On 6 and 7 December 2012 Berlin was host to the European Venture Summit, the largest meeting point for entrepreneurs in Information and Communications Technology (ICT), Life Sciences and Cleantech.
Startups from across Europe attended the summit to look for investors and compete in the prestigious European Venture Contest 2012 (EVC) Awards. The EVC is Europe’s largest startup contest and identifies the businesses that have the most capacity to grow rapidly. Christian Nagel of Earlybird Venture Capital was president of the contest’s ICT sector and chaired the EVC jury which involved some of Europe’s most active venture capital funds.
He says: “The summit is attended by the who’s who in European venture capital and is essential for attracting investment and for finding out about the latest high-tech innovations.” More than 850 businesses entered the EVC from which 130 startups were selected at 18 pan-European qualifier events throughout the year. At the summit the 130 qualifying startups pitched to more than 120 investors and sector experts. Each startup was reviewed and given feedback from experienced investors on their business plan and market positioning. Using the investor reviews, event organiser Europe Unlimited identified the Top 25. These 25 best rated enterprises were then voted for by the EVC jury, to select the EVC Top 10. Startups were evaluated on business potential, team experience, product/technology merit, competitive position, investment profile and presentation quality.
| Nagel says:
“The contest is very competitive and judging criteria is rigorous, considering all aspects of the business including whether the market opportunity is large enough, whether it is innovative, is the management passionate about the business and is their vision clearly articulated, do they have the right background and experience, is the product going to be able to fulfil the market requirement, is the cost right and is it scalable.” |
Falcon Social was voted in the ICT top four. It offers social media management for large consumer orientated companies and stood out as it is signing big global customers. Falcon Social began selling in June 2012 and had already over-achieved its bookings budget by 25%. Also awarded in the ICT top four was: Bitbar, which tests Android applications in the cloud; Conferize, which publishes conferences online; and iTraff Technology, which develops smartphone applications using image recognition technology. The contest revealed a growing theme of exploiting mobile and social media. While California’s Silicon Valley has dominated the world’s IT startup scene, European startups are gaining an edge in mobile technologies, especially in the Nordic countries which are a test-bed for the latest mobile technologies such as smartphones and tablets. Recently there has been a concentration of activity with clusters of startups forming in Berlin, London and Copenhagen.
Traditionally US startups have had an easier time than their EU counterparts; as capital was more readily available and there is a large domestic market to build presence in without the complexities of trading across multiple countries, in numerous languages. In Europe language barriers had meant building distribution across the EU was much harder. However, the internet has changed this. The internet has enabled IT companies to sell directly through a website to multiple countries from a single location. For example, Falcon Social has employed salespeople who speak multiple languages from a range of nationalities who can sell all over Europe from its office in Copenhagen. Its social media management solution is scalable worldwide and it has implemented a 44 country rollout for major national retailer and brewer Carlsberg, helping to ensure the corporation is in control of what is published across social media.
| Nagel says:
«Interestingly Falcon Social and Conferize are both from Denmark. Danish companies are punching above their weight in entrepreneurship awards. Due to its small population of around 5.6 million people Danish startups need to be international from day one. Rather than a burden, this has been embraced to maximize market opportunity.» |
The fact that EU startups tend to be multi-lingual is a big advantage over those in the US. “European investors have also improved their game in the last five years and have more experience in helping startups access capital, grow and exit successfully. The high quality of startups and investors at the summit highlights the strength of entrepreneurship and innovation in Europe. It is an exciting time for EU venture capital.
Posted on April 10, 2013 by admin