The event featuring pitches from 13 teams represented the pay-off of nearly 2 months of hard work from the programme's participants in refining their ideas into solutions and learning valuable entrepreneurial skills.
After well over a dozen expert-led workshops covering a host of important key entrepreneurial competences, the participating teams in Helsinki Incubators' first programme - the Deep Tech, AI & Sustainability themed pre-incubator, Compass - celebrated reaching the end of their first foray into entrepreneurial thinking with an evening of pitching to a panel of judges and invited VIP guests.
Gathered in the Linus Torvalds auditorium at the University of Helsinki's Kumpula campus, the teams, consisting of University of Helsinki students, researchers, and staff, as well as other innovation-minded thinkers and doers from the broader Helsinki start-up community. With solutions ranging from revolutionary biosensor technology to AI-based services helping businesses and consumers live more sustainably, the teams presented compelling cases for ways in which new technologies and AI could benefit the world.
"It was wonderful to see not only how heterogenous this participant group was both in terms of teams and themes," said Marko Berg, Deputy Chief Investment Officer at University of Helsinki funds and one of the judges, "but also to observe how environmental and social responsibility were built-in to the core of each of the business ideas presented in the final."
In addition to comments from Mr. Berg, the teams also received valuable feedback from the other three members of the judging panel: Caritta Seppä, COO & Co-founder of Tespack and Forbes 30 under 30 nominee, Elena Inguglia, Business Development Manager & Food Tech Advisor at Helsinki Innovation Services, and Tuomas Oksanen, Investment Director at Grid.vc.
