Last week, we concluded the 12th edition of Blackbox Connect, welcoming 14 international startups on stage to present their startups and global growth strategies. Read more about their ideas and the talented founders who drive them forward.
BIDTOTRIP is an auction platform that allows travelers to bid for and win luxury travel packages.
With discounts as high at 95%, BIDTOTRIP plans to connect the 1 million rooms that go empty every day with customers who would normally not be able to afford them. The rest of the participating bidders can also purchase rooms at a discounted rate through the “buy now” option. Active in the UK and Italy and growing by 40% every month, they are now looking to expand to the US and other European countries.
BonzaQuote (Ireland)is the global online marketplace and community for Do It Yourselfers (DIYers) to connect with home improvement retailers online.
Founder Jack Drea has extensive experience in the building supplies industries through his family’s construction business and his passion for DIY. After having launched in the UK and partnered with King Fisher, he plans to expand to the US and create the best global community of DIYers.
Started 3 years ago in Lebabon, Brate is a data mining solution that helps people discover what places and things are trending from 100M users and growing.
Currently covering 10 markets across South Arabia, Jordan and Egypt, the Brate cofounders are planning to launch in the UK and further expand to the US and internationally.
Divano (Slovakia) is a personalized and social mobile video platform for watching additional content from favorite shows on your mobile.
With 6+ years in the media industry, Lujza plans to leverage Divano’s reach on traditional media and grow it into the place for media chat, cross screen campaigns and VOD. With 15k users and growing, they plan to expand to the Check Republic as well as internationally.
Expandly (UK) enables retailers to expand their global reach by aggregating 34 global sales channels including eBay, Amazon, Shopify and Etsy.
With 700 users and growing, Expandly is helping businesses not only sell across multiple channels but also centralize product listing, inventory and orders.
Jowi (Singapore) is the first SaaS end-to-end restaurant management platform that allows restaurant owners and managers to save time & money.
By combining every process a restaurant needs from reservations, payment, deliveries, ordering and tracking, Jowi offers a comprehensive solutions for owners and managers to have a good overview of their business and save money through automating specific tasks. Since launching in January, they on-boarded 200 restaurants across 4 countries and are now looking to scale to the US as well.
M2Talent Ltd is a Finnish digital service company focused on recognizing and channeling people’s competences.
Their first product, Mazhr™, is a platform that allows individuals to connect with the most relevant job opportunities. They’ve been working with large companies like P&G to connect them with talented people and have had great success in spotting and helping talented people find their preferred jobs based on their passions.
Piggipo (Thailand) is a personal finance app for managing multiple credit cards through an engaging user experience.
Having already been acknowledged as the #1 credit card application in Thailand and awarded with the people’s choice awards, Piggipo rapidly grew to 120,000 users and is expanding to neighboring countries as well as the US.
Plumis (UK) is a next generation plug & play fire sprinkler using targeted watermist technology that needs 90% less water, reducing fire & water damage.
With 1,5M revenue in the first year, and having already saved at least 1 person to date, Plumis is very keen to look into the American market and explore the best possibilities to implement their watermist sprinklers into more homes around the world
ShopShopMe (UAE) brings together the UAE’s leading online stores, allowing users to cross-shop thousands of products all from its own website.
Featuring products from the most popular online stores in UAE, to the up and coming boutiques, shopshopme.com lets users search most UAE’s retailers at once — by category, brand, store, sale items, price point, free shipping. Having already partnered with 200 retailers, and reached 50,000 users, ShopShopMe is eager to reinvent the shopping experience across more areas and markets.
SportConnect (Finland) enables influencers and brands in sports, fitness and wellness to monetize their fans and followers.
Sport Connect is a platform that allows athletes and sport enthusiasts to create their own apps and engage with potential customers who are interested in exercises and advice. This allows potential coaches to monetize their content and expertise through their own apps.
TommyJams (India) is a marketplace where venues book artists for live events, and fans book tickets to attend those events.
Started in India, TommyJams is a virtual platform for musicians and organizers. Seeing the lack of communication between artists and new events and opportunities, the founders of Tommy Jams decided to create an online marketplace between artists and venues and allow the musicians to take control of their touring calendars and income.
Zero Keyboard™ (Finland) changes how Enterprise Systems are used on mobile. It automates user input by using voice, picture and touch gestures.
With extensive background in the B2B enterprise software business, cofounders Antti Rikkinen and Jaan Apajalahti plan to revolutionize enterprise data collection and analysis.
Zoomaal (Lebanon) is a platform that enables innovation — a critical driver of economic growth — in 3rd world countries via crowdfunding.
Noticing a gap in the crowdfunding market, Zoomaal helps innovative projects in the Arab world by connecting them with potential supporters. With over 90 projects already funded, the Zoomaal founders plan to scale up and find even more innovative and important social projects around the world.
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