"AOU Startup” is an initiative organized by Arab Open University. It embeds the foundations of innovation and business creation to AOU students, spreads the main principles among them , and fosters innovation for a long-term growth. The startup concept originates from Saudi Vision 2030. The participating students will utilize their expertise in opportunity discovery and evaluation to deliver a feasibility analysis presentation of a novel company proposal. Every company concept must align with one or more objectives of Saudi Vision 2030, perhaps leading to the establishment of a new enterprise.

Students from diverse backgrounds, possessing sufficient business and IT experience, are organized into small groups to establish their startups. During a period of four months, the students receive mentorship and instruction from the inception phase to the market readiness phase. The final phase involves Top Ten finalists’ groups presenting their ideas through a video presentation of three minutes.

Some important achievements :

• The AOU Startup was internally created to engage our academics from several branches to serve as mentors on January 14, 2025. During the announcement phase, 33 academics from the Business College and the Computer Science College, located across our six branches of AOU KSA, expressed interest in participating as mentors.

• The AOU Startup was introduced for students on January 21, 2025. One hundred four student groups expressed interest in participating in the AOU Startup by submitting their business ideas in accordance with the goals of Saudi Vision 2030.

• Following three selection rounds, we selected our top 10 startup ideas, which will compete in the final competition scheduled for April 29, 2025. The ten finalist groups belong from the Riyadh, Dammam, and Jeddah branches.

Our Partners :

AOU Startup will establish long-term cooperation with The Garage & Monshaat. We are also discussing with additional companies to support AOU Startup.

Copyright Concerns :

The 10 top finalist ideas will be protected under the AOU Startup copyright.

Our immediate objective is to engage in the forthcoming startup challenges by incorporating the ten top ideas.

We seek to establish a partnership with Hult International Business School in Dubai and Babson College in Massachusetts, USA, and to engage in their global challenge competition.