Pitching is a crucial part of startup life, but it can surely create stress and grey hair even for young founders. At the same time, one must say that pitching in Nordics is often a lot less like Dragon’s Den and a lot more like a meeting with friendly mentors.
To lower the barrier to climb on pitching stage FINAC, a business acceleration network in Finland, launched Open pitching events, next of which is due on September 5. You can apply here, by Aug 31.
Marit Tuominen, director at FINAC, says the focus for the new pitching events is on lowering the barrier and giving young teams a chance to get on stage and tell their story in 3 minutes, while aiming to help the teams with finding the killer business and also linking them up with potential investors.
“Pitching entrepreneurs get also immediate feedback from the financiers of how to improve their business idea,” says Tuominen.
The first event in spring gathered 30 pitching teams and 160 participants. As the event is in Helsinki one can use either English or Finnish, Tuominen said on the first event many teams had their presentation slides in English but spoke Finnish.
Crowdfunding deep-dive
Alongside with pitching event, there is also an information session – this time on crowdfunding, and how it fits into the funding scheme of fast-growing startups. What platforms to use, how, what are the potential challenges etc.
State-sponsored FINAC is known as an umbrella association pushing co-operation in the startup ecosystem, while it’s also in charge of Vigo accelerators. It works to bring know-how, processes, capital and networks to strengthen growth and globalisation of Finnish startups and growing businesses.
The free event (signup here) starts at 16.30 on Sept 5 at Ilmarinen Auditorio, Porkkalankatu 1, Helsinki
