Troubled Events Startup Pollen Up for Sale Amid Restructuring Bloomberg
Tag: startup
Embattled events startup Pollen misses payroll amid acquisition talks
London-based events startup Pollen, which has raised hundreds of millions of dollars from some of Europe’s best-known VCs, missed payroll in June as it works to secure new funding, potentially in the form of an acquisition.
Salary payments to hundreds of staff were due to hit bank accounts on June 30. Six days later, management told US-based staff via Slack that their salary was being transferred that day. UK-based staff received their salary on July 1.
In a message to staff on July 1 sent via Slack, seen by Sifted, Callum Negus-Fancey, cofounder and CEO of the events operator, explained that the delay came as the company is “closing a transaction with a large, well-known entertainment company”.
“They will become our biggest investor and shareholder,” the message continued. One person who is a shareholder in the company tells Sifted that Pollen is in fact in discussion with several parties about an acquisition.
Asked if the company was looking to be acquired, Pollen tells Sifted: “We can’t discuss ongoing commercial transactions externally. However, watch this space.”
Negus-Fancey’s message to Pollen employees went on to say: “I am working hard to finalise negotiations with our shareholders as fast as possible and get them to wire funds. I am really sorry about the inconvenience and anxiety the situation has caused all of you.”
It’s the latest twist for a company that announced a massive $150m fundraising round in April only to lay off 22% of its full-time workforce the following month. The company, which organises concerts and “experiences” around the world involving artists including Justin Bieber, has been hit by an avalanche of refund requests this year after events were cancelled because of pandemic restrictions or limited demand. Several customers reported to Sifted in June that they had been waiting “months” for refunds.
After missed payroll and amid the company’s funding discussions, morale among Pollen’s remaining employees is now “terrible”, according to one employee. Fears are growing internally that the company could announce another round of layoffs.
Sifted asked Pollen if it will be able to pay staff next month. “Yes, absolutely we can,” the company replied in a statement, calling last week’s payroll “mis-timing” and “an isolated, one-off event”. The company also denied it was at risk of insolvency. “The company has a supportive and well funded shareholder base,” Pollen said.
Pollen has raised roughly $255m in equity from investors including Northzone, Kindred, Backed and Molten Ventures. It last announced a $150m Series C in April this year, which was led by Sienna Investment Managers, a Luxembourg-based investment firm.
Late payments
Since Sifted reported on outstanding refund payments in June, multiple current and former Pollen employees and suppliers have shared their concerns about the company. One person who previously supplied services to Pollen tells Sifted that he and several others — who were also seeking payment from the company — were considering legal action if Pollen didn’t pay them soon.
Employees were this week openly discussing the impact of delayed salaries on the company’s Slack.
Slack messages shared with Sifted show employees fretting about rent payments and transactions that won’t go through as a result of the late payments. Another employee wrote that they had credit card payments due soon and failure to pay them promptly could negatively affect their credit score.
There have also been delays in outstanding pay for those laid off in May. Former employees say they were due to receive their final pay cheques in late June, but Sifted has seen emails from Pollen’s chief people officer where staff were told that their outstanding salaries had been delayed further.
Pollen did not comment on outstanding pay for laid-off workers.
“They’re in too deep, this is all they can do with payroll,” another former employee tells Sifted.
Late payroll has happened once before at Pollen, the company told Sifted last month. “In the company’s history, there has been an occasion where payroll was late by two days for one of our US entities due to human error and the following day being a bank holiday,” it said.
Eanna Kelly is a contributing editor at Sifted. He tweets from @EannaKelly1. Freya Pratty is a reporter at Sifted. She tweets from @FPratty.
Fintech Startup TradeStreet Tracking Unusual Market Events Expands Internationally
The Swiss and Czech-based startup TradeStreet using a proprietary algorithm to track unusual stock market events is expanding its coverage from Switzerland and Czechia to the rest of Europe and the United States.
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Publishing date:
May 18, 2022 • 44 minutes ago • 2 minute read • Join the conversation
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Prague, Czech Republic–(Newsfile Corp. – May 18, 2022) – TradeStreet, a Swiss and Czech-based fintech startup, is expanding its operations over the borders to foreign markets including the rest of Europe, the US and other major markets. TradeStreet is an application that helps to detect unusual events happening in the US stock market by analyzing hundreds of millions of data daily in real-time.
