Southern Europe and the rising stars: Join our online pitch event!
Si eres un emprendedor che crede profondamente nella tecnologia e que está infinitamente ansioso para melhorar o mundo… Welcome to the Southern European Stars 2020
At Samaipata, given our Southern European blood, we want to be there in these times of crisis for founders and ease them a way of showcasing their ventures to investors. For this reason, jointly with Bright Pixel and @KiboVentures, we’ve organised an online pitch event teamed with some of the most relevant VCs in Portugal, Spain and Italy. Come join us, great things awaiting!
Why here? Southern Europe is the most promising ecosystem in Europe
In the past few years, VC investments have grown in Southern Europe, reinforcing a landscape that is growing both on entrepreneurs and companies to a point where we’re now proud to say that Southern Europe has 9unicorns and we’re eager to see how many are coming.
Like most of the companies we invest in, tech ecosystems also leverage on network effects in order to grow. Spain, Portugal and Italy have now the right ingredients to be the fastest growing startup ecosystem in Europe during the next decade:
- Money flowing: VC funding has grown 3x in the last 5 years, from €735m in 2015 to €2.2Bn in 2019, where many of that increase has been driven by international funds investing in the ecosystem.
- Great companies: We only had 1 unicorn in 2015 and now we already have a total of 9. This generates a cascade effect of funding, talent and innovation implying an exponential growth of the ecosystem as a whole.
- All stakeholders involved: Governments are committing to investing in innovation and entrepreneurship, from Fund of Funds to tax incentives.
- Accessible talent: We have leading universities worldwide (e.g. Bocconi in Milano, UPF in Barcelona, Catholic University of Lisbon) and tech giants setting their EU hubs in the region (e.g. Netflix in Rome, IBM in Madrid, Google in Lisbon & Madrid). Both are contributing to generate an impressive talent pool.
Who? In times of crisis, It’s a matter of enabling communication
When everything is going south at such a global scale, the worst thing that can be done is to only think on yourself. This event is not about taking credit for any specific investors but about getting all VCs involved in one same project and help the key players of the ecosystem, founders. There has been much rumouring and debate about if investors are or are not open for business, won’t get into this but what it’s certainly true is that all investors are still willing to look for amazing founders (specially in the hottest ecosystem of all) and what’s on our hands is to enable a more direct communication.
Okay, enough talking — how do I join?
- Show us what you got: Apply here to the event and check us out here if you want a more detailed explanation of who we are. Deadline: 13th of May
- Hear back from us: All participating investors will be reviewing all the startup applications and voting the top 5 for each vertical (B2B, B2C and Healthcare).
- And the winner is: The day of the event is set to be the 20th of May. We will be holding the event on zoom and will be open for everyone to come as part of the audience and benefit from the event. That same evening we will communicate the winners of each vertical.
We’ve tried to create an open pitch event so most can participate but with some clear lines of action for everybody to follow:
- Tech startups in Southern Europe
- Raising less than €3.5m
- There will be 3 streams happening simultaneously: B2C, B2B and Healthcare
- Pitches will be 5 min long with 15min Q&A
Surprises, networking and much more — c. €500k in rewards for selected startups
Sure, an online pitch event seemed like a good idea and it’s the core of the value proposition, easing up a way for founders to get in touch with some of the most reputed investors in Southern Europe in a joint (virtual) space. However, we couldn’t settle just for that. We took it one step further and we’ve joined forces with some of the key stakeholders in the tech landscape to offer different services and network to the finalists of the event.
- Cloud and tech-related services: AWS will be offering €5k in cloud credits as part of their Activate Program to the startups that we select. Also, IBM Cloud on their side is partnering with us to offer up to €10k per month during a whole year in tech-related services as part of their Startup with IBM Premium package to the winner in each vertical, as well as offering their Startup with IBM package to the 15 finalist which involves €1k per month during one year of their pioneering technology and services.
- Free office: Bright Pixel, co-founder of the event, has offered to give 3 month free office space once we go back to normality to the winner in the B2B vertical.
- Google consulting services: Winners from each vertical will be offered consulting services and ad-hoc mentorship from Google for Startups mentor network to help the winners build state-of-the-art products, B2C Sales processes and tech infrastructure.
- Successful founders network: The other co-founder of the event, Kibo Ventures, as well as other VCs who are co-branding the initiative with us have offered their network to help finalists and winners connect with some of the most successful founders in Southern Europe and create that community essence that the ecosystem needs nowadays.
Come on! Join us, we’re looking forward to hearing more about you :)
Also, as always… contrarian views on my opinion of the Southern European landscape are welcome, please reach out!
Samaipata is a pan-European VC fund investing in digital platforms and marketplaces at Seed stages, from its offices in Paris, Madrid and London. If you are an entrepreneur launching a platform, get in touch!
