Azad Ali
JA Sweden (Ung Företagsamhet)
Azad Ali’s path to entrepreneurship took a number of harrowing turns. As a 12-year-old, he escaped from Kurdistan, and after several years of dangerous travels, he finally ended up in Sweden, where he began training as a skilled carpenter.
Occasionally, he tested his skills by creating furniture and accessories for his own use. One such creation was a modern wooden lamp, which he developed not as a prototype to launch a business, but simply as a beautiful way to increase lighting in his home.
Then one day, a friend stopped by and marveled at the workmanship. “Where I can buy one of these?” the friend asked, admiring the lamp. Azad volunteered to make another one.
A second friend had the same reaction a few weeks later. Then a friend of a friend. Requests started rolling in.
Around the same time, Azad enrolled in the JA Company Program through Ung Företagsamhet (JA Sweden), through which high-school students form real companies, develop a product or service, market and sell the product, and assess their profits.
When it was time for Azad and his team to choose a product for his company, he knew just the thing!
Azad, with his prototype lamp, in 2018
The team called themselves Trälampor-UF, organized as a JA company. “I dreamed of becoming an entrepreneur,” Azad said. “Through Ung Företagsamhet, my entrepreneurial journey took off, and we started making these environmentally friendly lamps.”
The team ended up presenting, setting up a trade booth, and competing at the national JA Sweden Company of the Year competition in Stockholm, where he sold two lamps to Mikael Damberg, Sweden’s Minister for Industry and Innovation. The Minister later posted a short video on social media showing his new lamp and demonstrating how easy it was to assemble.
“I brought one of Azad’s lamps home,” Mikael says in the video, “and today, I assembled it. It went faster than IKEA.” As you can imagine, the video received plenty of attention online.
Azad was later selected to represent his region at a dinner at the Royal Palace with the royal family, all of Sweden’s governors, and another 180 invited guests, ranging from celebrities and sports stars to community leaders. The Swedish dinner is an annual event to celebrate Swedes—including Azad—who have made a significant contribution to society.
It was an overwhelming experience for Azad to visit the palace. “I never had a country. Where I come from, you are never exposed to the people who are in charge. When I left the palace, I cried. It’s an experience I will never forget,” Azad said. While at the dinner, Azad also had a chance to talk to Prince Daniel, who sits on the board of JA Sweden. They spoke for 30 minutes, and the Prince ordered one of Azad’s lamps.
Trälampor-UF was reorganized in 2018 into an individual company and changed its name to AXD, which stands for Azad eXciting Design. Azad, now 25, continues to grow AXDSweden, which has branched into new lines. “I have broadened the range at AXDSweden,” Azad told us. “We currently have six employees and a premises of approximately 3,000 sq meters, where our employees manufacture furniture, interiors, displays, and shop fittings, and also offer contract manufacturing.”
Azad in 2022, at the AXD Sweden headquarters.
AXD Sweden and Azad recently won the 2022 ICA Entrepreneur Award “Local Hero of the Year—Junior” from among 200 nominees and five finalists. The award brings a prize of SEK 100,000. ICA, a major food retailer, created the annual award to pay tribute to committed residents who moved to Sweden and inspire others to take similar initiatives. "Azad Ali has proven to be an entrepreneur through and through,” the award committee said. “With solid craftsmanship and a sense of business, his AXDSweden has grown and become a significant player in Nybro, Sweden, where he is also a local role model for many young people." Azad added, “The prize sum will be used to develop our web presence and eventually open up an online store that will also target private individuals. The AXDSweden brand will be bigger!”
Azad also tries to give back by mentoring and supporting Swedish youth: “A lot of entrepreneurs helped and supported me on my journey,” he says. “And now I see, in so many other young people who have emigrated to Sweden, the same will and interest I had in running a business.”
Like so many of JA’s 100+ million alumni, Azad Ali is making the world a little bit brighter.
