Syria’s National Startup Agenda appears to be a cross-sector effort between the state and the private sector, with presidential directives to support growth and focus on innovation, through coordinated efforts across stakeholders. The strategic vision of building a “cohesive startup ecosystem capable of scaling regionally and globally” by 2030 demands learning from the best and applying what works for Syria. 

let’s take a look at what Syria can adopt from the NOC model:

  1. First, entrepreneurship should have degree-credited requirements. For instance, structured startup and venture creation courses (including internships) could be formally recognised by institutions as a part of a students final grade. Instead of just an extracurricular programme or elective. New academic programmes surrounding entrepreneurship (refer to point 2 below) or spaces designated for start-up hubs and incubators could be trialled.

Indeed, such efforts are not new. There have been influential ground-up initiatives building the Syrian startup ecosystem, such as Startup Syria, Jusoor and Scale Up Syria - all of which are integral and valuable. Given the scale of Syria’s ambition, more support and coordination could be provided, and having universities be part of the growing entrepreneurship ecosystem is a strategic move to grant legitimacy, galvanise support, and accelerate the speed of transformation.  

Key idea: 

• Entrepreneurship to be institutionally legitimised such that its importance is not outweighed by other academic requirements. This will increasingly encourage students to try entrepreneurship as there are fewer opportunity costs at hand.

  2. Next, an experiential university programme. One example of a university programme that could be piloted, is none other than NUS Overseas Colleges (NOC), potentially starting off in partnership with growing diaspora hubs in Berlin, Dubai, and Riyadh, where Syrian businesses and founders are clustering. This immersive exchange can broaden the horizons of Syria’s future entrepreneurs, allowing them to learn and adapt from best practices around the region, and even the world.

However, we know that such a programme can be costly and logistically-intensive to run. Hence, in the near term, it could start within Syria - after all, NOC has a Singapore version of the programme where students work in a local startup, and this has helped catalyse the growth of Singapore’s ecosystem. Students can intern in and support local startups, such as YallaGo or TarKeys, that will shape the future of Syria’s economy. The envisioned SOC programme could kick off domestically first. 

Key idea: 

• To start a “Syria Overseas Colleges” programme modelled after NOC in Singapore. This will leverage untapped resources such as Syria’s large youth population and huge diaspora of talent spread across the middle east and more. 

  3.  Third, a national entrepreneurship flywheel fund. The above-mentioned efforts cannot take place in a vacuum - to have the most impact, we must ensure everything feeds into a flywheel to grow the ecosystem. In line with the National Startup Agenda, the fund could be seeded that, over time, reinvests returns from early exits back into the next cohort of founders, mirroring the NUS Venture Capital Programme model of channelling capital into deep tech startups. PR Newswire APAC

These ideas are also not novel - since the new regime, new funds have been established, such as the Syrian Development Fund (SDF) and Invest in Syria Fund. The former is a government-led fund with US$83 million raised so far, and appears more focused on macro-reconstruction, while the latter is a privately-established fund in the USA, with “30% of the US$15 million fund is specifically earmarked for technology startups”. If a modest portion of the SDF can be deployed to startups and entrepreneurship - much like the Invest in Syria Fund, that will go a long way in kickstarting the flywheel. 

Key idea:

• A flywheel system must be set in place such that the cycle of founders becoming investors continues for years to come. This is ultimately the backbone of Syria’s startup economy and talent must be retained to pass their knowledge forward in order for Syria to keep improving.