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  • 152 followers
  • Closed
  • $20,000 in prizes

We've finished judging, and will announce winners mid-next week!

Winners Gallery

First Place [1 Prize at $5,000]

SBA Gems
SBA Gems

  • By

Second Place [3 Prizes at $3,000]

Small Business Toolbox
Small Business Toolbox

  • By

SBA Loan Search App
SBA Loan Search App

  • By

CapitaList
CapitaList

  • By

Third Place [3 Prizes at $2,000]

SB Alert
SB Alert

  • By

Every Thing For The Entrepreneur
Every Thing For The Entrepreneur

  • By

Energy SBA
Energy SBA

  • By

View all submissions

Timeline

  • Submission Period

    Nov 5
    01:00AM
    EDT

    To

    Nov 20
    11:00PM
    EST

  • Judging

    Nov 20
    11:00PM
    EST

    To

    Dec 4
    11:00PM
    EST

  • Winners Announced

    Dec 15
    12:00PM
    EST

Prizes

First Place [1 Prize at $5,000]

$5,000

Second Place [3 Prizes at $3,000] (3)

$3,000

Third Place [3 Prizes at $2,000] (3)

$2,000

About the Challenge

For most entrepreneurs and small businesses, the Federal government has useful programs and services, but it can be hard to identify, engage and navigate Federal websites.  Often, small businesses do not know that the Federal government already offers a program that they would find useful.  Entrepreneurs and small businesses need better tools to navigate the Federal government’s vast resources – including programs, services, and procurement opportunities.  The goal of the Apps for Entrepreneurs is to give small businesses and entrepreneurs those better tools through this challenge format.

Read more

Judges

Jonathan Aberman

Managing Director at Amplifier Ventures

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Jack Bienko

Deputy Director of Office of Entrepreneurship Education, Small Business Administration

Peter Corbett

CEO at iStrategy Labs

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Julie Fajgenbaum

Vice President, Brand and Social Media at American Express OPEN

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Sean Greene

Associate Administrator for Investment and Special Advisor for Innovation, Small Business Administration

Alex Howard

Government 2.0 Correspondent at O'Reilly Media

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Gwynne Kostin

Director, Mobile of the Office of Citizen Services & Innovative Technologies at the U.S. General Services Administration

Craig Newmark

Founder of craigslist and craigconnects

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Nandita Pinisetti

Senior Marketing Manager for Developer and Platform Evangelism at Microsoft

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Steve Ressler

Founder and President of GovLoop

Justin Thorp

Marketing Manager at HelloWallet

Judging Criteria

Mission and Impact [25%]

Does the application meet the goals of the Apps for Entrepreneurs Challenge? The application will be rated on the strength of its potential to make Federal government programs and information more useful to small businesses.

Creativity [25%]

Is the application innovative, creative and interesting?

Use of Required Data [25%]

Does the application use a combination of creative and relevant Federal data sets, including at least one data set from either http://www.sba.gov; http://www.sbir.gov; www.data.gov or http://green.sba.gov? Otherwise, is there an explanation?

Technical Implementation [25%]

Is the application functional, well designed, and simple to use? It is accessible to a wide range of users including those with disabilities?

How to Enter

To enter, participants should develop an innovative application designed for the Web, a personal computer, a mobile handheld device, console, or any platform broadly accessible on the open internet that utilizes data which is freely available on Federal government websites.  

The Apps submitted for this Competition must use data from at least one of the following sources: Small Business Administration http://www.sba.gov/api; Small Business Innovation Research Program http://www.sbir.gov/apis; Green Government Opportunities for Small Business http://green.sba.gov/apis or Data.gov www.data.gov.  

Participants should then register for Challenge.gov and submit through entrepreneurs.challenge.gov. The submission should include the app's URL and a short description.