TiE hosts its third annual International Startup Competition
The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) London Chapter hosted its third annual International Startup Competition (TISC) finals at the Lansdowne Club on the Friday 21st February 2020. The competition put eight ambitious young leaders, from over 100 applicants, head to head in a Dragon’s Den style contest, pitching their businesses to a panel of judges for the chance to secure £50k of business funding, mentoring from the TiE London Board and a ticket to the European competition finals. TISC was won by Kevin Sefton of Untied, the UK’s personal Tax app with Invisage, a financial services research tracker, and Small Spark Space Systems which is working to democratise sending payloads into space as runners up.
For the last two years, led by CEO of thesqua.re Group, Sid Narang, TISC has been a highlight of the TiE London events calendar. The TiE UK Angels invest their own money into the winning business and provide the chance for them to attend TiECON in Silicon Valley, exposing them to investors on a global scale.
Sid himself spearheads this competition because he sees it as a chance to give back, to give those just starting out a much needed helping hand while identifying some of the most exciting start-ups the Capital has to offer. TISC is a chance to refocus the mind on the original ethos of TiE, supporting and nurturing entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship.
The competition is open to technology-driven worldwide start-ups or university start ups running for 3 years or less who will have the chance to win £50,000 in funding, a trip to TiECON in Silicon Valley as well as on-going mentoring
The 2018 winner, WealthKernel, a fast-growing UK-based digital wealth infrastructure and technology provider, went on to raise £4.5 million in Series A funding from ETFS Capital to democratise wealth management. WealthKernel CEO Karan Shanmugarajah returned to the TISC competition to encourage the finalists for this year.
The 2017 winner, Medical Magnesium went on to win over $700,000 in funding in Silicon Valley and has gone from strength to strength since winning in London.
The TISC 2020 Judges
Sid Narang
Sid Narang is the Founder & Chief Executive Officer of TheSqua.re group. He is an innovator having bootstrapped TheSquare into a 20m USD revenue marketplace for Corporate and Luxury Serviced Apartments in 500+ cities worldwide. His expertise lies in Marketplaces, SaaS, Enterprise Sales and Funding, having bought and invested in an array of European Banks in his past career as a baker with Morgan Stanley. He founded the TiE London TISC competition and has invested in more than a dozen startups.
Dinesh Dhamija
Dinesh Dhamija is a British Indian business entrepreneur and was formerly a Member of the European Parliament. He is best known as the founder of online travel agency eBookers leading it its rapid growth to 1bn USD in sales and its eventual IPO on the NASDAQ.
Tony Harris
Tony Harris is an entrepreneur, technologist, futurist and thirty year IT industry veteran. Tony is an active business Angel Investor and is a member of the Cambridge Capital Group and the Oxford Capital Partners’ ‘Investors Circle’.
Rohit Krishnan
Rohit Krishnan is a venture capital investor and entrepreneur with experience working across tech, software and financial services across the UK, Europe, USA and Asia. Currently he is an investor at Unbound, a venture capital firm, focused on finding exciting software startups globally.
Dr Peter Bentley
Dr Peter Bentley is an Honorary Professor and Teaching |Fellow at the Department of Computer Science, University College London (UCL), Collaborating Professor at the Korean Advanced Institute for Science and Technology (KAIST), Chief Technology Officer at AI company Braintree Ltd, co-founder of Kazoova Ltd, a consultant and freelance writer.
The shortlisted competitors
CashCoach
CashCoach is a gamified savings app to manage money and save more.
Pukket
Pukket is a fully automated customer advocacy management platform.
FavourUp
FavourUp brings brands endless high quality contact for marketing activities across touchpoints.
Arroe
Arroe powers solutions for the mobile worker. Never worry about battery again with the Arroe app and LAER the portable battery and charging hub.
Small Spark Space Systems
Small Spark Space Systems is working to develop hybrid engine launch technology to drive the price of access to space to be low enough for anyone to send payloads into space.
Arete Medical Technologies
Arete Medical Technologies produces hardware and software for precision, personalised and preventative management of chronic diseases.
Invisage
Invisage helps independently track the performance of financial services research recommendations in the form of model portfolios and build track history for each research analyst and provider.
Untied
Untied is the UK’s personal tax app.
About The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE)
The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE), was founded in 1992 in Silicon Valley by a group of successful entrepreneurs, corporate executives, and senior professionals with roots in the Indus region. TiE Global is a nonprofit venture devoted to entrepreneurs in all industries, at all stages, from incubation, throughout the entrepreneurial life cycle. With a global reach and a local focus, the mission of TiE is to foster entrepreneurship globally through the 5 pillars of TiE: mentoring, networking and education, funding and incubation. Dedicated to the virtuous cycle of wealth creation and giving back to the community. TiE’s focus area is to generate enable the next generation of entrepreneurs.
For further information visit https://london.tie.org/
