Le Web For Les Nordiques
As far as web conferences go, French LeWeb is the biggest happening in Europe so far. With an average ticket price hovering around 1700 EUR, it attracted 3000 participants this year. The guests ranged from Google, Facebook and Twittter executives to latest start-ups from around the world to investors to students and loads of press. Apart from hosting presentations and discussions with dot.com gurus, the conference is known for being a great place to network. How to justify this exquisite but costly experience for a Nordic or Baltic start-up? Depends on what you’re looking for. If it’s publicity you’re after but you’re not part of the Startup Competition, I’d recommend against going to Le Web. The size of the conference is so big that chances of being noticed are quite low. Not impossible but low.
XIHA Life Partners With BlueTeach To Enable Online Teaching
XIHA Life has partnered with a French company called BlueTeach to enable online teaching at their multi-cultural and multi-national social network. XIHA Life is a Finnish startup that has moved to Switzerland (Update: They're still registered in Finland). They have steadily grown their user base and Jani Penttinen, Co-founder of the company has tweeted that they recently passed the 600 000 registration mark.
With the help of BlueTeach's in-browser application, teachers are able to go through a variety of material together with their students. BlueTeach is also able to monetize the teaching situation as teachers are able to ask for a price for the session or teach for free. Looking at the offering BlueTeach has, I have to state that it is a pretty neat package put together. The service is also easy to use and you are able to use it to record your lessons and have them online for later use.
Two Arctic Companies to Pitch at LeWeb
LeWeb has announced their startup contestors and judges for this year’s Startup Competition. From the 30 companies there is one from China and Israel, five from US and 23 European companies, including Finnish Zipipop(previously covered) and Estonian based instant website creator Edicy.
The deal is that each company gets 7 minutes to pitch to the judges on the day. Winners of the competition will then have a chance to present their companies on the LeWeb main stage and additionally SUN Microsystems will offer a server to three final winners.
We at ArcticStartup congratulate and hope for the best for all startups but especially for our own Zipipop and Edicy. At least Zipipop has a nice track record with a win at Mobile 2.0 Europe and recent experience at Mindrek Startup Launchpad.
See the full list.
Finnish Startups Taking A Sauna Truck To LeWeb
ArcticStartup and Digibusiness Helsinki Region are organizing a trip for Finnish startups to LeWeb which takes place in Paris on 9th and 10th December.
LeWeb is the brainchild of Loic le Meur and his wife Geraldine le Meur. Loic is also steering the much talked about startup Seesmic. LeWeb is currently hands down the biggest and most talked about startup event in Europe that features many of the world famous anti-heroes and heroes such as Michael Arrington of TechCrunch, Dan Farber of CNET News, Steve Gillmor of The Gillmor Gang, Om Malik of GigaOm and Robert Scoble of Fast Company along with hundreds of startups.
A group of Finnish startups will invade LeWeb with a massive Sauna Truck. Yes! You heard right, a Sauna Truck! The hottest Finnish social media startups, metaphorically and literally after a few hours in the sauna truck, will combine their efforts at Le Web’08 in Paris in December. The trip is a continuum to a successful joint business trip to the Web 2.0 Expo San Francisco last April.
The Finnish startup mafia will arrive in Paris on Monday December 8th and the Sauna will be open for press, bloggers and industry leaders already in the same evening. If you're a Finnish startup and want to tag along contact tommi.rissanen [at] culminatum [dot] fi. There's still room for a few so hurry up!
Hope to see you all in the sauna.
