- Sheraa launches ASC 2025, offering Dh500,000 in equity-free grants to global EdTech startups addressing future-ready skills and Arabic language learning.
- Winning solutions will be piloted in four top Sharjah educational institutions, fostering innovation in early childhood and digital skill development.
- Aligned with UAE’s knowledge-based vision, ASC 2025 promotes global collaboration, educational excellence, and cultural identity through strategic EdTech innovation.
Sharjah Entrepreneurship Centre (Sheraa) is inviting global innovators to contribute to the future of learning through its 7th edition Access Sharjah Challenge (ASC). The competition will see two winning startups receive an equity-free grant of Dh250,000 each with the added benefit of piloting their solutions in four of Sharjah's top-performing educational institutions.
With the UAE's EdTech industry anticipated to grow at six per cent every year up to 2030, driven by the country's initiatives to create a knowledge-based society and to develop skills in the era of AI and technological advancement, strategic and mission-oriented support for innovators in this significant sector is vital for the future.
The first, the 'Future-Ready Skills Challenge', calls for creative solutions to impart students with fundamental digital literacy, computational thinking, critical thinking, and core soft skills. This responds to the urgent need raised by the World Economic Forum that foresees 85 per cent of the 2030 jobs yet to be invented, requiring flexibility far beyond memorisation.
The second, the 'Arabic in Early Childhood Challenge', is to create a profound, meaningful relationship with the Arabic language in the critical nursery and early primary years. It invites age-appropriate, engaging solutions that develop fluency, cultural appreciation, and a true love for the language.
The challenge presents a compelling offer for serious education innovators with an aggregate equity-free grant pool of Dh500,000.
Two successful startups will each get Dh250,000, together with the priceless chance to test pilot their solutions at four top institutions Alsedra Private School, Khalifah Al Hamzah American School, Pakistan Islamia Higher Secondary School, and Al Badee Nursery.
At its core, ASC 2025 is a powerful engine for multi-directional knowledge exchange and skill development, and as global entrepreneurs prepare to present their cutting-edge technology and fresh perspectives to be implemented within Sharjah’s diverse educational landscape, Sheraa will be there to guide them on every step of the journey.
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ASC 2025 is an investment in strategic knowledge exchange, professional skills development, and collaborative co-creation of learning environments ready for the future, and calls on both regional and international innovators to collaborate with the educational ecosystem of Sharjah and take this legacy to the next level.
Sheraa, formed to empower business owners and establish Sharjah as a catalyst of purpose-driven innovation, has strategically identified Education Technology (EdTech) as one of its key Centres of Excellence.
It directly addresses the emirate's commitment to enhancing learning outcomes, preparing students to face an uncertain future shaped by rapid technological change, and nurturing cultural identity and pride.
Drawing on the robust educational base in Sharjah with some of the finest universities and institutions in the region, and further supported by its private schools attaining a mean score of 519 in the 2021 'Progress in International Reading Literacy Study' (PIRLS), higher than the international standards, ASC 2025 identifies two co-defined and key priorities in partnership with the Sharjah Private Education Authority (SPEA) and Sharjah Education Academy (SEA).
