Excitement is building ahead of the announcement of the winner of Westmeath’s Best Young Entrepreneur Competition. The winner of the competition, organised by Local Enterprise Office Westmeath, will be announced at the ‘Here to Help Small Business’ event taking place on September 23 at the Mullingar Park Hotel. Adjudication has taken place and the entries in the three categories are waiting anxiously for the announcement of the winner.
This is a new competition open to individuals aged 30 and under and was ran over the summer by Local Enterprise Office Westmeath with the aim of finding Westmeath’s Best Young Entrepreneur and with an investment fund of up to €50,000 available across the three categories. Winners in the Westmeath competition will proceed to regional and national finals with aim of finding Ireland’s Best Young Entrepreneur.
Winners will be named on the day in three categories - best new idea, best start-up, best new venture for established business - as well as an overall winner who will be Westmeath’s Best Young Entrepreneur.
Entrants to the competition since July have attended workshops and received one to one mentoring to assist them to develop a business plan and prepare them to pitch their idea to the judging panel for the competition.
Speaking ahead of the announcement, head of local enterprise at the Local Enterprise Office, Christine Charlton said ‘The aim of the initiative is to encourage and support a culture of entrepreneurship among young people in Ireland, to promote entrepreneurship as a career choice, and to encourage the establishment and development of new innovative businesses by Ireland’s young entrepreneurs. This is hugely important for job-creation as two thirds of all new jobs are generated by businesses in the first five years of existence - more start-ups and a thriving entrepreneurial culture will lead to more jobs being created.”
This project is an integral part of the Action Plan for Jobs 2014 and is supported by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation through the Local Enterprise Offices.
For more information email www.localenterprise.ie/westmeath or call (044 ) 9338945.
