Watric Energy Resources represents Puerto Rico in global competition
Five emerging companies comprised of university students participated in the local edition of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization’s Global Student Entrepreneur Award (GSEA), in which Karlos Miranda of Watric Energy Resources, won and will now represent Puerto Rico in Cape Town, South Africa in April 2023.
Watric Energy Resources is a tech firm that develops alternative water sources. The other competitors were Carlos Hernández, con Piñacoladavisuals, Jarianne García of J’Koloré, Yavián Maldonado of Fundación Génesis and Cristian Meléndez of Meet Your Finance.
“Since June, these five companies have been getting business training from Grupo Guayacán to maximize the skills and abilities that an entrepreneur requires on their path to success,” said Orlando Montañez-Suárez, president of the EO chapter in Puerto Rico.
“Beyond their business model, this competition evaluates the student based on their character, tenacity and reasons why they decided to become entrepreneurs, since we believe these factors are decisive when facing the challenges in their business path,” he said.
In recent years, the winners from Puerto Rico have landed first place, third place and the award for innovation in the global competition, a unique achievement among the more than 200 chapters worldwide in just six years of establishing the competition in Puerto Rico.
Puerto Rico’s participation caught the attention of philanthropist Richard Watson, who provided the funds for this year’s winner to get $20,000 in seed capital to develop their company.
“In addition to the economic award, the winner will get training and mentoring from the members of EO Puerto Rico up until the global competition, which will undoubtedly result in an excellent representation as our young people have always done,” said Montañez-Suárez.
In addition to the local and global GSEA competitions, the emerging companies will be participating in Grupo Guayacán’s EnterPrize competition in December, having the opportunity to win prizes ranging from an additional $10,000 to $20,000 for their business venture.