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“We are committed to make the big market data readable to anyone,” Co-Founder and longtime investor Dominik Kovarik said. “People can go and search in millions of data in publicly or privately available data sources, but it is extremely difficult to interpret anything from them. Thus, we have founded TradeStreet. We combine data from many sources and by using modern AI algorithms we backtest, combine and interpret the results to the users.”
Dominik Kovarik, TradeStreet Co-Founder & Investor
The platform makes it easy for intraday, swing and long-term traders to follow unusual option flows. Delivering more than 600 unusual option orders a day by scanning multiple exchanges at once, it helps stock and option traders to reveal sweep orders on the option market. That is especially helpful in conjunction with unusual trades in Dark Pool exchanges (private securities exchange in which typically large financial institutions trade anonymously).
The users will find many other features like analysis of insider transactions (CEOs, CFOs, beneficial owners and others). The AI runs big data analysis on this data based on clustering of the transactions, sentiment evolution and many more.
TradeStreet makes big market data readable to anyone
Similarly, one can follow analyst ratings from the top Wall Street analysts powered by AI and a set of other rules trying to filter the best analyst ratings. The proprietary algorithm, called TradeStreet Analyst Algo™, is an algorithm that based on several conditions trades based on new analyst ratings.
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The platform is full of such features, and it is extremely transparent with their customers regarding future features. Via a public roadmap, it prioritizes new features directly with the users. Users can even suggest new feature ideas and by voting and they can eventually be implemented by the two development teams located in Switzerland and the Czech Republic.
Find more at https://www.tradestreet.io or you can sign up for an on-line Workshop hosted by Dominik at https://event.webinarjam.com/register/71/o80vntm8.
Media Details:
Viral Media spol. s r.o.
Martin Linha
support@tradestreet.io
Rybna 716/24, Stare Mesto, 110 00 Prague, Czech Republic
To view the source version of this press release, please visit https://www.newsfilecorp.com/release/124111
#distro
Montreal-based startup to launch event platform | IT World Canada News
A Montreal-based startup is developing a mobile event platform where users can post their own events and find things to do in their area.
Thrills, launching at the end of May, will let people discover or post all kinds of events and activities for anyone to enjoy.
The pandemic temporarily stopped group events and gatherings, and as restrictions loosen and pre-pandemic activities resume, people are on the hunt for fun things to do.
“We spent two years behind walls and no one’s going out anymore. So how about we create something that would allow people to enjoy life again,” Clarence-Hugues Domond, a fourth year computer science student at Cal Poly Pomona, and co-founder and chief technology officer, said while explaining the idea behind Thrills.
Here’s how the app works:
When a user first opens the app, the first screen they will see is a list of all the events available within a certain radius of their location.
Users can filter by the kinds of event they are interested in, as well as by the start time and date and the time at which the event was posted. Users can also search for specific events.
Examples of events include birthday parties, meetups at bars, or even more low-key events like hiking a specific trail with a smaller group of people.
Once they find an event of interest, users can join group chats for all the participants of that event.
“That’s a very cool feature, where once you join an event, you’re able to break the ice with the people that are going there, you’re able to make friends before the event and make the experience a bit more personal,” Domond said.
Thrills users can create their own profiles where their current and past events will be displayed.
Because of this feature, Domond describes the app as a “crossroads” between a social media and event platform.
Securing Thrills
For privacy reasons, users can choose to make their event public, private, or exclusive.
“If you don’t want everybody to try and join your venue, you’d make it private and so nobody would be able to see it except you and the people you invited. Exclusive means that people can see it, but they have to request to join so you’re able to filter this flow of people in and out your event,” he said.
In addition to the event settings, Thrills also ensures that accounts are verified and linked to real emails for security purposes. As of now, only people above the age of 16 will be allowed to use the app.
The app will only disclose the location of the event once a user joins.
Thrills has been designed to be compatible with both iOS and Android.
What’s next?
The team is now working on adding a feature that allows users to post content from the events they attend on the app, similar to what they’d create for an Instagram reel or TikTok video.
“This platform allows you to just go on there and create anything on the spot, or join anything on the spot. That’s where the beauty of Thrills really is,” Domond said.
Hopin: virtual events start-up struggles as real gatherings return
In November 2020, with the pandemic in full force, British virtual events start-up Hopin declared that a new era of digital gatherings had begun.
Virtual events were “here to stay”, said founder Johnny Boufarhat, as he bragged that there were “more than 15,000 monthly events” available on Hopin’s “Explore” platform. Today, there are fewer than 500 listed.
