DLD Munich 2018
Over 150 speakers and 1000 attendees will touch base at #DLD18. For the 14th time, “Europe‘s hottest conference” brings together the most influential opinion-makers, industry leaders, start-ups and digital giants in Munich, on January 20-22, 2018.
“Reconquer” is DLD’s call to action and our theme for 2018! In our technology-driven world, at the edge of a new era of machine learning – biotechnology, IoT and robots, let us courageously face new realities. Let’s join forces and actively take control of our business, lives and society.
We need to reconquer trust, values and optimism.
This year we will soft-open the conference on the evening of January 20th with a Keynote speech at Literaturhaus München.
DLD18 tickets are 2.950,- EUR (+VAT) and by-invitation-only. Please note that there is a limited number of free conference passes for young creatives, students and NGOs.
Italian winners for StartUp Europe Awards
StartUp Europe Awards 2017is an international competition promoted by the European Commission and Finnova Foundation to stimulate open innovation and collaboration between the different actors of the European ecosystem through public-private partnerships in support of the entrepreneurs.
The prize-giving ceremony of the startup winners of this year’s edition took place on December 12th, organized by Starboost Srl, Company Creator, where the CEO and Co-founder, Mattia Conte, represents Italy as Country Manager for SEUA17, in partnership with CNA Young Entrepreneurs.
A national jury of experts in the field assessed more than 60 applications from all over Italy, according to criteria such as degree of innovation, sustainability of the business model and team composition, and have selected the winning startups, each for own category.
During the evening, startups presented their businesses with a pitch and videos. The event was attended by Marco Zanni, Member of the European Parliament, who has connected from Brussels by a video call, Daniele Alberti, Eleonora Rocca, marketing manager CEO & Founder of Mashable Social Media. Day Italy and Digital Innovation Days, Adriano Travaglia, lawyer, startupper, manager, Founding Solomon & Travaglia, President of the European Start Up Association and Giovanni Caponetto on behalf of the European Commission, also Chiara Appendino, Mayor of Turin.
The Italian winners are:
Agricolus in Agritech category, their aims is to support farmers, agronomists and other operators in the agricultural world optimising agronomic practices, integrating expertise and the latest technologies data collection and analysis.
In Fintech category, Helperbit, is the winner. Helperbit uses blockchain to bring transparency in the charitable and insurance sector. The platform allows tracking of donations up to final beneficiary and to subscribe to a mutual plan against disasters.
HotBox, for the Gastronomy category. Hotbox solves the problem of cold and rubbery pizza to home thanks to the use of excess heat from the scooter and the de-umming system which allows you to keep the pizza hot and crisp until you get home.
Italian Artisan, for the Fashion category, a B2B marketplace of Made in Italy fashion that connects the best craftsmen specialized in the manufacture of footwear, accessories and clothing with designers and international retailers.
Leevia, is the winner in the Creative category. They are the first Italian platform to create online contests legal proceedings in just a few clicks. Provides services to companies and communication agencies to involve the community, collect qualified leads and create brand awareness.
Mobygis, is the winner for the Water category. Thanks to a combination of ground, satellite and model data mathematical, provides for the availability of water resources in the territory in the form of snow and water, to tourism, civil protection and hydropower industry.
Nextome, for the Cybersecurity category. Nextome is a patented software system navigation and localisation operating in closed environments (where the signal GPS is not present), technology compatible with traditional smartphones, easy to install.
Planet Idea, for the Smart City category, is the first Competence Center that transforms the large Real Estate real estate interventions in smart projects.
Tommi, for the E-Health category. They are a virtual reality game developed to reduce anxiety and pain in the children with cancer and their caregivers, collecting data useful for doctors to monitor cancer patients and their caregivers patients during therapy.
Tutored, by Edtech category, a social platform where students improve their lives from preparing the exams for the first job opportunities.
Cubbit, for the Iot category, the first data center operating without proprietary servers users connect your storage and get the first unlimited Free Cloud service.
Marshmallow, for the Social Innovation category. Marshmallow Games creates educational apps that stimulate learning by mixing content Editorials and game.
Winning startups can be selected by SEUA to access the benefits and opportunities offered by part of European institutions, businesses, public bodies and other entrepreneurship stakeholders, for develop and promote their business.
They will have the opportunity to take part in the final to be held in Brussels in 2018.
