Luxinnovation recently held the graduation ceremony for the three Graduates of the Autumn 2017 edition and announced the 2018 candidates for the Spring edition. The prize? Up to €150,000. After two inspiring speakers shared insights on the future of Innovation in Luxembourg, the 10 panel-selected candidates made their way to the stage.
(Featured Image: the 10 new candidates selected for Fit 4 Start program / Image Credit: Silicon Luxembourg)
Fit 4 Start is Luxinnovation’s 16-week program that provides new players in the startup scene with coaching, free co-working space, networking opportunities, and a grant of €50,000 out the gate.
Needless to say that the 2017 Graduates are a happy triplet: ume solutions, See More, and VanHack. Ume solutions has been designed to respond to the asset management industry demands for an effective automated due diligence of fund distributors. See More brings augmented reality solutions that allow users to display art on a wall. Van Hack is a platform that helps tech talent find jobs.
“We’re excited to see how far we’ve come,” said Ilya Brotzky, CEO of VanHack. “Fit 4 Start has been a great opportunity, and we’re excited to build off of these results. This opportunity will help VanHack fill the gap between tech talent and open positions. Our 150,000 user base will grow, and the created jobs will change lives.”
“We want Luxembourg to be the Gateway to Europe.”
Speakers set the mood
Michele Gallo, Director of ICT Coordination at the Ministry of the Economy, was happy to reaffirm the Ministry’s support of Fit 4 Start and its role in Luxembourg, saying Fit 4 Start is “fulfilling its role in opening access to finance to startups that are developing very, very quickly.”
He also highlighted the scope and economic impact, noting that over 21 different nationalities have been represented in the candidate pool and that they have created 40+ jobs in Luxembourg since. But the vision is even larger. Fit 4 Start has generated over 2.5 million euros with the current allotment of candidates. The goal is to augment the candidate pool by 400%.
In a nutshell, the Director proceeded with a beaming smile, “we want Luxembourg to be the Gateway to Europe.”
Next up was the keynote speaker: Piet Colruyt, Director at Impact Capital and a family director at Korys, the family holding behind Colruyt Group, Belgium’s leading retailer. Piet offered a persuasive speech about the close ties between social and business motivation.
With personal anecdote, the Belgian director made pivotal points: Social Entrepreneurs are ahead of the game because they necessarily view growth from a global perspective, social innovation is a huge market, and the co-creative nature between social growth and business is the new model.
“163 candidates originally applied of which 39% came from Luxembourg.”
The Big (New) Ten
Jacob Arnould, CEO at MyMedBot, was thrilled with the results, saying with passion, “I have an insulin dependent disease. It’s a job in and of itself. The MyMedBot chatbot will change the way people like me treat their health and give them a heightened sense of security in everyday life. We are excited to continue the project with the Fit 4 Growth program.”
163 candidates originally applied of which 39% came from Luxembourg. After 10 hours of pitching, the judge panel of five selected the 2018 Candidates:
B2B PAY
Germany – B2B Pay provides Virtual Bank accounts with their own IBAN for companies that export to Europe. The companies can use this virtual accounts to collect payments from 35 European countries via SEPA and save nearly 80% in transaction fees.
Find out more: b2bpay.co
BNESIS
Poland – bNesis simplifies credit application process allowing credit institution to analyze payment, banking, eCommerce, credit bureau and social media data of the borrower with the help of multiple, external scoring engines working simultaneously.
Find out more: bnesis.com
HOPES
France – HOPES aims to be the first social utility platform, that let’s you control the footprint and impact of your energy from generation to usage for consumers that cares. How the startup is doing that? By independently collecting SMART data to collectively guide them towards a new clean energy era.
Find out more: hopesinitiative.com
INTEGERAI
United Kingdom – In a general office environment, many employees are performing mediocre and time consuming administrative tasks on their desktops. IntegerAI product helps to remove the burden of these mediocre tasks and increase employee productivity by using proprietary unsupervised Machine Learning algorithms to Seek, Learn and Automate tasks.
Find out more: integerai.com
INKSPIRED
Ecuador –Inkspired is a self-publishing online platform for emerging writers and readers, where they can connect, read and write creative stories and book series.
Find out more: getinkspired.com
MACHINATIONS
Romania – Machinations is a cloud-based solution that helps game developers design digital game systems. This animated diagramming board and dynamic chart simulations tool can shorten the process of building mobile game economies by ~40%, in a $94.4B market with a 20% YoY growth.
METRI
Finland – Metri merges advertising results from different advertising channels. It puts data together from e.g. Google Analytics, FB, etc. in order to see which campaigns really work for your business.
MYMEDBOT
Luxembourg – MyMedBot is every insulin dependent diabetic’s own medical emergency personal assistant – working 24/7 – it automatically informs First Responders, the diabetic’s Followers and bystanders who rarely know what to do in case of emergency.
Find out more: mymedbot.lu
SALONKEE
Luxembourg – Salonkee is a smart, AI based and personalized beauty assistant. Imagine a future without the need to search for the salon (Hairdressers, Masseurs, Beauty Salons,…) that fits your needs, but where the right salon finds you.
Find out more: salonkee.lu
UNIVIZE
Luxembourg – Univize is an online platform that helps students find the right university. On Univize, prospective university students can connect with current university students and ask all their questions about the university and study program.
Find out more: univize.com