Boufarhat’s vision made Hopin a pandemic sensation and Europe’s fastest growing start-up ever. Launched in 2019, his company rocketed to fame after Covid hit with a conferencing product that seemed tailor-made for lockdowns.
The 27-year-old raised more than a billion dollars for Hopin in little over a year, reaching a $7.8bn private market valuation that made him Britain’s youngest self-made billionaire on paper.
As top-tier venture capital firms like IVP, Andreessen Horowitz and Tiger Global clamoured to invest, Boufarhat sold $195mn worth of his own shares, according to a Financial Times analysis.
With Covid beginning to recede and publicly traded technology stocks being dumped by investors, Boufarhat now faces a moment of truth as he tries to build a sustainable business that lives up to the lofty expectations it set during the pandemic.
“The landscape will look very different going forward. People can now meet,” noted one events industry executive. They dismissed the pandemic-driven online events boom as “a bit of an artificial bubble”.
The slump in listings on Hopin Explore, envisaged as an “events marketplace” for virtual and hybrid gatherings but considered a “flop” by one former employee, is just one sign that Hopin faces harder days ahead.
In February, the company laid off 12 per cent of its staff, or about 138 people. Hopin has a fully remote workforce and no offices. At the time, Hopin said it was “reorganising to align with our goals for greater efficiency and sustainable growth”
The market price for Hopin shares fell 41 per cent during the first quarter on Zanbato, which operates a private secondary trading market, according to the company’s data. A broader index maintained by Zanbato fell 1 per cent during the same period.
Hopin softened the blow of the redundancies with generous severance packages, but the effort was undermined by comments Boufarhat made at a subsequent company-wide virtual meeting, according to people familiar with the matter.
One person briefed on the comments said Boufarhat had joked about the number of people present, saying: “I guess we got rid of more than I thought.”
Hopin said Boufarhat “immediately regretted his choice of words and apologised to the team”. It said that hybrid events remained a big area of opportunity for the company, adding: “As 79 per cent of event marketers in the EMEA are planning to host hybrid events in 2022, we’re currently executing on our vision to offer the most seamless, hybrid solution on one platform.”
Explore was launched to publicise events that were open for anyone to attend, but much of Hopin’s focus has now shifted to running invitation-only corporate events, such as sales meetings or employee get-togethers. It is also developing a broader range of tools, including for physical events.
The company said Hopin Explore was “a nice tool that we will likely dedicate more time and attention to in the future but it is not currently an area of focus.”
Hopin crossed $100mn in annual revenues last year and has not needed to spend much of the money it has raised, said one person familiar with the company’s finances
Boufarhat, who was born in Australia and later studied at University of Manchester, was a little-known UK-based budding entrepreneur who had raised only a seed round of funding for Hopin when the pandemic struck.
He has said the idea for Hopin originated in a bout of illness in 2015 that left him immunocompromised and at times confined at home. The experience got him thinking about networking online.
Boufarhat’s other ventures have included a curated written content discovery platform called Readory, and an online speed dating company called Quiin. Some of the code for Quiin was wrapped into Hopin, according to people familiar with the matter.
He blogged as well as coded. In one piece posted in 2016, he railed against “globalists”; another was titled “How Hillary Clinton Tried to Rig the Elections”. Hopin noted Boufarhat was 22 at the time, adding: “His views have evolved and he would not publish them today.”
When Covid arrived, Hopin rose as event organisers scrambled to move online to avoid cancelling events outright. Hopin offered more functionality for large gatherings and conferences than companies like Zoom. “The Covid situation helped the company jump really quickly,” said a second former employee.
As customers flocked to the company, so too did major investors and the extraordinary demand allowed Boufarhat to sell $195mn of his own shares, or about a fifth of his stake. He now owns just under 40 per cent of Hopin but retains voting control.
In a podcast last year, Boufarhat was candid about the leverage he has had with Hopin’s backers, saying that while he was always transparent with investors about the performance of the business, he disliked giving them contractual rights to information.
“I don’t want you over looking, over controlling, being able to ask for information whenever you want it, bothering our VP of Finance who is busy with an acquisition and three other things while we’re scaling at super fast speed,” he said on the Twenty Minute VC podcast.
Some of that rapid growth has come through acquisitions, most significantly in December 2020 when the company acquired live streaming site StreamYard for $250mn The move effectively doubled Hopin’s annual recurring revenue to $65mn at the time.
