After hosting competitions in ten countries in Europe and Central Asia in only five months, Seedstars World already identified ten of the most promising startups in each country, highlighting their local startup ecosystems. D’efekt, a community-powered content creation tool with the help of which users can create, collaborate and unleash their creativity, will represent Armenia. Only the Ukrainian finalist is yet to be found.
The biggest startup competition for emerging markets is now hosting its entrepreneurship forum for emerging markets, Seedstars CEE Summit, from December 12th to 14th, in Kyiv, Ukraine, at Lavra Gallery. During the event, the 12 finalists from four cities in Ukraine will compete for the title of “Best Startup in Ukraine” and the chance to represent the country at the Seedstars Summit, the competition finals, happening in April in Switzerland.
Olena Boytsun (Luminate), Jeffrey Donenfeld (Boomtown Accelerators), Eveline Buchatskiy (One Way Ventures), Christoph Sollich, aka. The Pitch Doctor, Anastasia Sylenok (1991 Civic Tech Center), Dmitriy Shemet (R&D64) and Andrii Degeler (Tech.eu) are among the star-filled line up who will join the Seedstars CEE Summit to mentor and share valuable insights with all attendees.
“For the past five months we have made this Region our home and went on an interesting journey deep into ten startup scenes, not only scouting for the best tech entrepreneurs but working directly with them and other passionate ecosystem builders. We aimed at making a difference everywhere we went.”, says Agahuseyn Ahmadov, Regional Manager for CEE at Seedstars.
From Uzbekistan in May to Latvia in October (and everything in between) the 22 early-stage tech startups have won their local competitions or semi-finals and will join the Seedstars CEE Summit, on the run-up to the finals in Switzerland. The event is designed to facilitate meaningful discussions about relevant tech entrepreneurship topics, with a special focus on civic tech. This includes an intensive civic tech workshop, organized in partnership with Luminate, one of the biggest investors in the field, having committed more than USD 128 million in civic tech projects worldwide.
“Now we are very excited to bring the entire network together in Ukraine, to dive into the different ways how technology and entrepreneurship can rapidly impact and improve people’s lives by tackling local social challenges directly. Through different activities, such as the civic-tech workshop we are organizing with Luminate, we hope to be able to shake the grounds and shape the future of tech entrepreneurship in CEE.”, Ahmadov adds.
The Seedstars CEE Summit will be a privileged occasion for the Seedstars World finalists to engage and gain key learnings from the most prominent local and international stakeholders and prepare themselves for the Seedstars Summit in Lausanne, where they will represent their countries on the competition for the title of Seedstars Global winner and up to $1mn in investments and other prizes.
The Embassy of Switzerland in Ukraine, Unit.City, Chasopys and Radar Tech are also supporting the event.
