TEHRAN – Iranian female entrepreneur Azam Karami has secured first place in the Energy, Infrastructure and Mobility category of the BRICS Women’s Startup Contest 2026.
Led by the BRICS Women’s Business Alliance (BRICS WBA), the contest aimed at empowering and accelerating women-led startups across BRICS nations.
The event was held from September 9 to11 in New Delhi, India, with over 506 projects from BRICS member countries competing in six areas: “Health and Wellness,” “Agriculture and Food Security,” “Education,” “Energy and Infrastructure,” “Trade and Digital Transformation,” and “Sustainable Development.” Ultimately, only 18 projects reached the final stage.
Titled ‘Smart Monitoring of Railway Track and Bridge Errors Using Drones and Artificial Intelligence’, her project was developed with the aim of increasing safety, reducing maintenance costs, and improving productivity in transportation infrastructure management.
Karami is a faculty member at Shahid Bahonar University of Kerman. In the BRICS Women’s Startups Contest 2024, she received the award in the nomination ‘Artificial Intelligence’ for her project titled ‘Automatic Fault Detection in Power Transmission Lines’.
The 2026 edition of Women’s Startup Contest continued to spotlight innovative, high-impact women-led enterprises, fostering cross-border economic integration, collaboration, and knowledge exchange within the BRICS ecosystem. The initiative provided a dynamic platform for visibility, networking, and business expansion, enabling women entrepreneurs to scale their ventures and engage with investors, industry leaders, and policymakers across BRICS countries.
Fostering sustainable development, promoting economic inclusion, strengthening integration among BRICS markets, supporting innovation in key sectors, building entrepreneurial resilience, highlighting women-led solutions for global challenges, enhancing collaboration between BRICS nations, raising awareness of sustainable business practices, promoting technological adoption and digital transformation, and strengthening local economies through global connections are among the key objectives of the contest.
Iran outlines policies on women, family at BRICS WWG
In July, Narjes Abolqasemi, an official with the Vice-Presidency for Women and Family Affairs, elaborated on the country’s macro-level policies on women and family at the BRICS Working Women Group (WWG) held in Kerala, India, on July 6-7.
The empowerment of women requires a transition from sporadic measures to strategic and sustainable policies; in Iran, women’s entrepreneurship and economic development serve as driving forces for strengthening national resilience and the family foundation. Therefore, the policies are designed and implemented with a family-centered approach, IRNA quoted Abolqasemi as saying.
She also highlighted the importance of the four priority areas of the meeting, which included promoting women’s participation in governance and leadership, advancing digital and financial inclusion, strengthening women’s entrepreneurship and skill development, and enhancing the role of women in climate action, food security and nutrition.
Referring to the country’s experience in expanding the women entrepreneurship ecosystem, she said Iran focuses on establishing support models for women-led innovative businesses, developing modern skills, and benefiting from the potential of the digital economy.
Iran’s participation in the WWG meeting provided a great opportunity to share indigenous experiences, expand joint efforts, and develop new initiatives to achieve economic justice and sustainable development among BRICS member states, Abolqasemi noted.
Underscoring the significance of fostering specialized collaboration among BRICS member states, the official announced Iran’s readiness to utilize its scientific, policy, and executive capabilities to assume an effective role in the design of innovative models for women’s economic empowerment and expanding multilateral cooperation within the BRICS framework.
The WWG Meeting was held under the theme “Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability,” which reflects a people-centric and humanity-first approach to global cooperation.
It brought together senior government officials from BRICS member countries in the two-day event to discuss key issues related to women’s empowerment, women-led development and enhanced cooperation across shared priorities.
MT/MG
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