Afrah Shuja
INJAZ UAE
In May 2022, David Meltzer’s entrepreneur pitch show 2 Minute Drill aired an episode featuring six JA alumni from around the world: Alyssa Le, Junior Achievement of Southeast Texas (USA) alumna, Founder & CEO, Locket; Ida Johansson, Fonden for Entreprenørskab (JA Denmark) alumna, Founder & CEO, Turn Consulting; Kordian Caplazi, Young Enterpise Switzerland alumnus, Co-Founder, Rimon Technologies; Love Dager, Ung Företagsamhet (JA Sweden) alumnus, Founder & CEO, NextGenGov; Mykolas Aškelovičius, Lietuvos Junior Achievement (JA Lithuania) alumnus, Co-Founder, Yuffi; and Afrah Shuja, INJAZ UAE alumna, Founder & CEO, CorteX Wellness.
On 2 Minute Drill, contestants have two minutes to pitch their business to a panel of powerhouse businesspeople for the chance to win a cash prize of US$50,000. The alumni episode featured Verb Technology founder and CEO Rory Cutaia, Trade and Travel founder Teri Ijeoma, Powerhome Solar founder and CEO Jayson Waller, and show host and JA University Chief Chancellor (and fellow JA alumnus) David Meltzer. Unsurprisingly (at least to us), the six alumni blew the judges away with their pitches.
So . . . who won the US$50,000?
Afrah Shuja!
“I founded CorteX Wellness after learning about how many people are suffering from psychological disorders and mental health issues at school in particular,” Afrah said, “especially after witnessing, you know, how the pandemic affected my friends in my immediate circle. I decided that it's important to build something to help them.” CorteX Wellness provides direct lines of communication to therapists and counselors for students ages 10–18 years old in UAE. Users can also join interest groups, find additional resources, and sign up for events through the platform. “I've been doing this for a year now,” said 18-year-old Afrah. “You know, I want to really test my potential and see what my limits are, and then push those even more. Just put it in my all every day and see where it takes me.”
Afrah’s Pitch
“Fifteen-year-old Sarah was upset about her low grades, but she kept it to herself. Nobody knew until she died by suicide, leaving her friends and parents grieving. And she is not alone. In fact, approximately one in six youth reported making a suicide plan in 2019. And it’s not that schools just don’t care about this. They don’t have the infrastructure in place to do so adequately. I noticed that affecting my friends. So I built a website to facilitate remote counselor communication. And with its success, I realized I could do so much more. Fast forward, and that project is now accompany: Cortex Wellness. We’re digitizing school wellbeing-support systems. For example, in the place of super long and boring psychological surveys, we’re gamifying those online. You can book a school counselor appointment and find help with the privacy and ease student like Sarah deserve. We are currently pre revenue having just launched our MVP and R&D that follows with 84% of students saying that having Cortex at their school would have helped them with a mental health issue. We toured schools an annual fee and our milestone market in the GCC is valued at $2.21 billion. We’ve received over 11 recognitions including first place at the Harvard Innovation Challenge and Company of the Year by INJAZ UAE. We plan to service 10 to 15 schools this year. I acknowledge I’m only 18 years old, but I surround myself with awesome people. I’m joined by my former business teacher and school wellbeing researcher full time as well as an advisory board with experts and executives. This is not only a huge market gap, but one that we have a social responsibility to fill. With the $50,000 we will have the seed necessary to scale our tech and help schools better actively prevent tragedies like Sarah’s from happening ever again. Thank you.”
Afrah and her team developed Cortex Wellness during their time in the JA Company Program with INJAZ UAE, and they won the national Company of the Year competition. Additionally, the company won first place in the Harvard Innovation Challenge and Abu Dhabi University’s Entrepreneurial Challenge, and it is part of the United Nations SDSN Youth Project and startAD incubator at NYU Abu Dhabi.
Check out Cortex Wellness for yourself and give it a follow on Instagram!
In addition to the US$50,000 in cash and prizes awarded to the winner, each episode features the JA Impact Award. This award is given to the contestant whose company demonstrates the greatest social impact. The recipient of the Impact Award is selected based on their mission-driven values and has the opportunity to align with JA Worldwide to our alumni network, driving awareness to their brand through millions of entrepreneurs around the world. The award also comes with a US$1,000 donation to JA Worldwide in that contestant’s name. But, of course, with this special episode came a special surprise for all six contestants and for JA . . .
