Lenovo and INCUBATE recognised some of the key achievements of the latest class to undertake the 14 week startup accelerator program at the culminating Demo Day event.
The event gave each team the opportunity to present a final pitch to three esteemed entrepreneurs and an audience of around 200 attendees, in an effort to attract funding from potential investors.
Designed to build support for Australian startup ventures, INCUBATE’s program promotes partnership between educational institutions and business to foster talent organisations need to thrive in the digital age.
The accelerator program has backed 48 start-ups so far, enabling them to raise over $5 million in capital. The combined value of the startups has reached $23 million to date.
Lenovo supplied technology to all the teams and awarded the Lenovo Choice Award – a package of high-tech hardware worth $10,000 – to the team it felt showed the most promise.
The company has also committed to a long term partnership with INCUBATE.
“After much deliberation, and being truly astonished by the concepts from all the teams, it was Fluid Education that showed the greatest acceleration and innovation during the program and at the final event,” said Matt Codrington, Managing Director, Lenovo Australia and New Zealand.
“Having said that, I think we’ll see great things to come from all the participants in this class. At Lenovo, we know our future will be built by the highly creative and capable minds that are continuously pushing the limits of what can be done while they’re still at university. We have always supported education and entrepreneurship - INCUBATE is something we feel is critical to encourage those with big ideas to come forward and develop them."
“Entrepreneurs have a distinct ability to look at how we live day-to-day and identify real areas of pain and the opportunities for change – we have seen this in practice from our mentors who founded successful companies themselves and now with our graduating startups,” said James Alexander, INCUBATE program manager.
“INCUBATE backs these first-time entrepreneurs to help them in their first few months. We know how hard it is building something innovative and trying to sell it to the world, let alone doing it for the first time, so we support our startups with a community of dedicated and experienced mentors, grant funding and co-working space.”
One of this year's ventures was created by INCUBATE class member Masood Naqshbandi through his autonomous inspection and analytics provider, Abyss. The initiative involves 3D mapping and drones to provide more than 400km of imaging and modeling for a major water company.
Others chose to look at human services with technology as the backbone. Dr. Jay Spence is empowering people in the workplace to access preventative mental health solutions through his online platform, Uprise. The service allows employees to access proven psychological skills from their smartphone with its trial results equivalent to best practice face-to-face therapy while reducing workplace absenteeism by half.
Matthew Mills seeks to simplify the human resources technology industry, having successfully secured a number of partnerships with major platforms including SEEK. Hireflow integrates multiple platforms in the hiring process such as screening and sourcing etc. into one easy to use platform.
INCUBATE is now accepting applications for its next 14 week program, to commence in December.
For more information about INCUBATE and how they support innovation please visit their website: http://incubate.org.au
This article was originally published on the Lenovo Australia blog.