Applications open for IoT acceleration programme
IoT Tribe are launching our next equity-free accelerator programme for early-stage IoT start-ups. Are you interested in joining us?
We will be supporting 10 startups in a 12+12 week intensive acceleration programme based out of the North of England where you will power up your product development, market testing and investment readiness with engineers-in-residence, access to a prototyping and testing lab and joining in on supply chain missions to South East Asia.
Are you…
- An early-stage IoT company?
- With an existing prototype and some evidence of product-market fit?
- With 2 or more founders?
- And the ambition to scale?
If so, apply to IoT Tribe North, the equity-free IoT accelerator. We’re offering 10 early-stage IoT start-ups a package worth over £100,000- and yes, its equity free!
More information at: http://bit.ly/IoTSupsAI
Hugin&Munin – Branding for Startups
On Thursday 30 June, Madrid Google Campus hosted a brand communication workshop for all startups (21) selected in the second batch of the IoT accelerator programme run by Startup Scaleup. The workshop was part of IoT week, a 5-day event where startups selected by Startup Scaleup receive mentoring, talks and workshops before beginning their 6-month journey to acceleration.
Led by Hugin&Munin, Startup Europe Press Office, the workshop focused on addressing startup branding needs in a personalised way.
Following a brief introduction on branding, many activities such as group work and individual tutoring were held. Those exercises helped to highlight some of the challenges facing startups: the ability of making their brand stand out, how to achieve the X factor. Branding is not typography, a concrete colour or a flyer – it’s a mixture of everything, it’s about what messages are imprinted in the consumers’ mind.
– If I tell you that I am the most good-looking at this table, this is marketing.
– If I repeatedly tell you that I am the most good-looking, this is advertising.
– If Alberto tells you that I am the most good-looking, this is public relations.
– If you state that I am the most good-looking, this is branding.
This is how Víctor Teodosio, co-founder of Hugin&Munin, explained the differences between those technical concepts.
Once these notions had been fully comprehended, the workshop moved to a deeper analysis of website logos, informational material, social networks, all with the help of hands-on exercises. Depending on the startups’ objectives, ideal customers and sector, a set of recommendations were given on the visuals, the tone, the channel that would convey the message best and, of course, the message in itself. All those key parts would then lead to fostering brand value.
– the use of social media channels always has to be coherent, and this is achieved by adopting the same tone: do you think that Media Markt Community Manager never has a bad day? Branding is a slow process, but it takes very little to destroy it.
Alberto Pascual made a contribution to one of the biggest headaches that all startups share: which social media networks to use, how to feed them, and if they were really useful based on their resources, targets and products offered.
The workshop ended up lasting twice as long as scheduled, i.e. 4 hours, where Hugin&Munin dedicated about 15 minutes to each of the 18 out of the 21 selected startups that attended the event. Undoubtedly it was a very short time to carry out a deep analysis for every startup, but just enough to be able to work with them internally afterwards and then send personalised emails where concrete advice was addressed and summarised in such a way that startups could keep working on their branding.
– all startups have something that makes them special, not only the idea, but the person who is behind them, his or her inborn qualities as a communicator, or perhaps a picture they took with the phone camera and then uploaded on the web, maybe a slogan that perfectly summarises their core value or a typography which perfectly fits with the image they want to transmit. There’s a need for a brushstroke of creativity to tell their story, they’ll have to change sections and organise their visual image so that there’s always a pattern, but you can tell why they’re here. They deserve it.
Closed Victor in an internal chat with Andrés Carrillo, Director of the Cloud Incubator HUB.
What did startups think?
The overall feedback was highly positive, startups enjoyed the experience and thanked Hugin&Munin for the mentoring. They even asked whether it was possible for them to keep cooperating with Hugin and Munin within the IoT acceleration programme.
Conclusions and a bit of advice:
Branding is still not being given enough importance but hopefully, after this mentoring, startups will see it as a way to reach their objectives and be successful.
Branding is something that needs to be taken care of from the outset, and its use varies according to the resources available. Also, everything they do will have an impact on branding. This will make them have to think carefully before making it visible to the public, using social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter. As a matter of fact, many startups have started to rethink their logos and pay more attention to their websites.
A last piece of advice for good branding for startups would be to work with a branding agency that really understands what a startup is, and knows how to make the most advantageous use of its resources. And startups should also invest more time and effort on good branding, as it’s just as valuable as investing in a good labour force: those are outlays that startups simply can’t afford not to make.