World’s Largest Start-up Event Slush 2018

by Shrutee KDNS

Bengaluru - World’s largest start-up event, Slush, known for its sustained commitment to encourage the next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs, concluded their 2018 Helsinki chapter. A student-driven, non-profit movement, the motivation of the event is to break notions about entrepreneurship and provide a platform for entrepreneurs world-over to exhibit their ideas and secure an opportunity to bring it to fruition. Slush, today, has grown into a melting pot for various communities, who add value through their local take on challenges, and channelize a solution for it. The community is 40,000 plus attendees strong, organizing more than 75 events globally. 

Amongst the participating Indian start-ups were Stumagz’s solutions, Forbes recognised Edtech solution of India, Zunik Energies, a start-up focused on inverter topology, SDS, creator of first ever unmanned marine surface vehicle, any EMI, a payment aggregator FinTech company, Reckon Green, manufacturer of LED lamps that offer 800% longer life, Interview buddy, a cloud-based video interviewing platform, CYRRUP, an entity working in the domain of road safety, Cerelia Nutritech, an entity tackling maternal mal nourishment through frugal innovation, to name a few.

Beginning on the 4^th of December, Slush started with an interview of Julia Hartz, Co-founder & CEO of Eventbrite, by Harry Stebbings, founder of The Twenty Minute VC and Stride.VC, followed by a talk on “How Scaling a Hypergrowth Business & Creating a World-Class Team is all about Collaboration”. Day 1 also hosted a panel discussion on “Creativity vs Science: The Right Balance for Building Successful Games”. Day 2 began with “Showcase Studio: E-commerce & Online Market Place”, an intimate platform for promising start-ups to get stage-time to demonstrate the use of their products. This was followed by “Slush GIA Showcase”, a program that supports impact start-ups and showcases business opportunities in emerging markets, vital for solving complex challenges.

One of the Indian companies at Slush this year was NCrypted, a start-up enabler that provides ready-to-go software products and sector specific tailored solutions, consulting and advisory to start-ups and small to medium scale businesses. On Slush and the Finnish ecosystem, Kunal Pandya, CEO, NCrypted, said, “You have to be at Slush if you are part of the start-up ecosystem. We saw Slush as a great opportunity to connect with young, energetic start-up founders having brilliant ideas and thoughts. We also connected with like-minded investors, partners and country specific pavilions to discuss possible business collaboration and investment interests. Finland has emerged as one of the world's most innovative start-up ecosystems and the talent pool available compliments the overall purpose. After India, it has made complete sense to us to be based out in Finland than anywhere else. The best part of Finland and the start-up ecosystem here is that it is well connected, and we get the right support that we need. Helsinki Business Hub and PrEver Consulting have been instrumental in introducing Helsinki and its business cluster to us.”

Slush for their India activation organised “Slush Small Talks” in Hyderabad on 22^nd November in association with T-Hub, a global start-up catalyst that caters to shaping entrepreneurs and helping them scale. The initiative was an effort to solidify the mutually beneficial relationship established between India and Finland and their respective start-up ecosystems. The aim of “Slush Small Talks” in India was to go a step beyond and aid Indian tech entrepreneurs connect with top-tier investors, and partners both in India and globally. Speakers included the likes of Peter Vesterbacka (former Mighty Eagle at Rovio, the makers of Angry Birds) Ville Vanhala (Co-Founder of Brella), Gourish Sinla (Chief Strategy Officer of Shivom), Adibeli Nduka-Agwu (Director of International Growth at Blinkist), Otso Rasimus (Founder of Valohai) and Florian Jourda (First Engineer at Box).

About Helsinki Business Hub and PrEver Consulting: Helsinki Business Hub (HBH), the regional development agency for the Finnish capital region, makes Helsinki the best place to accelerate your business. We enable foreign companies to establish their businesses and innovation driven companies to grow and develop in the Helsinki region. This we do by providing the right information and contacts and by designing growth opportunities for our customers, free of charge and based on full confidentiality. Companies and investors can turn to HBH, if you they are looking for deal flow from Finland, searching for the best location for their R&D activities, interested in Finland’s renowned start-up environment, or looking to grow their business in and from Helsinki. Helsinki Business Hub is a unique partner for a company looking to internationalize their business, as it offers a one-point access to all contacts and information of the Helsinki region.

PrEver Consulting along with Helsinki Business Hub have proudly served and assisted 25+ Indian Company visits to Helsinki region. PrEver and HBH have jointly hosted over 160+ business meetings cutting across industries like ICT, HealthCare/Tech and Cleantech; resulting in 16 Indian Companies starting their Finnish entities in Helsinki region till date. The vision going forward is to create larger footprints bringing in Innovation & Highly Skilled Talent pool from India to Finland to contribute in Job creation, IP and sustainable Economic growth in the region.