TWiSTldn 5 – See the Pitches on This Week in Startups
A hugely successful meetup; 3 impressive companies, a lively panel discussion, awesome venue and over 100 London Entrepreneurs. TWiSTldn 5 featured a Live in-Person meetup with host Jason Calacanis, Tyler Crowley, Peer Index CTO Sanford Dickert and VC Hussein Kanji.
Thanks to our venue sponsors Forward Internet Group for providing a fantastic space, Dominos pizza and beer.
Here’s the official show video, more of the less official discussion, news round table and questions for Jason to follow.
Pitches from StreamingWell, Six3 and Leemail
Read More
TWiSTldn 5 is LIVE! 11th November 2011
You may have wondered when the heck the next TWiSTldn meetup was going to be? You’ve seen the guys from Seoul, South Korea; Santiago, Chile; Cape Town, South Africa all benefit from the learnings, experiences, successes and response from the Global Meetups held in London and Paris. We’ve helped the guys around the world to quickly and effectively pull together cracking events, with amazing companies and to get themselves ready for a This Week in Startups Global Meetup show.
Well, enough of that. It’s time the spotlight was back in Europe.
Those of you who caught the last TWiSTldn / London Calling meetup would have heard the seed planted for what was to come. So thrilled with the level of quality in the companies and the events, Jason and Tyler said how they’d love to come and do a Live Meetup in London and Paris.
Well I can now announce that we’re on!
The first This Week in Startups LIVE from London. November 11th 2011.
So, I hear you asking, “Where is it going to be held?”. “How can they possibly top the ast event’s location?”
Well, you’d be surprised.
TWiSTldn 5 will be held at the offices of Forward London, Camden. A truely inspirational story of success, Forward is a fantastic representation of the UK/London scene and a great venue to represent our companies to our guests. And what a space they have to offer us.
This is going to be the largest TWiSTldn Meetup yet, but still, space will be limited.
The most important thing right now, is that if you have a company, product or idea that is ready to pitch and is too awesome not to tell Jason and the world then get in touch and apply now. We have space for at least 6 companies. We will be selective and you’ll have to be on top form to get in, since competition is usually high. But embrace the challenge!! Email steve@twistldn.com for details.
TWiSTldn 4 – Image Gallery
It’s been a little while since our last meetup, so what better way to revisit the event than to browse through some selected stills, expertly captured by Olly Freeman. You can view all of the images on our Flickr Stream
Read More
Dead Heat! Kliqed and MyChoicePad share the honours
It’s fair to say the bar was set pretty high after our last meetup, both in the event organisation and the pitching companies. If I said I wasn’t feeling the pressure, I’d be lying! That said, everything came together (almost) perfectly which resulted in another fantastic event for all those involved – what fun!
As ever, the 6 pitching companies battled it out for the opportunity to link up directly with Jason Calacanis and Tyler Crowley – adorned in British paraphernalia – to give their pitch and get the sought after feedback from the TWiST crew.
Of the 6 companies, including Eeve, Kliqed, Lifesort, MyChoicePad, Skadoosh and Vungle, it was Kliqed who emerged victorious as voted by the 70 strong crowd who turned out for the event.
Runners up, MyChoicePad and Skadoosh joined Kliqed on the live show.
For the first time, Jason and Tyler were split on who should take the overall title.
Jason’s Picks
1. MyChoicePad
2. Kliqed
3. Skadoosh
Tyler’s Picks
1. Skadoosh
2. Kliqed
3. MyChoicePad
In the end it was decided that Kliqed and MyChoicePad should share the honours, with each company being invited to the next Launch Conference and being given a booth in the demo pit. How the Mailchimp prize will be allocated, we need to figure out…
In a further gesture, Jason invited the founders of the other pitching companies to attend Launch as well, and as TWiSTldn found when we attending the hugely impressive first Launch, it’s definitely a great opportunity for all those involved. Keep an eye out for the event video, but in the meantime, here’s the show broadcast for those that missed out
This Week in Startups 153 – With Steve Schofield
Read More
Here comes London: TWiST pitchers #4
We have got an brilliant line-up for This Week in Startups #4. Six awesome startups picked from a greater number that submitted a video interview though the cloud video interviewing platform OVIA.
The three organisers Steve Schofield, Dimitar Stanimiroff and Colin Hayhurst had a hard time picking the final six and are sorry to disappoint those other applicants.
We’ve sold out on tickets so this should a cracking event of pitching and networking. If you have not got a ticket , you can always follow the event on Twitter at #twistldn and then watch the live TWiST show here. The audience on the night will pick the top three pitches and those will pitch again live to Jason Calacanis.
Here are the companies in alphabetical order:
A fun way to discover and create events with your mobile phone
A meet-up management phone app that helps you see the important people in your world more easily, more often, for more fun!
The first all-in-one system to Sort, Store and Share your files, pictures, music & videos
Everyone has the right to communication – MyChoicePad is an educational Makaton iPad app that enables people to communicate. Be heard. Be cool. Be you.
Sh! Coming soon… Earn rewards for loving the things you like.
App Discovery through video
We can’t wait to hear these startups pitch. Last time those companies put through to the live show, bowled Jason over. One of them, Tripbod, even got nominated for the TWISTEE awards last week, as one of the five best pitches of the whole of the year. Also all the companies got invited to the first Launch event in San Francisco.
Read More
TWiSTldn Winners to get Chimped!
One area I’ve been really keen to make the most of, improve and evolve is ensuring our pitching companies have the biggest incentive to apply in the first place and if selected, to put on a great show at the events. I know that if we do that well, our humble little meetup will be known for it’s quality of both the companies and the guests who will come along to see them as a result. And to me, that’s why I’m doing this. Quality wins out at the end of the day.
So, what can you offer to companies as a cash strapped, volunteer supported event? Well, up until now, apart from the exposure and opportunity to pitch to Jason and appear on an episode of TWiST, the answer is very little (unless you also count tickets to Launch for the last meetups success stories).
But things are moving in the right direction and off the back of the event’s success, the buzz around London tech right now and growing popularity of This Week in Startups, I’ve been inundated with sponsorship inquiries and offers of support, which has been really gratifying. While we figure out what to do with them on a local level, this news actually comes from the support we’re now getting from our friends at This Week In. And, more importantly, their headline sponsors!
So, we can all thank, in a Jason monkey stylie “OOooohhh, OOooooOOOhh, Aaaahhhh, Aaahaaah”, our friends at Mailchimp who have donated 50,000 credits to the eventual winner of TWiSTldn #4. Now, I have a feeling it’s not going to stop there and we’ll have some more news on the prize front coming up…
Read More