Iceland just saw the final day of their first startup acceleration program, Startup Reykjavik. The ten week program ended with an Investor Day on August 17, where the ten teams pitched to a private group of angels and VCs.
“Looking back, now that the program is over, I think it was a huge success,” says Stefán Þór Helgason of Innovit Entrepreneurship Center. “All the people who participated in making Startup Reykjavík a reality e.g. the mentors, the participants and the general entrepreneurship environment here in Iceland all agreed that this program must go on, giving more entrepreneurs the chance to take part in the ‘unfair advantage’ accelerators like this give them.
Helgason says that the quality of pitches have improved tremendously since the beginning of the program, and their company concepts have been hardened and strength tested.
The accelerator has had an impact on the Icelandic entrepreneurship ecosystem as a whole, and not just the 10 teams who graduated. The program has opened its doors to other entrepreneurs by having an open BBQ and beer night on Thursdays where everyone could meet up together and have a good time, and hosted other events.
The Icelandic media gave good coverage to the program, likely playing into the narrative of a country that is shifting from finance and fishing to new endeavours. There have been a handfull of really interesting companies we’ve written about coming from Iceland, which is impressive considering they’re coming from an island of only 320 000 people.
The future plans for Startup Reykjavik is to open up applications for domestic and international applicants in the beginning of 2013 and have the program up and running next summer.
Here are the teams that participated:
Mymxlog enables the management of licences, certificates, training and experience necessary to comply with European Aviation regulations.
Cloud Engineering provides data extraction technology. We create tools which will revolutionize the way you gather content from the web.
GuitarParty provides music enthusiasts with a way to learn their favorite songs using a unique user interface, songbooks and video lessons.
Live Shuttle is a free service for smart phone users where they share their experience Live with their friends, family and the world.
StartupVille is a place for investors and start-ups to play. A social game where investors make virtual investments in start-ups.
Streamtags allows you to watch movies online with friends via webcam. Now, you can get information on anything onscreen you see or hear and buy it.
Designing Reality offers creation of high accuracy three-dimensional models using standard two-dimensional photographs and computer vision.
Heilsufar.is is an internet health-bank for individuals. All your health related data in one place including diet and fitness.
WhenGone is a web based tool to record messages where people leave their last words/advice to their loved ones, to be viewed after passing.
Eski Tech is developing RemindMe, an automatic medicine dispenser. Many people struggle with their medicine intake and RemindMe is aimed at making that process easier.
