ArcticStartup is joining Geek Girl Meetup as a media partner. Geek Girl Meetup is a Swedish unconference for women, by women, who are interested in technology, web, social media and entrepreneurship. The event takes place October 24-25 in Stockholm and is being organized for the second time despite its short existence. What started as a one day event for 50 participants in March has now turned into two day event with 100 women attending. And there’re still ladies on the waiting list!
conference
Geek Girl Meetup Gathers 100 Women To Talk About Tech
Mindtrek’s First Day – Full Of Variety
Check, check… mike working, reporting from the Mindtrek conference from Tampere where some 800 people are networking, discussing internet and digital media at large. The day has been action packed and there has been a lot of different content to consume. Furthermore, the audience saw some top notch speakers at Mindtrek this year, especially Chris Messina and Jyri Engeström, who were keynote speakers continuing on the post they wrote for ArcticStartup earlier.
The day began with a keynote by Chris Messina. He talked about identity as a platform. Judging on the amount of comments from people on the aisles in the conference, Chris hit top on with his presentation. Although there were some illogicalities, which he admits, it’s always great to hear news from The Valley on the trends that are pumping there.
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More Startup Buzz (And Money) At Mindtrek This Year
Mindtrek is the annual conference for social media, web 2.0 as well as digital media and business in general. In 2008 the conference gathered about 800 people from 32 countries with 150 foreigners attending the conference. ArcticStartup is extremely happy to be participating in this leading conference in its field. We will be helping out with the conference this year, so you’ll be able to catch some visibility on our blog as well if you happen to participate. Mindtrek will be organised between September 30th and October 2nd this year.
Why do we like Mindtrek? Simple, the prizes are magnificent and without competition. This year, Mindtrek is hosting its launchpad competition to startups and innovative people with ideas. The main prize is 20 009 € including business sparring, internationalization, growth and financing services provided by Tekes, Finnvera, Technopolis Ventures, Finpro, Diges, Lexia, and Hermia. A lot of help and money to be won through a simple competition. It’s not too pricey to participate either – entries are only 150€ per company. You can find more information on the competition on the Mindtrek website and to register, you should follow the instruction over here. The deadline for entries has been extended to August 31st.
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Reminder: Elevator Pitch Contest for Nordic & Baltic Firms
This is a reminder for all interested startups in the Nordic and Baltic countries to apply for the upcoming elevator pitch contest, to learn from venture capitalists and other startups and win free world-class consulting.
The instructions on how to apply can be found in our original post, hurry up!
The contest is open to all technology startups in the region.
The pitch contest is organized on 26th May 2009 in Tallinn, Estonia in conjunction with the Second Annual Tallinn Conference of The International Technology Law Association.
See also the detailed conference agenda (PDF).
Open For Applications: Elevator Pitch Contest
Update: The deadline is extended until May 13th.
The conference agenda can now be downloaded from the event home page (or use this PDF direct link).
ArcticStartup is proud to present an opportunity for all Baltic and Nordic startups to connect with and pitch to venture capitalists and compete for great prizes.
In alignment with the Second Annual Tallinn Conference organized by The International Technology Law Association in collaboration with Enterprise Estonia, ArcticStartup is cooperating to organize an Elevator Pitch Business Plan Contest with support from Connect Estonia. The contest is held in Tallinn, Estonia on May 26, 2009.
Prizes:
- One full day of law consulting with Fish & Richardson P.C., Silicon Valley, worth $6000. The prize can be used as the winner wishes, e.g., to incorporate a subsidiary to establish operations in Silicon Valley. The consultation can be done in person or by Skype or Polycom video. Consultation with the Munich office of Fish & Richardson P.C. may also be included, subject to availability and requirements of the contest winner.
- One full day of law consulting with Knobbe, Martens, Olson & Bear, LLP, worth $3000, to be used as the winner wishes. The consultation can be done in person (location negotiable) or by Skype or Polycom video.
The jury:
- Martin Hauge, Managing Director, Creandum, Stockholm
- Allan Martinson, Managing Director, MTVP, Tallinn
- Artturi Tarjanne, Managing Director, Nexit Ventures, Helsinki
- Rick Marshall, Managing Director, Intelligent Capital, San Francisco
- Sten Tamkivi , Chief Evangelist, Skype, Tallinn
- Ott Parna, Managing Director, Estonian Development Fund, Tallinn
- Richard Allan Horning, Principal, Fish & Richardson P.C., Silicon Valley
Growth-oriented technology startups from all Nordic and Baltic countries are welcomed to apply. Five firms will be selected to present a 5-minute pitch at the event. The judging criteria include the expected success of the firm, growth potential, differentiation and competitive advantage, risk and financial viability, and the management team.
