The winners of the Start Tel Aviv competition started their week-long programme in Tel Aviv on Sunday focusing on building contacts with investors and business partners.
“Israel is primarily interesting for us as a B2B market, but also knowledge and international investors are interesting,” Caritta Seppä, co-founder and COO of Finnish Tespack, told ArcticStartup.
This marks the fifth annual competition where 32 leading startups from around the world are brought together to take part in a five-day event in Tel Aviv, which has been ranked #1 startup ecosystem outside of the United States. During this week the entrepreneurs will get an inside view of startups, as well as visit some of Israel’s top Venture Capital companies.
This year the competition celebrates women entrepreneurship around the world, and all the participants are women, highlighting the fact that Tel Aviv’s startup ecosystem has been ranked #1 hub for women entrepreneurs outside the United States. According to the Compass report, Tel Aviv has 20% women founders in startups, while the European average is 17%.
“The woman-focus has merit in the targeted support, but generally I prefer if the startup world were solely recognized by their expertise,” said Tespack’s Seppä.
From the region are participating also Ilse Zaharane, co-founder and CEO of Latvian startup CheeksUp, an interactive facial therapy game to support children with speech and face disabilities; and Annika Salak, CEO and co-founder of Leansite, an app to manage all aspects of construction production on site.
Start Tel Aviv is a global competition held by The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality. The competition took place in 31 countries.
