Startups & Incubation
How UNILUS equips aspiring student entrepreneurs with the skills, mentorship and facilities to turn ideas into ventures.
The University of Lusaka recognises that socially sustainable, financially viable start-ups and youth entrepreneurship are key to addressing Zambia's chronically high levels of youth unemployment. We want to encourage students to become entrepreneurs — graduates who don't merely seek a place in the employment space, but who create employment opportunities of their own through the ventures they start.
UNILUS's commitment to changing the employment and innovation landscape — by equipping aspiring entrepreneurs with the necessary skills, mentorship and facilities — is delivered through the following initiatives.
UNILUS Innovation & Entrepreneurship Hub
The UNILUS Innovation & Entrepreneurship Hub is UNILUS's innovation and incubation centre, providing training, mentorship, co-working space, and access to networks for student founders. It aims to elevate early-stage student ventures, particularly those with the potential for real impact on Zambian communities.
The Hub runs a structured incubation track for student teams, taking participants from an early business idea through to a pitch-ready venture. Individual participants can either explore their own business idea or join an existing student venture, and the Hub also serves as a platform for local businesses and partners to engage with student talent.
- Phase one: a short venture validation course focused on testing the business concept.
- Phase two: an extended venture-building course aimed at accelerating development of the validated idea.
Social Innovation & Enterprise Programme
UNILUS integrates social entrepreneurship into its curriculum through the Social Innovation & Enterprise Programme, which builds capacity, knowledge and networks among students, practitioners and partners to generate lasting community impact. The programme awards bursaries to promising student founders working on socially focused ventures, and convenes practitioners for dialogue and best-practice sharing.
The programme also runs a Community Innovation Fellowship, aimed at students interested in developing solutions to long-standing local challenges — with an emphasis on community engagement, sustainability, and practical impact in Lusaka's surrounding communities.
Health Innovation Partnerships
The UNILUS School of Health Sciences partners with the Innovation & Entrepreneurship Hub, local health facilities, and community organisations in peri-urban Lusaka to drive a collaborative effort toward a healthier Zambia through entrepreneurship.
This partnership focuses on impact in the following areas:
- Health Employment: equipping students with skills critical for sustainable health-sector growth.
- Health Entrepreneurship & Innovation: building capacity for practical ventures that improve quality of life in target communities, with a focus on youth and social entrepreneurship.
- Health Ecosystem: strengthening UNILUS's capacity to train skilled health workers for Zambia's growing health system.
- Learning Network: building a long-term network of partners working together to create dignified jobs across Zambia's health ecosystem.
UNILUS Careers Service & Entrepreneurship Days
The UNILUS Careers Service offers workshops, seed funding, an annual pitch competition, mentorship and other services designed to boost student entrepreneurship. Conversations about sustainable, socially impactful business ideas are facilitated alongside training that helps students turn ideas into real ventures.
UNILUS Market Days
Hosted each year by the Innovation & Entrepreneurship Hub, UNILUS Market Days gives student vendors and early-stage founders a real marketplace to test and sell their products on campus. Sessions typically include a financial literacy talk from a local bank partner, a "business blueprint" workshop, and panel discussions with UNILUS alumni entrepreneurs.
Free for all UNILUS students, Market Days gives founders hands-on experience with pricing, customer service and cash flow — sharpening the entrepreneurial skills that carry through into the Entrepreneurship Days pitch competition later in the year.
Have a startup idea of your own?
Get in touch with the UNILUS Innovation & Entrepreneurship Hub to find out how to join the incubation programme, apply for a fellowship, or take part in the next Market Days or Entrepreneurship Days.
Email research@unilus.ac.zm