Five One Labs Co-Founders Selected as Colombia University Entrepreneur of the Year

Article originally published here

2021 ENTREPRENEURS OF THE YEAR

Columbia University Entrepreneurship is very pleased this year to award the 2021 Columbia Entrepreneurs of the Year award to Alice Bosley ‘17 SIPA and Patricia Letayf  ’17 SIPA.

We first met Alice in 2016 when she joined the Columbia Entrepreneurship team as the Design Studio Lead during 2016, the Studio’s inaugural year. In 2017, Alice joined with fellow classmate, Patricia Letayf ’17 SIPA, to form Five One Labs and enter it into the 2017 Columbia Venture Competition SIPA Dean’s Challenge. Team Five One tied for first place - and since the competition has grown into a start-up incubator that has impacted hundreds of entrepreneurs in conflict-affected areas.

Alice says, “The Dean’s Challenge, our professors, and the whole Columbia Entrepreneurship community gave us an incredible foundation from which to build Five One Labs.”

Today, Five One Labs runs startup incubators and co-working spaces in Erbil and Sulaimani in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq that help talented entrepreneurs in conflict-affected areas launch and grow their businesses. Since launching as the first incubator in Iraq in 2017, they have provided training, access to a community, and funding to over 90 scalable startups in their incubation programs, and have reached thousands of aspiring entrepreneurs from across Iraq and Syria through other programs and support. Five One Labs provides a wide range of specialized incubators to create a community of entrepreneurs, including their Female Founder Fellowship, their technology-focused incubator, and programs offered in Arabic, Kurdish, and English to ensure they are accessible to all entrepreneurs in the region.

As entrepreneurs themselves, Alice and Patricia are driven by the mission to foster a network of innovators and fellow entrepreneurs who have the support, skills, and connections to positively change their local economies and communities. The types of businesses that have participated in Five One Labs range from Bedayat, an online platform that provides career development training, to Mosul Solar, a company bringing solar energy to Mosul City.

Basel Mohamed Zaki Allawi, the founder of Greenshoav and winner of a pitch competition following the Five One Incubator, explains the impact Five One has had on his company, saying:

“I had an idea and did not know how to start and where to start, and I was always looking for someone to provide advice to organize my ideas and support to start my project. I applied to Five One Labs, and fortunately, I was accepted to join the Five One Labs’ incubator 2020 in Erbil and this was a major turning point in my project. Many thanks and gratitude to the Five One Labs team for their continuous support and finding radical solutions to all problems that stand in the way of the progress and expansion of our project.”

In the year ahead, Alice and Patricia look to build on the rapid growth Five One Labs has experienced so far, as they work to expand to other cities in Iraq, like Mosul, Baghdad and Basra. They hope to begin expanding internationally over the next 12 months as well.

To support this growth and development of Five One Labs, check out their website and consider donating here: https://fiveonelabs.org/donate

ALICE BOSLEY CO-FOUNDER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Alice is passionate about business approaches to humanitarian challenges. She was an Innovation Specialist with the UN Refugee Agency’s Innovation Unit, using design thinking to solve humanitarian challenges worldwide. She has also worked at the American University of Iraq, Sulaimani, and consulted with Mercy Corps’ Social Ventures team. Before launching Five One Labs, she served as the Design Lead at the Columbia Entrepreneurship Design Studio.

In 2017 Alice completed her Masters of International Affairs from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, where she focused on humanitarian action, economic development, and entrepreneurship. She obtained her BA in international relations from Stanford University.

PATRICIA LETAYF, CO-FOUNDER, DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS

Patricia's main interest is Middle East politics and she has traveled extensively throughout the region for both work and academic research. Prior to Five One Labs, Patricia worked as a Middle East political risk analyst with a focus on Iraq and North Africa for the Dubai office of consultancy Control Risks. She is also a volunteer facilitator for the Soliya Connect Program.

She obtained her Master of Public Administration degree in Economic Development in 2017 from Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, where she concentrated in economic and political development, and her BA in International Relations and Economics from Tufts University.