Please note the contest rules and other information in the Invitation. Any questions about the contest can be sent to miikka(at)arcticstartup(dot)com.
The applications must be based using this form.
Please send your application to events(at)arcticstartup(dot)com latest by May 13th 6:00 PM EET. Finalists will be announced on May 14th.
Coaching and training for preparing the pitches are available to all chosen finalists prior to the contest, provided by Connect Estonia and members of the International Technology Law Association Luiga Mody Hääl Borenius and Raidla Lejins & Norcous, either online, in Tallinn, or in the participants’ home country, depending on possibilities.
The Next Web Brings The European Startup Scene To Amsterdam
The Next Web 2009, the fourth edition of the conference that began in 2006, will be held again in the beautiful city of Amsterdam on the 15th to 17th April.
The great guys at The Next Web gave us 10 passes with 20% discount to give out to our readers, you guys. First come first served, so be quick. You can buy a discount ticket here.
TheNextWeb also announced the 19 startup competition finalists. Among other we’re happy to see Prezi on the list. Congrats to all the finalist!
The conference has traditionally had a solid line up of speakers and this year is no exception. You can see the whole list of speakers here and the agenda for the three days here.
I will be in Amsterdam for the three days, so if you’re coming join ArcticStartup Dopplr group and drop me an email if you want to meet up. See you in the windmill country!
Photo by earcos (CC)
Plugg Startup Rally 2009 Deadline Closing
Plugg, the one day conference organised in Brussels, will be closing its Startup Rally 2009 submissions on February 4th. Plugg is taking place on the 13th of March and this year will showcase an interesting line-up of speakers from around the globe, including the former CEO and current chairman of the board of Dopplr Lisa Sounio.
Plugg is organised by Robin Wauters, a Techcrunch writer, who has this to say about the startup competition, “we want to give those European startups with the most potential a chance to raise their profile in front of the world, which in our case means hundreds of professional web practicioners, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and trade press / bloggers.” 20 most prominent startups from Europe will have a chance to give a 2-minute pitch to the audience at the conference. Registering is free and all you have to do is fit the criteria provided. Read more about registering on this minisite.
Four Nordic and Baltic Startups to Mobile Peer Awards 2009 Finals
Four Nordic and Baltic Startups were selected to Mobile Peer Awards 2009 Finals in Barcelona by the international virtual Jury from the 42 semi-finalists.
- Fortumo – MobileMonday Estonia
- Portal for setting up free and extremely fast web-based mobile services and monetizing them, offering billing in 11 countries and expanding.
- Getjar Networks – MobileMonday Lithuania
- One of the world’s most popular mobile application distribution and developer communities with over 14 million downloads per month.
- Mobintech – MobileMonday Copenhagen
- Offers small digital display glasses, through which the small screen of mobile phones will be transformed into an experience similar to viewing a 30” flat screen TV.
- PopCatcher – MobileMonday Sweden
- Provides technology and products for stripping out talk and commercials from recorded radio music into plain music MP3’s.
The firms will be presenting their final pitch in Barcelona on February 16th.
(See the full list of the 20 selected companies on Mobile Peer Awards web page.)
Congrats all four!
The Following Takes Place Between… 24 Hour Business Camp Ongoing
The Swedish 24 Hour Business Camp (in Swedish; try Google translation and our previous post) has been kicked off in the outskirts of Stockholm today at noon. There is a buzz across the Japanese style Yasuragi Hasseludden conference center with over 50 small teams of Swedish Internet entrepreneurs and developers planning their new businesses.
The event started out yesterday evening with a boat trip to the conference center, where the participants tuned in to creative mood by relaxing and mingling over a sushi dinner in Yukata’s, and enjoying spa and the tranquility of the establishment.
Nothing great is born without pain, though (right?), and there have been some problems this time as well. As Ted Valentin, the event organizer, mentioned earlier, “All one needs is a laptop, an Internet connection and an idea.” Well, so we thought. The equation almost fell short with major wifi fail lasting from the last evening until the very kick-off of the event. Some hotshot technicians were brought in this morning, however, and got the issue fixed in time for the start, preventing the conference group switching to another location. But the network is still rather sluggish and somewhat unstable.
Nevertheless, the teams have not let connectivity issues slow them down, and are working at full speed. Our hope with Ted and the participants is that these kinds of events will radiate the excitement and entrepreneurial spirit across the whole of Nordics and Baltics.
You can find out more from the event’s live blog, and ArcticStartup will also report tomorrow with a new post. We will publish some video interviews later on as well (and of course register the newborn startups in ArcticIndex). See also the Flickr photos.