One venture capitalist who passed on investing in Hopin last year said they viewed the valuation as too high at the time because the business had been boosted by the StreamYard deal and Covid. They recalled Boufarhat arguing in response that Hopin was growing faster than its competitors.
Hopin said a StreamYard product for business customers launched last year had attracted customers like Amazon and Microsoft, and was “exceeding its goals”.
“Our investors believe in our vision to bring the world closer together, and we are in a strong financial position,” the company said. “We will continue to invest in our growth and building an impactful company.”
Additional reporting by Max Harlow and Tim Bradshaw
The Startup Race Hosts Events in Scotland, Headlined by Ash Maurya, Bestselling Author of ‘Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth’
Nine Networking, Workshop and Fireside Chat Events in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dundee, Focused on Connecting Angels, Investors and Startup Founders for increased scaling of companies that matter in Scotland
Ash Maura, bestselling author of ‘Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth’ will be headlining nine events throughout Scotland.
Ash Maura, bestselling author of ‘Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth’ will be headlining nine events throughout Scotland.
EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND, April 20, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The Startup Race, an accelerator program reinventing how startups both scale and connect with investors, announced today that it will host nine events in Scotland, each headlined by bestselling entrepreneurship author Ash Maurya. The nine events in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dudee, will focus on connecting angels, investors and startup founders for future economic growth in Scotland and the United Kingdom. Maurya, who is one of the world’s leading business startup gurus is the thought leader behind Running Lean,’ which is both a book and an entrepreneurship movement. As the Austin, Texas-based author headlines the nine events around Scotland, he hopes to meet Scottish entrepreneurs and investors to discuss how to systematically identify risk in their business model at every stage. The events are supported by both The Startup Race through a partnership grant with the Scottish Government’s Technology Ecosystem Initiative.
“As I always say, ‘Building a scalable and successful business starts with knowing what to measure and how,’” said Ash Maurya, entrepreneurship thought leader and the author of The Lean Canvas. “Being able to bring this mission to Scotland with the support of both The Startup Race and the Scottish Government’s Technology Ecosystem Initiative, in order to meet with like minded individuals – this is a true honor.”
The events intended to connect angel Investors, venture capitalists and high growth entrepreneurs, kick off on May 3, 2022. Each event is free with limited capacity, and each attendee will receive a copy of Maurya’s new book, Running Lean.
Dundee 3rd May
Glasgow 4th May
Edinburgh 5th May
The nine events with Maurya are part of the runway to kick off a £10,000 Startup Race under The Startup Race brand and company. Founded by Startup and VC veterans Michael Clouser and James Shoemark, The growth hacking competition begins in May 2022, with a Hackathon (£5,000 Cash prize), and continues through the fall of 2022. A winner will be announced and awarded the £10,000 cash prize in December of 2022.. Currently, more than 300 Entrepreneurs (and Angel Investors who will observe their performance) have already registered their interest in taking part. The Startup Race will be partnering with Scottish Investors to run a £300,000 Startup Race and then a £1,000,000 International Startup Race in 2023.
Mr. Maurya’s visit to Scotland is focused on meeting Scottish Angel investors and Scaleup Entrepreneurs to discuss how funded Scaleups need NOT accelerate their business into a wall but can instead continue to exploit the “Lean Startup principles” as competitive advantage and organizational dynamic to achieve revenue and profit growth. Entrepreneurship topics may range, but a core focus will be on discussing how to systematically identify what’s riskiest in a business model at every stage in order to know how or what to optimize.
“Introducing Ash Maurya to the Scottish startup community has been a goal for quite some time, and we are thrilled to be able to launch this partnership,” said Michael Clouser, co-founder of The Startup Race. “We hope Scottish based startup founders, angels and investors find value in these events for future growth in all of their entrepreneurship endeavors.”
