TEF Tourism Innovation Incubator Helps Entrepreneur Turn Idea Into Business

When Founder of GemVoyage, Shanya Connell was selected to participate in Cohort 2 of the Tourism Innovation Incubator, she had an idea, a problem she wanted to solve and the technology in mind to do it.

What she did not yet have, she readily admits, was a business.

“I entered this programme as a student with just an idea. I left as an entrepreneur with a registered limited liability company, a clearer minimum viable product (MVP), a prototype, and a much bigger vision of what my company, GemVoyage, could become,” she says.

GemVoyage is a tourism technology company that is developing a digital platform aimed at enhancing the visitor experience in Jamaica, while helping tourism transport operators work more efficiently.

Miss Connell tells JIS News that the inspiration behind GemVoyage is personal, having grown up with a father who works as a tourism bus driver and a mother who works as a dispatcher.

“I grew up seeing it, seeing all the behind the scenes for the coordination and the pressure that operators face,” she says.

She remembers nights spent waiting for her father to return home after being stationed at an airport or hotel, hoping to secure enough work for the day.

At the time, Miss Connell did not view these experiences as business problems. However, her perspective changed as she got older and pursued bachelor’s and master’s degrees in computer science.

“I realised that some of the stresses that I would have seen my parents going through are not just part of the job, but if they had some technology, it would really solve some of those problems that operators have,” Miss Connell says.

It was then that she saw an opportunity to bring together the two worlds she knew well – technology and tourism transportation.

Prior to joining the Tourism Innovation Incubator, Miss Connell participated in another pitch competition with an idea she was confident could become a business.

It was during that experience that she encountered a question that would change her perspective on entrepreneurship.

“One of the judges asked me a simple question. How will the business make money? I could barely answer. Apparently, something along the lines of, ‘I’ll figure it out’, is not a business model,” she recalls.

“At the time, I really thought I had a business, but I didn’t. I had an idea, and TEF (Tourism Enhancement Fund) taught me the difference,” she continues.

The Tourism Innovation Incubator is an initiative of the Ministry of Tourism and is implemented by the TEF.

It is designed to help local entrepreneurs transform innovative tourism ideas into viable, market-ready businesses through mentorship, networking and access to resources.

Determined to make full use of the programme, Miss Connell immersed herself in the learning experience.

Among the early exercises was the development of a lean canvas, which required her to examine areas such as customer segments, the problem and solution, marketing channels and revenue streams.

The exercise, along with mentorship provided through the programme, challenged her assumptions and helped to refine the business concept.

“The more the idea was challenged, the clearer my business became. That taught me one of the biggest lessons I’ve learnt as an entrepreneur – your job is not to prove that your first idea is right. Your job is to be willing to find out where it is wrong so that you can make it better,” Miss Connell says.

She shares that through the Tourism Innovation Incubator; she gained a clearer understanding of developing a business.

“It really helped me to understand my customers, market, my business model and eventually what my MVP needed to be. All the workshops, the mentorship, and feedback gave me a foundation that I simply did not have before,” Miss Connell states.

That foundation has helped Miss Connell to move GemVoyage from an idea to a developing business, with the customer and driver applications and an administrative platform now developed.

The company is currently at the beta-testing and refinement stage and is engaging tourism transport operators to participate in testing the technology.

Miss Connell explains that GemVoyage is designed to bring greater structure and efficiency to tourism transportation, much of which she says is still coordinated manually through telephone calls, WhatsApp messages and paper-based processes.

“You have pickups at the airport, pickups at the hotels, different drivers, different times, and so much change is happening throughout the day,” she says.

Through the platform, visitors will be able to arrange and track transportation, while drivers and operators will have tools to manage trips, bookings and vehicles.

Miss Connell emphasises that the technology is intended to support, rather than replace existing tourism transport operators.

“What we’re really doing is providing the technology for the operators to run their businesses,” she says, noting that the longer-term vision for GemVoyage is to connect transportation with other elements of the visitor experience, including hotels, attractions, tours and other tourism-related businesses.

For Miss Connell, the business has now moved beyond the question of whether the idea can work to how it can be successfully applied in the industry.

Now, as participants in cohort 3 embark on their own entrepreneurial journeys, Miss Connell is encouraging them to embrace the learning process and remain open to having their ideas challenged.

Her advice is to speak up even when unsure, complete the assignments, listen to the experts and avoid becoming so attached to an initial idea that there is no room for it to evolve.

“Never give up on the problem you care about but be willing to rethink the idea that you think would solve it,” she advises.

“Every difficult question, every uncomfortable correction, and every challenge you face can both refine your business and you as an entrepreneur. Sometimes, the moment your idea gets broken is the moment your business begins,” she adds.

Fifteen entrepreneurs are participating in cohort 3 of the Tourism Innovation Incubator, which recently got under way.