“I am so impressed by all of the contestants,” David Meltzer said, “that I'm going to make a donation in the name of each of the contestants. Because it's so impressive and the issues that they're addressing are so important. And I encourage anyone out there that watches this episode, we support Junior Achievement because if anything is going to be a testament to what that program does for our future.”
Watch the special JA alumni episode of 2 Minute Drill below or on davidmeltzer.tv.
Elena Tosheva
JA Bulgaria
Elena Tosheva joined the JA Worldwide Board of Governors in 2020, but she was associated with JA long before that. Born in Bulgaria, Elena participated in the JA Company Program as a teenager, which was her first introduction to the world of entrepreneurship. Passionate about building high-impact communities and empowering people to create and innovate as entrepreneurs, she has worked in tech, NGOs, and academia, striving to create scalable solutions for today’s most pressing challenges.
Today, Elena is Brand Marketing Manager at Google, where she builds greater trust and stronger relationships with key opinion formers and partners across the EU. She leads the Brand and Reputation strategy in Brussels on key topics and helps to shape Google’s company-wide programs across Europe.
Before joining Google, Elena was part of the startup team behind City.AI, a platform for applied artificial intelligence. As the Global Head of Community, she built the global network, spanning across 70+ cities on six continents with thousands of active members from academia, business, and governments. Previously, she oversaw the Techstars Startup Programs across Europe and has supported the growth of startup communities in 140+ European cities.
““I was very lucky to be part of a JA program as a teenager. I wish for all young people to have a similar opportunity. My JA experience helped me cultivate constant curiosity, while building up my self-confidence and resilience early on. I believe that JA empowers the new generations to build a better world. And I am thrilled to continue supporting its ever-more relevant mission by joining the Board of Governors.””
Elena has been an active JA alumnus and volunteer since 2006. She served as president of JA Alumni Europe from 2012–2014 and is an active JA Alumni Honoris member. A group of JA alumni from Europe who have achieved something extraordinary in the fields of entrepreneurship or business or within the JA alumni network, Honoris aim to improve the recognition of the JA alumni brand and to continue giving back to JA as mentors, advisors, volunteers and donors. In 2019, the Honoris gifted €55,000 to JA Worldwide in recognition of JA’s Centennial.
As a member of the JA Worldwide Board of Governors, and the first to fill the JA alumni member seat, Elena represents JA alumni around the world and brings both student and alumni perspectives to the decision-making table. She also serves on the JA Board Marketing Committee.
Aya Yousef
INJAZ Lebanon
INJAZ Lebanon alumna Aya Yousef, a nominee for the first-ever Global Student Prize and architecture student at the American University of Beirut, spent time as a child in a refugee camp. We’re truly inspired by Aya’s journey, and we think you will be, too.
JA Worldwide: Given your own experience, what are some of the biggest challenges facing children in refugee settlements, especially in terms of Global Goal 4, Quality Education?
Aya: The biggest challenge facing young refugees is a lack of access to proper education and what that does to their mindset. But another major issue is the architecture and infrastructure of camps, which lack open, green spaces, and this led to my current major.
In 2016, I started the first-ever coding club at my school, in which I shared my knowledge and experience in coding with around 20 students who were willing and eager to learn something new. I wanted to reach students with a similar background—who had lived in a refugee settlement—because I didn’t think they would have learned to code in a settlement, yet that knowledge can open up so many opportunities and revolutionize a student’s mindset.
I started noticing that these students also lacked access to resources about attending universities and earning scholarships in Lebanon. I had already been researching this information for myself and decided to start sharing these opportunities. I became part of an outreach team to spread the word about educational opportunities at the best universities in Lebanon. I partnered a year later with two other change makers with the same vision and mission, and we co-founded ToRead to increase the scale of our outreach.
JA Worldwide: Can you tell us more about ToRead?
Aya: ToRead works on bridging and filling the gap between high school students and universities/scholarship foundations. It is an online platform that allows high school students to search, filter, and compare university and scholarship options in Lebanon and abroad. They can compare all university options in Lebanon, check applying criteria, and available services and programs. They can also find scholarships and other opportunities they are eligible to apply to.