For more information on The £10,000 Startup Race, please visit: https://thestartuprace.com/the-10000-startup-race/
ABOUT ASH MAURYA
Ash Maurya has been an entrepreneur for nearly three decades, and has been in search of a better, faster way for building successful products since 2010. His mantra is “Life’s too short to build something nobody wants.” Greatly inspired by the works on Customer Development and Lean Startup pioneered by Steve Blank and Eric Ries, he became very well-known in the global lean startup community and went on to create the highly popular one-page business modelling tool “Lean Canvas” and write two bestselling books that taught entrepreneurs how to implement the philosophies – “Running Lean: How to Iterate from Plan A to a plan that works” and “Scaling Lean”. He also founded LEANSTACK, which provides world-class tools, courses, and training that help early-stage entrepreneurs find repeatable and scalable business models. Ash is praised for offering some of the best and most practical advice for entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs all over the world. Driven by the search for better and faster ways for building successful products, Ash has developed a systematic methodology for raising the odds of success built upon Lean Startup, Customer Development, and Bootstrapping techniques. Ash is also a leading business blogger and his posts and advice have been featured in Inc. Magazine, Forbes, and Fortune. He serves as a mentor to several accelerators including TechStars, MaRS, Capital Factory, and guest lecturers at several universities including MIT, Harvard, and UT-Austin. Ash serves on the advisory board of a number of startups, and has consulted to new and established companies.
ABOUT THE STARTUP RACE
The Startup Race, based in the UK, is a hackathon and accelerator dedicated to proving that sales and revenue are the true benchmark of a successful startup, rather than the initial pitch. The event and company itself is the product of a young entrepreneur asking Mr. James Shoemark in 2014, how the startup process could be gamified. Shoemark decided that a business competition using the Pirate Metrics (AARRR as popularised by Dave McLure) of Acquisition, Activation, Retention, Referral and Revenue as a benchmark for ambition, competition and growth could be the answer. He soon teamed up with Michael Clouser, a former Silicon Valley VC and other Edinburgh based Entrepreneurs and Investors to partner with him on this new venture in order to support Fast Growth startups in the UK and around the world. The first £10,000 Startup Race will continue though the fall of 2022, where a winner will be announced and awarded the £10,000 Cash Prize. After this Startup Race has completed, they will be partnering with Scottish Investors to run a £300,000 Startup Race and then a £1,000,000 International Startup Race.
More information about The Startup Race can be found: www.TheStartupRace.com
Attachments
CONTACT: CARSON QUINN THE STARTUP RACE 312.339.9779 CARSON@ZINDSEY.COM
The Startup Race Hosts Events in Scotland, Headlined by Ash Maurya, Bestselling Author of ‘Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth’
EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND, April 20, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The Startup Race, an accelerator program reinventing how startups both scale and connect with investors, announced today that it will host nine events in Scotland, each headlined by bestselling entrepreneurship author Ash Maurya. The nine events in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Dudee, will focus on connecting angels, investors and startup founders for future economic growth in Scotland and the United Kingdom. Maurya, who is one of the world’s leading business startup gurus is the thought leader behind Running Lean,’ which is both a book and an entrepreneurship movement. As the Austin, Texas-based author headlines the nine events around Scotland, he hopes to meet Scottish entrepreneurs and investors to discuss how to systematically identify risk in their business model at every stage. The events are supported by both The Startup Race through a partnership grant with the Scottish Government’s Technology Ecosystem Initiative.
“As I always say, ‘Building a scalable and successful business starts with knowing what to measure and how,’” said Ash Maurya, entrepreneurship thought leader and the author of The Lean Canvas. “Being able to bring this mission to Scotland with the support of both The Startup Race and the Scottish Government’s Technology Ecosystem Initiative, in order to meet with like minded individuals – this is a true honor.”
The events intended to connect angel Investors, venture capitalists and high growth entrepreneurs, kick off on May 3, 2022. Each event is free with limited capacity, and each attendee will receive a copy of Maurya’s new book, Running Lean.
Dundee 3rd May
Glasgow 4th May
Edinburgh 5th May
The nine events with Maurya are part of the runway to kick off a £10,000 Startup Race under The Startup Race brand and company. Founded by Startup and VC veterans Michael Clouser and James Shoemark, The growth hacking competition begins in May 2022, with a Hackathon (£5,000 Cash prize), and continues through the fall of 2022. A winner will be announced and awarded the £10,000 cash prize in December of 2022.. Currently, more than 300 Entrepreneurs (and Angel Investors who will observe their performance) have already registered their interest in taking part. The Startup Race will be partnering with Scottish Investors to run a £300,000 Startup Race and then a £1,000,000 International Startup Race in 2023.
Mr. Maurya’s visit to Scotland is focused on meeting Scottish Angel investors and Scaleup Entrepreneurs to discuss how funded Scaleups need NOT accelerate their business into a wall but can instead continue to exploit the “Lean Startup principles” as competitive advantage and organizational dynamic to achieve revenue and profit growth. Entrepreneurship topics may range, but a core focus will be on discussing how to systematically identify what’s riskiest in a business model at every stage in order to know how or what to optimize.