Apply for MobileMonday Global Peer Awards 2009
As the new year soon starts, the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain will only be a few weeks away. Similarly to last year, MobileMonday in Barcelona will be organized the same week of the congress, on February 16, 2009. Also as last year, the event will focus on MobileMonday Peer Awards finals, the largest mobile startup innovation competition on the planet as the tagline says.
It’s now time to register your startup to the competition to your local MobileMonday Chapter (the one in your city, or the nearest one). Hurry up, the registration closes December 31st, midnight your chapter’s local time!
Each MoMo chapter will select their nominee for the finals using their preferred method of choice (email voting, local event voting, founder’s voting, jury, etc.; check your local chapter for more details). An international jury will then select the Peer Awards winner from 20 finalists in Barcelona based on 3-minute pitches.
Each chapter will announce their nominee by January 16, 2009 midnight local time. Notice that if you want to be eligible for the finalist nomination, you must be willing to travel to the Peer Awards in Barcelona at your own expense.
As there are altogether 67 chapters (!) participating this year, there will be an international virtual jury pre-screening the nominees, and selecting the 20 finalists. MoMo is trying to make the selection as transparent and open to the industry as possible. They are thus accepting applications to the finalist-selecting jury from individuals, to select the finalists among all the chapter nominees by online vote during mid-January. The virtual jury members will not need to travel to Barcelona. If you’re interested to become part of the online jury email jury AT mobilepeerawards DOT com with a short bio, your LinkedIn profile, and personal blog and twitter name if you have one.
LeWeb is now LeSauna
Thomas Crampton blogged about the Finnish startup initiative in Paris and posted a very cool video online that we just have to share with our readers.
Slush Live @ ArcticStartup
You can follow Slush live at ArcticStartup via Floobs’ live streams. Remember, do give us insight in terms of who you’d like us to interview in the comments of our previous post about Slush. The event will kick off at 9 am EET and the video streams are courtesy of Floobs.
Slush track 1 – Entrepreneur 2.0
– removed (we’ll add the archived the material later on) –
Slush track 2 – Software Developer’s Gathering
– removed (we’ll add the archived material later on) –
Will be great to meet all of you at Slush!
Fortumo and Kuneri Selected to Mobile Media Conference
Estonian Fortumo and Finnish Kuneri have won a free pass to Nordic Mobile Media Conference in Tallinn, Estonia on December 3-4th. Both companies will also get an exhibition stand in the event.
Fortumo (coverage) enables quick and free creation and monetization of web-based mobile services maintenance, while Kuneri (coverage) provides a variety of Flash Lite tools and services, latest release being Pikkoo.
Congrats to the winners!
[Registeration to the conference]
Free Pass to Nordic Mobile Media Conference
This is a reminder that ArcticStartup and Nordic Mobile Media Conference are looking for the “most interesting Nordic/Baltic mobile startup”. The winner startup will get 2 free passes to the event in Tallinn, Estonia on December 3-4th. To apply, please tell us why you should be selected by sending mail to mart.kikas [at] aspiro.ee and info [at] arcticstartup.com. As I didn’t remember post the reminder earlier, the time for applications will be extended until this Friday, November 7th. So send in your application if you haven’t already!
In addition to the entrance, the winners will get an exhibition stand in the exhibition hall in the networking/coffee breaks area, along with a table, chairs, electricity and WIFI internet connection for introducing your startup to the conference delegates and to demo what you are doing.
If getting a free pass isn’t your bag, you may also register to the conference on the event web page.
Nordic Mobile Media Conference on December 3-4th (Free Ticket)
Nordic Mobile Media Conference will be held in Tallinn, Estonia on December 3-4th for the fifth time. The conference will address different perspectives to mobile media strategies and act as a networking forum for mobile media professionals, and those eager to collaborate to further develop the mobile media industry and grow the market. Participants will have the opportunity to exchange ideas, share and learn from experiences, and hear about new exciting opportunities. Present will be media companies, mobile operators, content producers, mobile media companies, handset manufacturers and marketing companies.
ArcticStartup and Nordic Mobile Media Conference announce a search for the “most interesting Nordic or Baltic mobile startup”. The winner startup will get 2 free passes and in addition an exhibition stand in the exhibition hall in the networking/coffee breaks area. You will get a table, chairs, electricity and WIFI internet connection for introducing your startup to the conference delegates and to demo what you are doing.
To claim the free passes, please send us your pitch and reasoning why you would be the best candidate to participate at mart.kikas [at] aspiro.ee and info [at] arcticstartup.com. You have time until November 3rd to apply. We will announce the winner in the beginning of November. If you don’t fit to the target category or don’t believe in your chances, you may also register right away on the conference web page.
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