Today, I am no longer an active program manager; however, prior to leaving, my co-founders and I were able to register it officially as a company and even win several awards, including the Soraya Salti Best Company in the Arab World in Youth Entrepreneurship Forum 2020, the MasterCard Excellence in Technology Award in 2020, the INJAZ Lebanon Company of the Year Award in 2020, the Asfari Challenge for Social Innovation in the education sector in 2020, the incubation support by Nawaya Network 2019, and more.
JA Worldwide: What led you to choose architecture as your major?
Aya: Once I saw the architectural challenges of refugee settlements (and, now, planning a better camp is on my bucket list!), I wanted to make it my focus of study. Architecture opens the eye and widens the mindset, changing how you think about a building, the space around it, its users, the city it’s located in, and more. Architecture has changed my vision of the world and my personal mission to the humanity.
Architecture opens the door for many opportunities in various fields, because it’s about more than buildings. What I have found most interesting in my academic journey is how the design skills I’m learning are integrated with graphic and digital design, social media, animation, filmmaking, and more. The architectural journey doesn’t stop! For example, I never imagined I would find myself working on an agricultural architectural prototype, tackling food insecurity and roof gardening. Architecture is a starting point; a tool to be pushed beyond its usual limits.
JA Worldwide: What do you remember most about participating in the JA Company Program?
Aya: Right after we started, we were in mentorship sessions, developing our startup, preparing for the pitch and demo day. From there, we got to specialize and build our business. We competed on the national level, and then moved on to the INJAZ Al-Arab competition with 13 other countries. We had so many new experiences and success, and also networked and connected with mentors and other students.
Apio Sarah Ongom
JA Uganda
Apio Sarah Ongom heard about the JA Superfan Contest—launched by JA Worldwide to highlight the 2020 virtual Boston Marathon and associated fundraiser—during the summer of 2020 from her home in Kampala, Uganda, where she had been expanding her workout routine. Before the pandemic, Apio Sarah found that she would get busy and postpone her workouts, although she still managed to run twice a week and set aside some time for short yoga workouts at the end of each day. COVID-19, however, brought both restrictions and more time, and each contributed to Apio Sarah’s increased exercise routine. She lengthened her yoga workouts, ran longer and more often, and spent her early mornings and late afternoons walking to and from her apprenticeship, about 4 kilometers each way. She was no longer skipping workouts, so a contest that gave points for exercise was a perfect fit.
A business-administration student at Makerere University Business School, 24-year-old Apio Sarah first got to know JA in February 2020, when she heard about a campaign called “Tide Turners: Africa Beats Plastic,” organized by JA Africa and the United Nations Environment Programme. She liked and followed JA Africa’s Facebook page to learn more about plastics and their role in pollution, and then signed up to participate. “The whole campaign period was amazing,” Apio Sarah recalls, “and I emerged as the overall winner. (Also flip to pages 12 and 13 of the campaign report, below, to see her feature.) After that, I signed up for JA Africa’s newsletter and that’s how I learned about a bigger body called JA Worldwide. I later followed JA Worldwide on Facebook and Twitter and signed up for a monthly newsletter,” where she learned about her chance at being crowned JA’s Biggest Superfan.
Through the JA Africa Tide Turners campaign, Sarah learned skills that aren’t taught in a traditional classroom. She advocated on behalf of the environment, using her voice for a positive change and learning creative ideas for how to make money while recycling plastics. “I also got exposed to other meaningful ways of environmental protection,” she says, “which I believe will enable me to become an advocate for the environment at all levels. JA Africa allowed me to speak at the Online National Youth Summit Plastic Tide Turner’s Challenge 2020, organized by the United Nations Environment Programme in India (view below) in June. I am super proud to be part of JA.”
Sizolwethu Maphanga
JA Eswatini
At only 18 years old, JA Eswatini alumnus Sizolwethu Maphanga became an award-winning CEO, a voice for youth in her country, and a rising force in the African technology sector.