“Introducing Ash Maurya to the Scottish startup community has been a goal for quite some time, and we are thrilled to be able to launch this partnership,” said Michael Clouser, co-founder of The Startup Race. “We hope Scottish based startup founders, angels and investors find value in these events for future growth in all of their entrepreneurship endeavors.”
For more information on The £10,000 Startup Race, please visit: https://thestartuprace.com/the-10000-startup-race/
ABOUT ASH MAURYA
Ash Maurya has been an entrepreneur for nearly three decades, and has been in search of a better, faster way for building successful products since 2010. His mantra is “Life’s too short to build something nobody wants.” Greatly inspired by the works on Customer Development and Lean Startup pioneered by Steve Blank and Eric Ries, he became very well-known in the global lean startup community and went on to create the highly popular one-page business modelling tool “Lean Canvas” and write two bestselling books that taught entrepreneurs how to implement the philosophies – “Running Lean: How to Iterate from Plan A to a plan that works” and “Scaling Lean”. He also founded LEANSTACK, which provides world-class tools, courses, and training that help early-stage entrepreneurs find repeatable and scalable business models. Ash is praised for offering some of the best and most practical advice for entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs all over the world. Driven by the search for better and faster ways for building successful products, Ash has developed a systematic methodology for raising the odds of success built upon Lean Startup, Customer Development, and Bootstrapping techniques. Ash is also a leading business blogger and his posts and advice have been featured in Inc. Magazine, Forbes, and Fortune. He serves as a mentor to several accelerators including TechStars, MaRS, Capital Factory, and guest lecturers at several universities including MIT, Harvard, and UT-Austin. Ash serves on the advisory board of a number of startups, and has consulted to new and established companies.
ABOUT THE STARTUP RACE
The Startup Race, based in the UK, is a hackathon and accelerator dedicated to proving that sales and revenue are the true benchmark of a successful startup, rather than the initial pitch. The event and company itself is the product of a young entrepreneur asking Mr. James Shoemark in 2014, how the startup process could be gamified. Shoemark decided that a business competition using the Pirate Metrics (AARRR as popularised by Dave McLure) of Acquisition, Activation, Retention, Referral and Revenue as a benchmark for ambition, competition and growth could be the answer. He soon teamed up with Michael Clouser, a former Silicon Valley VC and other Edinburgh based Entrepreneurs and Investors to partner with him on this new venture in order to support Fast Growth startups in the UK and around the world. The first £10,000 Startup Race will continue though the fall of 2022, where a winner will be announced and awarded the £10,000 Cash Prize. After this Startup Race has completed, they will be partnering with Scottish Investors to run a £300,000 Startup Race and then a £1,000,000 International Startup Race.
More information about The Startup Race can be found: www.TheStartupRace.com
- Ash Maura, bestselling author of ‘Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth’ will be headlining nine events throughout Scotland.
- Ash Maura, bestselling author of ‘Scaling Lean: Mastering the Key Metrics for Startup Growth’ will be headlining nine events throughout Scotland.
StartUP SSM, Nothern Credit Union partner to host Startup Talks events
Event to take place May 4 at 6 p.m. in the Steamfitters Lounge
StartUP Sault Ste. Marie and Northern Credit Union are partnering up to host Startup Talks events, celebrating and hearing from some of Sault Ste. Marie’s top entrepreneurs.
The next event is set to take place May 4 at 6 p.m. in the Steamfitters Lounge (in the Machine Shop), where local entrepreneur and investor Kevin Rusnell, CEO of Dig Inc. and co-owner of Peace restaurant will “talk about his entrepreneurial journey since the age of 12, including his early roots in web design, and computer camps for kids and how he moved on to digital web analytics, becoming CEO and majority shareholder of Dig Inc.,” a news release issued today states.
Seating for this in-person event is limited. Tickets are $5 and can be purchased here.
For more information, see the full release below.
StartUP Sault Ste. Marie is thrilled to team up with Northern Credit Union to host Startup Talks events to celebrate and hear the entrepreneurial journeys of some of Sault Ste. Marie’s top entrepreneurs. Past entrepreneurs featured have included Jeff Elgie, CEO of Village Media and Joe Ruscio, President of Joe Ruscio Professional Corporation.
