Prince Andrew teams up with Will.I.Am

Britain’s Prince Andrew and Will.I.Am have joined forces to encourage young people to start up their own businesses.

The 54-year-old royal has teamed up with the ‘Scream & Shout’ hitmaker as part of the ‘inspiring Digital Enterprise Award’ which aims to equip young people with important digital skills such as coding, computing and marketing.

The project has been launched with the tech group Nominet and will target people from disadvantaged backgrounds.

The pair joined Susanna Reid on ITV’s ‘Good Morning Britain’ earlier today to discuss the scheme.

Prince Andrew explained: ”If we don’t give young people the skills to be able to work in this environment they are going to feel more ostracised than they may or may not be today and fundamentally I believe that this is not the preserve of the Etons, Harrows, Oxfords and Cambridges.”

Grammy Award-winner Will.I.Am – who was previously invited to London’s Buckingham Palace to discuss the project – admitted he was ”over the moon” to have met the royal and was shocked when he took him up on the offer.

Wil.I.Am said: ”I got invited to Buckingham Palace where Prince Andrew was there and I was so over the moon and full of excitement and I was telling him, ‘young kids in the cities, we need to find opportunities for them’… I didn’t think that conversation would follow up with ‘Hey let’s partner up’!”

The initiative is set to work with a number of business and educational partners in order to provide training and support to participants aged 16 to 25.

It also offers the opportunity for 20 teams of young people to pitch their digital business ideas to a panel of judges who will award a £15,000 prize to three groups of finalists so they can launch their own company.