Sizolwethu Maphanga’s participation in the JA Company Program enabled her to transform her appetite for tech into a burgeoning career. In 2018, she co-founded JA student company Nazware Innovations, which created IVOTE, an app that eliminates lines and other delays and ensures accuracy and transparency during the voting process. Under her leadership, her student company won second place at the JA Africa Company of the Year Competition, and Sizolwethu received both the Christi Maherry CEO Rising Award and the JA Africa Employability Award. The company continued to grow after the JA Company Program. In 2019, Sizolwethu shared, “We have been approached by our government, which wants to use the voting system for national elections in four years.”
She went on to participate in the African Girls Can Code Initiative’s first coding camp for girls in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A joint initiative from the African Union Commission, UN Women, and the International Telecommunications Union, the four-year program teaches girls digital literacy, coding, and personal development skills. The initiative held a contest to select a logo idea from among its students, and judges selected Sizolwethu’s design.
Not only did the logo design competition cement her place in the initiative’s history, it also meant an invitation to meet one-on-one with UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who believes the inclusion of girl and women in tech jobs is essential. Sizolwethu called meeting the Secretary-General “one of the greatest accomplishments of my life. Meeting the Secretary-General, the person who is at the top of the UN, was one of the best things that has ever happened to me.”
In 2020, as a featured speaker at a commemoration ceremony for International Youth Day, Sizolwethu said young people in Eswatini—a population numbering around 700,000—“simply need a listening ear, resources, and a little bit of faith.” In addition to the COVID-19 pandemic raging at the time, she addressed the challenges young people in Eswatini faced, especially the 46.55% youth unemployment rate and the prevalence of HIV among girls ages 15–19 years. “I believe the youth are fresh, vigorous, and innovative,” she said. “Their ideas, combined with the experience of the older people, can help bring about impactful economic activity in the country.”
Today, Sizolwethu continues the career in technology she began with the JA Company Program and Nazware Innovations. With aspirations to start an agriculture technology company, she seeks to transform the agriculture sector by developing software and equipment for farmers. “The goal is to make people more productive in their agricultural activities through the use of my technology products,” she said. “The services will range from security-like tracking devices for livestock, digital marketing and IT equipment production.”
We can’t wait to see what she does next!
Mabel Simpson
JA Ghana
Story by Helenah Swedberg; photos by Kate Carlton
The droning sound of sewing machines rises from the small workshop next to Mabel Simpson’s house. She sorts through a stack of African-print fabrics, while her two employees stitch together colorful laptop bags, handbags, backpacks, shirts, and cushions. One of the sewing machines once belonged to Mabel’s grandmother, and it has supported Mabel since she quit her office job over a decade ago to to launch mSimps, her own fashion brand.
“I love art, but my previous job had nothing to do with it,” Mabel says. Although making a career out of art is unusual in Ghana, Mabel studied visual arts in school, and it was there that she also learned to run a retail operation, though JA. Her school had a “JA Shop” on campus, and students were responsible for all aspects of managing the store, including keeping it running and profitable, learning the basics of business.
Mabel took those skills and poured them into the mSimps shop in Accra, Ghana. “The most important thing I learned from JA was business management,” Mabel says. “I’m really grateful for that opportunity. I don’t know if I would have managed to do all this without that experience.”
But being an entrepreneur can be a lonely path. “Few people understand it,” Mabel says. “They think you can wake up anytime and work anytime, and that you make a lot of money. But as an entrepreneur, you are always paying other people. You only survive if you have financial discipline.”
She wants to be an advocate for art and let young people know that they can make a career out of their artistic passions. “Some students want to study visual art, but their parents force them to pick something else,” Mabel says. “Art is underappreciated, but the key is knowing how to turn your passion into a paying job.” Mabel remembers a former mentor once telling her, “Art won’t pay you; business will pay you.” She now shares this advice with all the young art lovers she meets.
““You need both a creative mindset and business know-how. JA gives you all of this.””
Update to our original story!
Since our visit to Mabel’s shop in 2018, she has expanded to a large online store. You can find her product at https://msimpsgh.com. MSimps also now provides the opportunity for students to have internships during vacations to enable them have hands on knowledge, skill, and experience. Mabel also partners with Soar Global Foundation, an NGO dedicated to children education and community development, by organizing reading clinics for children in orphanages and underperforming schools and raising funds to stock books in school libraries across Ghana.