Is your idea big? How much capital do you need? Venture capitalists are not usually the best, they will take up shares, involved in the management of the company. Sometimes, the idea you have can only be conceptualized, re-designed, implemented and actualized by the person who initially came up with the idea.

If you have some capital on hand, I would suggest you first operate from a virtual/serviced office. This way you will test your idea without investing a lot of funds. A virtual/serviced office helps you reduce your capital expenditure and allowing you spread the small capital you have over a long period.

If your capital at hand is 500k, operate from a virtual office provider like VOS: http://www.vosoffice.com and spread this capital over many months. You get the exact office space you require and avoid/reduce costs like; office lease, office partitioning or furnishing costs (over 300k), HR costs (no need to hire a receptionist (15k), cleaner (8k), e.t.c), a phone system (80k), fibre internet connection (15k), LAN (30k), computer system and networking hardware (100k), server (200k), and many more.

You get to allocate money for marketing and adverts, professional support for your business, ready IT systems, free internet access, and many more services.

I operate from a serviced office, and it worked!!

All the best.

Determination, read how Joel Mwale is a Kenyan student and entrepreneur went on to start up Skydrop, his own bottled water company

http://edition.cnn.com/2...er/index.html?hpt=hp_c1

The UN-HABITAT Urban Youth Fund invites young people based in cities or towns from the developing world to apply for project grants of up to USD 25,000. Applications open 15th February 2012 and close April 15th 2012.

To qualify for a grant, the project in question must be led by young people aged 15-32, and be based in cities or towns in developing countries. Grants will be targeted to the young people who need assistance the most, particularly disadvantaged youth in urban slums. Projects promoting gender equality, or involving partnerships with the government, the private sector or civil society are especially encouraged.

For more information regarding the 2012 call for applications, please go to;
http://www.unhabitat.org/youthfund.