Join us on May 4 at 6 p.m. in the Steamfitters Lounge (in the Machine Shop), where our featured guest will be local entrepreneur and investor Kevin Rusnell, CEO of Dig Inc. and co-owner of Peace restaurant.
Kevin will talk about his entrepreneurial journey since the age of 12, including his early roots in web design, and computer camps for kids and how he moved on to digital web analytics, becoming CEO and majority shareholder of Dig Inc. Kevin is involved with several other local ventures and most recently, as co-owner, opened Sault Ste. Marie’s newest restaurant.
Audience members will have the opportunity to ask questions.
“The Sault has so many successful entrepreneurs and innovators, but we rarely find out firsthand, the steps they took to achieve success and the challenges they overcame to get here,” states Nevin Buconjic, president, StartUP Sault. “Startup Talks is our platform to learn more about local entrepreneurs and hear their stories directly. It is important and enlightening to hear the journeys of successful entrepreneurs. We are excited to hear Kevin’s story and celebrate local success.”
Seating for this in-person event is limited. Tickets are $5.00 and includes coffee, tea and snacks. Cash bar will be available.
Tickets can be purchased at the following link.
This event is also part of the inaugural Sault Startup Week in cooperation with the Millworks Centre for Entrepreneurship, Sault Ste. Marie Innovation Centre, Northern Ontario Angels and more.
Penn State Altoona to hold events for Startup Week April 4-8
A University-wide event, Startup Week brings leading minds in entrepreneurship and innovation to Penn State campuses across the Commonwealth. The week features entrepreneurial workshops, networking events, student pitch competitions, and presentations from startup founders and corporate innovators, including Penn State alumni. Startup Week inspires students to go beyond what is expected of them and expand their minds to think more broadly in whatever career path they choose.
Why HTC Invested In A Hong Kong Events Platform Startup In The Middle Of The Pandemic
An employee wearing HTC Corp. Vive virtual reality headsets at the T.UM showroom in the SK Telecom … [+]
SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg
When EventX, a fast-growing Hong Kong startup cofounded by a 30 Under 30 Asia alum, raised $10 million in Series B financing last year, the funding round was led by two investors. One was Gaocheng Capital, a venture capital and private equity firm based in Beijing. The other was HTC, the formerly high-flying smartphone maker.
The investment in EventX shows the Taiwanese tech company’s new focus: Virtual reality. It was “important to help us expand our universe of VR experiences,” says Joseph Lin, general manager of HTC’s Viveport virtual reality app store. “Because EventX focuses on 2D event management, it’s accessible to people who don’t have VR devices as well as those who do.”
EventX is an event management platform focusing on virtual events. Founded in 2013 by Angus Luk, who made the 30 Under 30 Asia list in 2020, and Sum Wong, the startup says it has served more than 5 million attendees across over 100 cities.
Last week, EventX announced it raised $8 million in funding led by GL Ventures, the early-stage investment arm of Beijing-based Hillhouse Capital (best known for its investments in Baidu, Didi and Tencent). Previous backers of EventX include VC firm 500 Startups, Taiwan-based accelerator AppWorks and Hong Kong government-backed Cyberport Incubation Programme.
“HTC and EventX are a good fit,” says Neil Mawston, an executive director with market research firm Strategy Analytics. “HTC sells VR devices in Asia, while EventX delivers VR software and services for business events in Asia. HTC and EventX have one eye on today’s virtual events, such as simple 2D webinars, and one eye on tomorrow’s 3D corporate metaverse, such as avatar meeting rooms.”
HTC, founded in 1997 as a contract manufacturer of electronics by Cher Wang and Peter Chou, stood out a decade ago for making some of the world’s earliest Android smartphones—before being overtaken by the top Chinese and Korean brands as the technology became increasingly commoditized. Facing a range of business losses six years ago, HTC made a hard turn into virtual reality gear and is now one of the leading brands in the growing field.
The Taiwanese tech company already runs a virtual reality meeting service called Vive Sync, which lets conference participants work remotely but feel like they are in the same room. Participants can customize avatars, create private meeting rooms, and work face-to-face with off-site colleagues.
HTC’s Vive-branded virtual reality gear competes most ostensibly with Facebook’s Oculus equipment. Oculus also has a “solution” for virtual meetings, so HTC must compete, says Brady Wang, Taipei-based associate director with market research firm Counterpoint Research. HTC, adds Wang, “needs to create an ecosystem.”
