Halfway to Vienna: A View From Inside the StartUpBusUK

Jakub Misiorny is a Software Developer for Bloomberg R&D and one of two Bloomberg mentors advising the StartupBusUK teams on their journey to Vienna. Here he shares his experiences so far.

Day 4, Berlin: We’re only half way on our journey to Pioneers Festival and the StartupBusUK contestants have already pitched their business concepts, formed teams, developed their ideas and built an early version of a working product. In the process, we have traveled more than 2000km, driven through four countries and stopped at some of Europe’s most vibrant startup incubators, accelerators and co-working spaces along the way.

There hasn’t been much time for sleep!

Right now, the teams are making use of a stable WiFi connection at Berlin’s RainmakingLoft to code, de-bug and finesse their products before we hit the road again, making the final leg of our journey to Vienna and the winners’ pitch at Pioneers.

StartupBus is not just a hackathon, it’s a business competition and the teams are now thinking carefully about how to market and scale their products. The teams’ ability to communicate the value proposition for their products succinctly is as important as their developing skills. Here’s a taste of the newly-formed startups in the running on Bus One:

• ActiVoice: an online platform giving users the ability to organize, support and fund media services to bring attention to local issues and hold public officials to account. @GetAnActivoice
• GrowthApp: a UK growth hacking tool allowing businesses to obtain organic viral customer growth through incentivising customer referrals.
• LetsDoThis: a peer-to-peer motivational app which groups five people with a shared goal together and gives them encouragement, competition and community. @LetsDoThisUK
• OnePinkElephant: an innovative tool that digitises memory technique to revolutionise mandarin character learning.  @OnePinkElephant
• Symbiometrix:  a platform designed for sales forces which uses people analytics to map the network of our online relationships in order to increase their real world potential @SymbioMetrix
• SeeVee: a video-based recruitment app designed to revolutionise the talent search process. The tool offers a unique way to request, record and store video Q&As. @SeeVeeUK