop a critical mass of viable growth-oriented agribusinesses as a pipeline for sustainable and impactful investment in selected African economies, such as Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire and Mali.