Startup Knight, a competition for early stage South African software-based tech startups, is back for a second year. Entries are open until 24th October and winner will be announced the following week.

Startup Knight was launched in 2012 for the first time, by software company Byte Orbit. The premise of the competition is to promulgate, support and embrace tech startups in South Africa by offering a disruptive competition platform. Many competitions, in and around South Africa, offer similar competitions – except none of them enter into a partnership with the winner in order to provide ongoing support. Even better, last year’s winner (Easy2Map) excelled and received additional funding from Umbono Google.

This year Byte Orbit intends to up the stakes and offer an even greater opportunity for tech entrepreneurs and concept innovators in South Africa by introducing two divisions to the competition – Concept Phase and Startup Phase.

Concept Phase: Moneypulation

Prize: R100 000 Cash

The Concept Phase has been themed “Moneypulation” for 2013. This stream of the competition is designed to attract visionaries with the most innovative “concept phase” software products that will turn heads in the financial and tech industry. (Think BitCoin, Square, PayPal, Mint, Freshbooks etc.). Note that all IP of the winning concept will be transferred to Byte Orbit.

Startup Phase

Prize: R100 000 Development and R100 000 P.R.

The Startup that has the most innovative software business that disrupts the South African tech industry. Note that the winning startup will enter into a partnership with Byte Orbit whereby Byte Orbit takes 15% equity.

How To Enter

To become a participant enter online at startupknight.co.za between 1 October to 24 October. Eight concept phase finalists and eight startup phase finalists will be announced by 25 October and they will be required to pitch to a judging panel at Byte Orbit offices in Durbanville, Cape Town on 2 November. The day prior to the final day of pitching (1 November) the finalists are required to attend a mentorship session at the Byte Orbit offices. Winners will be announced the evening of 2 November.

For even more information, visit Byte Orbit and don’t forget to follow the company on Twitter (#StartupKnight2013 too) for competition updates.

Note: The startups and the concepts will be guided by an array of successful South African entrepreneurs. Several partners came on board to make this event possible and Byte Orbit is very appreciative of Tech Report, SmileFM, Radisson Blu and BandwidthBlog.